- List of state and local political scandals in the United States (talk||history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
- List of state and local political sex scandals in the United States (talk||history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)
I am requesting the deletion of List of state and local political scandals in the United States and List of state and local political sex scandals in the United States be overturned.
The reasons given for the original deletion by the nominating editor were;
*Per WP:BLP, "If you cannot find multiple reliable third-party sources documenting the allegation or incident, leave it out." Many of these entries are supported by only one reliable source.
The actual WP:BLP policy quote is, “If an allegation or incident is noteworthy, relevant, and well documented, it belongs IN THE ARTICLE – even if it is negative and the subject dislikes all mention of it. If you cannot find multiple reliable third-party sources documenting the allegation or incident, leave it out.” ALSO “All BLPs created after March 18, 2010 must have at least one source that supports at least one statement made about the person IN THE ARTICLE.”
– Clearly these WP:BLP policies refer to using ‘multiple sources in the entire ARTICLE. A list however, has only one or two sentences per citation. I can find very other few articles that have multiple references per sentence and no other articles which consistently adhere to multiple sources per line. One sentence, one source, is de facto wiki policy, to which this article adheres.
*Per WP:BLP, “If the subject has denied such allegations, that should also be reported." This list not only omits denials, but also omits acquittals, which is really unacceptable.
- The nominating editor has not listed the offending allegation. I believe the single offending citation he refers to is a case in which the politician was accused, arrested, indicted and then resigned. He was then convicted. Years later, his case went to the Supreme Court where it was overturned. He is therefore innocent and yes, this one item should be removed from the list or kept with explanation. This is a case of a dated entry, not a cause for systemic deletion of the entire article. The presumption of innocence is so prevalent in the US that to re-iterate it time and time again for every citation in a list would unnecessarily expand length of the article. If necessary, a single sentence added to the lead paragraph would suffice.
*Per WP:BLP, "A person accused of a crime is presumed innocent until proven guilty and convicted by a court of law….Beware of claims that rely on guilt by association…. "Here, accused and acquitted people are mixed in with convicted criminals, which is guilt by association.
-I couldn’t find this policy and don’t see how it applies as stated. This is a list of SCANDALS, not convictions. Further, every person listed has his own citation and his own reliably sourced reference. Guilt is never implied.
*Per WP:LISTN, I don’t see that “state and local political scandals in the United States” are notable as a group.
- This is an opinion by the nominating editor, not a statement of Wikipedia policy. WP:LISTN redirects to Wikipedia:Notability/Stand-alone lists, which states, “The entirety of the list does not need to be documented in sources for notability, only that the grouping or set in general has been. Because the group or set is notable, the individual items in the list do not need to be independently notable, although editors may, at their discretion, choose to limit large lists by only including entries for independently notable items or those with Wikipedia articles.” I would say that “lists”, “states”, “politicians” and “scandals” are all notable groups and have been treated in Wikipedia extensively.
*The list is prone to being outdated, and thus an unintentional BLP violation simply by the passage of time.
- This is another opinion by the nominating editor. No Wiki policy is mentioned and I could find none at WP:BLP. An unintentional BLP violation deserves correction of the offending item, not deletion of the entire article. Further, I would ask what Wiki article is NOT affected by time? Are old articles worse than new ones? Are old subjects less important than current ones? This editor is grabbing for it.
*The main aim here is apparently to connect persons with crimes, or imply that they are guilty of crimes, for which they were not convicted.
- Another opinion. Again no Wiki policy is mentioned. This article only reports that the politician was charged, indicted and arrested, ousted or resigned. The definition of a scandal is “an action or event regarded as morally or legally wrong and causing general public outrage.” Given the number of Wiki articles about Benghazi, Whitewater, Lewinsky etc, this list is certainly within Wikipedia guidelines.
- WP:NPF applies to some of these named people who are not public figures.
