- The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
The result was DELETE. After analyzing the arguments of the delete side and the keep side, I think the delete side has the stronger argument. There is a consensus to delete this bio. AdjustShift (talk) 02:16, 29 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Miriam Sakewitz
- Miriam Sakewitz (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)
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This article fails to meet WP:BIO, specifically it meets WP:ONEEVENT. A woman solely notable for a criminal act and nothing else, simply does not meet the requirement for having a biography on Wikipedia. Yes, there are plenty of media references out there and quite a few ghits, but it's all based around the criminal obsession of a person who's likely mentally ill. C'mon - this really shouldn't be here. - Alison ❤ 06:23, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete - Perfect example of one-event. Perfect example of what belongs in a newspaper. A real encyclopedia would not have this entry, and if we want to become a real encyclopedia, we should not either. I'd like to think we can transcend over the media that would report this as news - which is fine - to something that contains biographies that readers will deem worth in a decade. Law type! snype? 07:03, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep - clearly passes WP:BIO. Remember what WP:ONEEVENT actually is for: "When an individual is significant for their role in a single event, it may be unclear whether an article should be written about the individual, the event or both." That's the first line, which means it is the most important one. That is to say, we don't delete articles due to it, we would simply rename them or possibly redirect them to the article on the incident. But it is not a simple, the person is only notable for one event thus we must delete them. So, if you want to pull that out, you need to decide if you want an article on this person, or the event. Here, I think the person is the more notable item as she is known across the globe as the Bunny Lady. But, there is actually another problem with ONEEVENT, there is not one event here. There are a series of events over nearly three years here, not just the raid that started it all. That raid received a lot of coverage in RS, as did her stealing the bunnies back, as did here parole violations, and as did her latest adventure with 12 bunnies in a hotel room. Thus, all of the RS provided (and there are a lot more) demonstrate the notability of the person by passing WP:BIO. Aboutmovies (talk) 07:08, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I tire of editors wanting to rename the event. It does nothing to solve the bigger problem of BLP articles. Law type! snype? 07:36, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- And it tire of editors not reading/understanding ONEEVENT, and the similar WP:IDONTLIKEIT argument. BLP is to protect BLPs from others, such as the Seigenthaler incident, it is not meant to protect people from their own actions. That is, defamation is the concern, not protecting people from what they did, thus the citing of the 3 core content polices in the lede of BLP. For example we have lots on a certain former US president and his "relationship" with a former intern, because he did do that, and it is adequately covered in RS to support having that content on Wikipedia. We don't protect people just because they are living, or just because the info is negative. We do keep out personal info (i.e. things the public does not know like maybe their address or social security number), but the info that is widely known is fair game if it comes from reliable sources. Aboutmovies (talk) 07:59, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I tire of editors wanting to rename the event. It does nothing to solve the bigger problem of BLP articles. Law type! snype? 07:36, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete please! As to notability: I have read about as least a dozen very similar cases (involving different animals) in the area where I live during the last few years. But you will *never* see a Wikipedia-article about any of these women (and a few men). Why? Because I live in Scandinavia, and the media here would *never* publish the names and/or photos of those accused of such -legally speaking- extremely minor issues. Have some mercy, will ya? This lady probably needs a shrink, and definitely not a Wikipedia-bio. Regards, Huldra (talk) 07:37, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- See WP:UNKNOWNHERE, but also where I live you will likely never have an article in my newspaper about a Swedish/Norwegian or other Scandinavian country, but that doesn't mean they are not notable. That's why we stick to the regular criteria of independent, reliable source, substantial coverage, etc. And there is plenty of that. Click on the Google news link above the nom and go to the end and see how many foreign press outlets picked up on the story. Aboutmovies (talk) 08:06, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- That was not my point. My point was that you have very different standards for what is notable, and for whose names should be published in different part of the world. If Ms. Sakewitz had done *exactly* the same things in my country, the case might have been noticed by the media, but she would *never* have been named, hence never ended up with an article about herself on Wikipedia. Heck, around here even murderers are, as a rule, not named. And this you call "regular criteria of independent, reliable source, substantial coverage"? Think about it, for a moment, will you? And to do something because *others* have done it...is not "fair game". We answer for our own choices, irregardless of others. Listen; basically for me it boils down to this: should we add to her burden? I simply think it would be extremely cruel to do so. Regards, Huldra (talk) 08:36, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I'm not sure what burden you are talking about, as the nominator said there are a lot of search engine hits, and a Google search was part of her downfall after she stole her bunnies back. She will remain a part of the public record whether or not Wikipedia or anybody else has an article on her, so I don't see us adding to her burden. But more importantly, that is not why we keep content out. It needs to violate some guideline/policy, and here it clearly passes WP:BIO. And no one is arguing we should have this article because others have done similar articles. It is that we have notability guidelines (WP:BIO), and we judge articles by those standards to try and eliminate subjective arguments such as "adding to a burden" or determining for everyone else what they feel a "real encyclopedia" should have articles on. Aboutmovies (talk) 09:14, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Huldra: she won't be named in Swedish media. This won't prevent the rest of the world of blowing up the story, nailing her with Darwin award or what's the name of the trout they use for whacking sick people etc. It's 2009, information knows no state borders and the media is cruel unless their lawyers object. We already had the same sort of discussion on two German murderers and the German court decision defending their anonimity, check the archives. NVO (talk) 11:03, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- You still don´t get it, do you? Firstly you are wrong: she can/will now be named in Scandinavian media *because* she has been named in US media/Wikipedia. (That is: if any media around here has the extremely bad taste of writing about/exposing a rather disturbed woman.) That other people do tasteless, cruel things does not mean we have to do the same, does it? Oh, I forgot. It *does* mean we have to do the same. Otherwise we are for censorship and that is a bad, bad thing.</sarcasm>
- And this cannot be compared with the, errrmm, "indiscretions" of a certain former president. When people have sought, and won, a public office, then *obviously* their actions should be scrutinized. And in detail, when you are dealing with the most powerful people in the world. ....But a little ms. Nobody from Oregon??