I quote WP:BLP/People who are relatively unknown, “Many Wikipedia articles contain material on people who are not well known, even if they are notable enough for their own article. In such cases, exercise restraint and include only material relevant to the person's notability, focusing on high-quality secondary sources. “
– And that is exactly what has been done. According to the eligibility criterion in the lead paragraph, only politicians, their appointees and staff may be included and only referenced information about each such person maybe been used.
*WP:Recentism is violated (scandals from this millennium are given undue weight)
- Huh? Scandals from this millennium are given more weight only because there are more of them. Does he really expect that scandals in the 13 colonies would equal those of the 21st century? Again I quote WP:Recentism, “Recentism is a symptom of Wikipedia's dynamic and immediate editorial process, and has positive aspects as well—up-to-date information on breaking news events, vetted and counter-vetted by enthusiastic volunteer editors, is something that no other encyclopedia can offer.” This is not even close to a problem.
- Once again I quote from WP:Unencyclopedic/Just unencyclopedic, “Saying something is "encyclopedic" or "unencyclopedic" are empty arguments. Unencyclopedic means "not worthy of being included in an encyclopedia", which is synonymous with "should not be included" or "I want it deleted". So when you use it as a justification for deleting something, it's a circular argument: "Delete, because it should be deleted". This is just repeating yourself.” So the nominating editor is again referring to a policy of which there is no violation, as stated by the very policy to which he is referring.
- I believe the original deleting editors were not concise enough in tracking Wiki policy and were swayed by the large number of deleting votes. Puppetry is not new to these articles. I should also note that the parent article List of federal political scandals in the United States originated in 28 January 2004 and was nominated for deletion on 26 November 2010. The result was delete, overturned at DRV to KEEP. That list and this, List of state and local political scandals in the United States are nearly identical in scope and execution. Both should be kept. For these reasons I would ask the deletion of List of state and local political scandals in the United States and List of state and local political sex scandals in the United States (which was deleted for the same reasons) to be overturned.Polarpark (talk) 21:17, 27 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Permit reconsideration with a change of title There would I think be no objection to a list of "List of local and state officials in the US convicted of ...." The more important question is whether we would include a list including those never tried or even acquitted if there were a suitable title , like "List of .... accused .... " Normally ,some BLP consideration apply with considerably less force to elected officials, because matters that would not be relevant for private individuals or even individuals in other types of activities are relevant here, because the necessity for voter trust is relevant to their careers. Even the totally false accusation of a politician could be notable enough for a separate article, though we would need to be very careful with the title. It would certainly be notable enough to be included in their bio. But would it be of sufficient importance to e given the added prominence of a list? This is a very difficult question, and I'm not sure about it. DGG ( talk ) 23:58, 27 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse my close at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of state and local political sex scandals in the United States (no comment on the other AFD listed here).
It's always a pretty tall order to ask that a unanimous WP:CONSENSUS in such a well-participated AFD should be disregarded, and here Polarpark has basically just disagreed with the outcome and the commenters' reasonable interpretations of policy. Even if you are not inclined to take the AFD commenters at their word, the content of the list itself was a hodgepodge of some mere allegations and some convictions, some actual crimes and a lot of mere infidelity, and little substance offered to establish that there was actually a "scandal" as opposed to merely "this happened" or "this was alleged". Perhaps most importantly, none of the purported scandals themselves have articles (contra the federal scandal list offered for comparison above). And the sourcing was mostly, if not entirely, from mere news stories. All of this together supports that the unanimous deletion consensus reached in the AFD was completely reasonable and addressed to unfixable problems in the very conception of the list. I could not have closed it as anything other than delete, nor is there a basis presented here for overturning that now. (note at the time of this posting that notices of this DRV have not been placed on either AFD.) postdlf (talk) 00:39, 28 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse The problem with these lists is that we are left with nothing more than a bunch of wholly negative mini-bios, often for subjects about whom we would never even consider having a full article because they fail one guideline or another. If there was a way to enforce the addition of only bluelinks to them then I'd be OK with them, but there isn't a way to do that - the editors who insist on us hosting these don't want that, and certainly the people who add the latest municipal scandal du jour (often in bad faith) to them don't either. And of course we're all about adding stuff to them but in the long run we're provably incapable of curating them correctly and following up when the facts for a given entry have changed (unless of course they write screaming to OTRS or show up trying to fix them and are often blocked for vandalism because they have no idea how to do it correctly). These are collections of little BLP nightmares in the making and they should be kept off the encyclopedia. If a person is notable then they should have a bio; if the scandal is notable then it should have an article. We should not have lists that get around those two restrictions. In any case the consensus in the AFD was clear and the admin's close appropriate. §FreeRangeFrogcroak 01:46, 28 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse as a fair assessment of the consensus. I agree there are many problems with the nominating statement but the purpose of DRV is to examine the closing, not the opening. Thincat (talk) 07:39, 28 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Oh, I see a second AFD was nominated but I shall endorse that one as well. I can't see anything remotely wrong with that close. Thincat (talk) 07:54, 28 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse both; closer has followed deletion process correctly. DRV is not AFD round 2. Stifle (talk) 08:07, 28 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse- no reasonable administrator could have closed that any other way. DRV is not a second go at AfD. Reyk YO! 09:04, 28 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- I think it's trivial to endorse those two closes on the basis that they're in accordance with the consensus, and we should probably just take that as read. But there's a more interesting discussion to be had about their relationship to the List of federal political scandals in the United States and List of federal political sex scandals in the United States, and indeed to List of Australian political controversies, List of political scandals in the United Kingdom, and their equivalents in other countries. On the basis of the views we're hearing here, it may be that Wikipedia no longer wants these lists at all. Perhaps a RfC?—S Marshall T/C 11:02, 28 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- When you get to the federal level, many of the scandals themselves have articles (e.g., contents of Category:Political scandals in the United States), and the politicians' degree of notability is much greater as well. There is also much less question in that context as to whether something is properly termed a "scandal" with such things as Teapot Dome Scandal; that's how every history book refers to it. So I think there's much to separate the deleted lists from the ones we still have, though there may be a call for discussion on appropriate theshold for including something in a list (must have its own article, must rely on more than contemporary news, etc.) or on whether "political sex scandal" is ever a meaningful label. postdlf (talk) 13:25, 28 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse - Filer has wasted everyone's time by re-arguing the debate rather than any attempt to point out administrator mistakes or misconduct. ("I disagree with the reasons he/she cited to close the discussion isn't valid). Tarc (talk) 12:32, 28 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse, there was no other possible way to close this discussion. The nominator seems to want a second round of AFD, but that's not what this process is about. Lankiveil (speak to me) 11:30, 30 April 2015 (UTC).[reply]
- Endorse I like the concept and spirit behind this article, as calling out politicians on their "Do as I say, not as I do" ways is important in a democracy. But the close of the AFD looks to have been reasonable, and DRV is not a 2nd round of AFD. And the scope of the article is ridiculously broad, by including local offices and including accusations that don't lead to a conviction. So, as I read it, if someone on the East Podunk town council gets pulled over for speeding, it would be within the scope of the article. To use an example, a list of major sports injuries which ended the careers of prominent pro athletes might make a good article subject, but extending the list to include every time a little-leaguer needed a Band-Aid is just silly. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:17, 30 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse The afd had clear consensus to delete. Deletion review is for when the closer's assessment is improper or inaccurate, not for when one party dislikes that consensus did not go his way. I would also note that the DELREV requester failed to notify interested parties by placing the deletion review notice at the top of the AfD, though this DELREV clearly doesn't need their help. Participants in the AfD have now been alerted (on May 3rd) to this deletion review. ― Padenton|✉ 16:16, 3 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- Something else the nominator did not do is make clearly that he was listing two AFDs for review. I've fixed the formatting above, and have also now added a notice to the second discussion, something I pointed out was lacking several days ago; apparently the nominator didn't care enough about this discussion to actually follow it. It's especially disappointing given that I reminded him in response to his comment on my talk page about this to make sure he had proper links to the discussion, and someone even had to fix the wikilinks he didn't post correctly here in the first place.[1] postdlf (talk) 16:47, 3 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]
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