- This article is now no. 3 on google (after only five days existence). So it *will* add to her burden; that is inherent of the "power" search-engines gives WP. Guys, seriously, don´t you have anything better to do than to giggle over, shall we say, possibly disturbed women from Oregon? (The sources I checked did just that). Anyway, I´m not going spend more time arguing about it. Each to his taste. Huldra (talk) 11:50, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Wikipedia is not censored. If you find the article bad taste, fine, it is your opinion, but it's no grounds for deletion. I think also articles like autofellatio can be disturbing for some people. However it passes WP:BIO very well, with extended sources coverage over a long period of time, so she is not "Ms.Nobody". --Cyclopia (talk) 12:00, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Another one who doesn´t get it. It is *not* about what I dislike, (if it had been that, then I would have put Ass to mouth up for deletion ASAP....)...it is about what can *hurt* other people. (I´m feeling I´m telling you that 2+2=4; it´s that damn obvious to me that I hadn´t thought of spelling it out). If she had been a person in power, of influence; yes: *then* we should have known. But she isn´t. She *is* a ms Nobody, "famous" only for possibly being mentally ill. Huldra (talk) 12:15, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Sorry, but if you say "each to his taste" I assume it was a matter of personal preference. Anyway, if what she did is documented by reliable sources, we are entitled to write about it. You say "she is a ms Nobody, 'famous' only for..." -Either she is famous, or she is mr Nobody, she cannot be in a superposition of states. If she did something wrong or funny or both, and it got public, there's no reason at all we should not document it. We're not here to protect people from their own public, documented actions. Frankly, looking at her bio, I think she has much more serious problems than a WP article. --Cyclopia (talk) 14:56, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- See WP:UNKNOWNHERE, but also where I live you will likely never have an article in my newspaper about a Swedish/Norwegian or other Scandinavian country, but that doesn't mean they are not notable. That's why we stick to the regular criteria of independent, reliable source, substantial coverage, etc. And there is plenty of that. Click on the Google news link above the nom and go to the end and see how many foreign press outlets picked up on the story. Aboutmovies (talk) 08:06, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep. A long, proven, public track of freezing the rodents exceeds "one event". And I like it (freezing, not the rodents). NVO (talk) 08:47, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep. Multiple and continuous coverage from sources from 2006 to 2009 prove that's not just a one-event bio. --Cyclopia (talk) 11:13, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per nom. ++Lar: t/c 13:35, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Expanding my comment. I agree with Alison that this reads more like a report of the event (albeit across several years) than a biography of a person. So it's not really a well rounded bio, nor is it likely to become one. Further, in alignment with Huldra, why name this person at all? How is this article likely to aid the encyclopedia as a whole. Perhaps a sentence or two could be merged to the animal hoarding case but BLPs of non notable or marginally notable people should be deleted. We are an encylopedia not a tabloid. We should act respectfully. ++Lar: t/c 00:26, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per nom. Ironholds (talk) 14:04, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Expanding: this essentially falls under WP:BLP1E, in that although the article contains information outside this one event, the references only cover the one event. Yes, her role in it was big (bunny-hoarding by a bunny-hoarder? The hoarder has a strong role) but the acts weren't important enough for this to justify an article, and fall foul of WP:NOT#NEWS. In summary: Coverage is of the crimes, not the person, negating the need for an independent biography, and the crimes don't pass the news threshold for their own standalone article. Ironholds (talk) 02:40, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment - Aboutmovies said this woman is known "across the globe", but on closer inspection of the refs, I notice that they are all to regional newspapers, mostly The Oregonian, as well as just one cite from the New York Post, which is hardly a credible source. So where is the evidence that this story has received global coverage? Gatoclass (talk) 14:27, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- As I said above, do the Google news search above. The very first source given is a UK paper, which last I checked is outside of the US. Then go to the last page of that search and you will see a few foreign language media outlets, which I don't know what countries those are from, but I don't think they are US based. So now that globally notability has been shown, you will be changing to keep, right? Aboutmovies (talk) 22:15, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The New York Post used a report by the Associated Press, which was also used by The Guardian[1]. The story has also had coverage in The Scotsman and The Daily Telegraph[2], although global coverage of a news report isn't the same as "known across the globe". snigbrook (talk) 22:21, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I've looked at these sources again, and they are copied from two articles from the Associated Press with a few minor changes (the Scotsman uses the same one as the Daily Telegraph; it is also available on Yahoo News). snigbrook (talk) 16:46, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Reluctant keepor Smerge This is apparently a three year pattern of behavior by a "financial systems analyst for a mortgage company" who per "The Oregonian" is "the largest hoarder by sheer numbers in Oregon’s history." It was not one incident with attendant press coverage, but the article reports several incidents, including taking back rabbits from the police. One alternative would be a selective merge to an article on Hoarding, or Compulsive hoarding which might be a more encyclopedic solution, where extreme cases would be good illustrations. There are TV shows about attempts to correct this behavior, and there are countless people who fill their homes with cats, stacks of old newspapers, things dragged from dumpsters, things bought at thrift shops or from EBAY. (I confess to having a section of my basement filled with old technology of every sort from the 19th and early 20th century). Edison (talk) 15:39, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete or merge. Pull the relevant information of the case and put it into Hoarding. If it's already there, delete this article per the nom. Lara 17:51, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
To further comment: Someone below states the "negative" aspects of her life are the only ones covered by sources. The only thing covered in sources is the one thing she is known for. WP:BLP1E is being completely misrepresented in this discussion. She is notable for one thing that is not significant enough for a separate article. Looking at it more broadly, Hoarding is an appropriate target, but she is otherwise keeping a low-profile. Repeated coverage for one negative thing. People need to realize that real people are more important than this website. On top of the policy-based reasons to get rid of this article, there are moral reasons. Lara 22:56, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Isn't merging her article with hoarding a bit like merging every killer's bio within homicide? --Cyclopia (talk) 18:09, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- No. Is that a serious question? If murderers are notable, they get their own article. If a murder is all they're notable for and the event is not significantly notable, they don't get a mention. There are, however, examples in Murder, so it's not unreasonable to consider Hoarder an appropriate target for examples. As the sources say, she's the largest hoarder in Oregon's documented history, thus a mention in the hoarding article seems appropriate. Otherwise, the article should be deleted. That seemed obvious to me. Lara 23:03, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes, it is a serious question, because in this case the event is proven beyond all reasonable doubt to be significantly notable, because there is sources coverage extending within several years. --Cyclopia (talk) 13:53, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It's unfortunate that it was a serious question, because it's illogical. And your claim is also false. Years of coverage in a local paper, written largely by the same person, and then picked up and distributed by other papers does not make something "significantly notable". Not even by a stretch. Tabloid garbage does not make one "significantly notable". What we have here is what we refer to as "marginally notable". And by BLP (and moral) standards, we don't need these types of articles. We're not a newspaper, we're not a tabloid. This is a real life you're debating over, not just an article as it's clearly not a biography. Lara 14:14, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I am sorry, but years of coverage by several papers does make something significantly notable. I understand you may not like it, but that's the way it works. It is a story which has attracted the curiosity of a lot of news sources and as such it became notable. And not once, but over several years. Not days, not months: years. This is as notable as one can possibly be. May I remind you again what WP:BIO says at the top, that is A person is presumed to be notable if he or she has been the subject of published secondary source material which is reliable, intellectually independent, and independent of the subject., which clearly is the case here. I don't understand what does it mean "we don't need these types of articles": why not? It is information on a notable subject, what if I want to read it, reference it, know it? Shouldn't I just because you don't like it? Again, we are not censored. If you don't like it, don't read it, but please respect the freedom of others to read it. Also, what does it mean "this is a real life" I am debating over? I have nothing to do with her life. She had public, widespread coverage of her actions, we're just discussing of that. I understand you feel sorry somehow from the subject but this WP article is the last of her problems. It is not last of mine, however, not because I care particularly of this article in particular, but because if we begin to delete referenced articles on notable subjects just on the basis of WP:IDONTLIKEIT, all the point of Wikipedia is lost. --Cyclopia (talk) 14:28, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Thank you. Your argument is all I need to construct a solid delete. "it is a story . . . it became notable. . . public, widespread coverage of her actions." That pretty well speaks for itself. "It" being her crimes, or as you put it, "her actions". She isn't notable, her crimes are. BLP1E. She's not significantly notable and does not warrant her own article. Thus, the information should be included in an article on the crimes only if those crimes are determined to be significantly notable themselves. If not, the information should be merged into some other applicable article.
That said, I don't care about what BIO says "at the top". The entire policy is what needs to be considered, and some policies (and some parts of policies) trump other policies (and other parts of policies). BLP, for example, trumps NOTCENSORED, so you can stop tossing that out now. BLP applies to this article because the subject is a living person. "What if I want to read it?" Just like IAR goes both way, so does the IDONTLIKEIT and ILIKEIT. If you're so interested in her crimes, Google her name and read the newspaper articles. If you're interested in her, then you're shit out of luck, because there is no biographical information on her available. We, in this article, have just regurgitated the same stories of her crimes. You know, what Wikinews does. But, that's the thing, we're NOTNEWS. You intentionally dismissing the entirety of others arguments as NOTCENSORED and IDONTLIKEIT, and then creating ridiculous false arguments to "refute" others is disruptive. Lara 14:46, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- 1. WP:BLP1E does not seem apply: we are talking of repeated coverage for repeated actions. It's obviously not "one event".
- 2. WP:BLP must be taken into consideration for sure, but everything in the article is neutral and widely sourced, so I don't understand where it applies.
- 3. WP:NOTNEWS weakly supports a move to Miriam Sakewitz hoarding case, but not deletion, when it states Unless news coverage of an individual goes beyond the context of a single event, our coverage of that individual should be limited to the article about that event. I stress that we're talking of several events, but I agree that most of the article is based on these events, and that they can be grouped together. All what is needed is a change of title and maybe a bit of modification in the introduction. I am willing to apply such changes.
- 4. Given that WP:BLP and WP:BLP1E do not seem to apply as grounds for deletion, WP:NOTCENSORED absolutely applies.
- 6. "You intentionally dismissing the entirety of others arguments as NOTCENSORED and IDONTLIKEIT" I am sorry if I gave this impression, but the problem is that most of the arguments herein brought seem to dismiss the existence of multiple, reliable, independent coverage on the subject, and many others just state that the article is not "decent" or stuff like that. You for example in your original post stated "moral reasons". To me these arguments amount to IDONTLIKEIT. I understand that now you are reasoning in terms of policy and notabiity, and this is for sure an improvement. --Cyclopia (talk) 15:28, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Thank you. Your argument is all I need to construct a solid delete. "it is a story . . . it became notable. . . public, widespread coverage of her actions." That pretty well speaks for itself. "It" being her crimes, or as you put it, "her actions". She isn't notable, her crimes are. BLP1E. She's not significantly notable and does not warrant her own article. Thus, the information should be included in an article on the crimes only if those crimes are determined to be significantly notable themselves. If not, the information should be merged into some other applicable article.
- Delete per WP:NOTNEWS — this sequence of minor news incidents doesn't appear to be notable. Nor do I see any evidence that the inclusion criteria in WP:BIO are met. There is also a WP:BLP issue with this article unduly focusing on negative aspects of this person's life, because no real biographical material was ever published in a reliable source. The lack of such material makes it essentially impossible to write an article that is compliant with our policies, including WP:NPOV. *** Crotalus *** 18:16, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- There is not a NPOV issue. As NPOV clearly explains, "representing fairly, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by reliable sources." If there were published info not covered in this bio that puts her in a more positive light, then there would be a NPOV problem. If someone is only known for bad things, then that is what their article would cover. It's about what BIO says, independent, substantial coverage in reliable sources, and no one had yet to say this is not met. As to NOTNEWS, again, like ONEEVENT, read the rule carefully and notice that it gives examples of what routine new coverage is, this does not fall into that. I understand people don't like the article, but there is no policy based reason to delete it. Aboutmovies (talk) 22:22, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Please read that these are not rules. We do not have rules on Wikipedia, we have policies and guidelines. One of which is Ignore all rules. Keegan (talk) 04:49, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes, I know we have policies and guidleines, as I said rule in one place and policy in another, but same difference. And as to IAR, there is a reason most people don't use it, and that's because it cuts both ways. If you want to invoke it to delete, anyone else can invoke it to keep. That's why its not a real policy. But, BTW, notice what term they use in the lede at IAR, rule, with a link to policies and guidelines. Aboutmovies (talk) 07:19, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
-
- Next time, don't alter other people's posts. Like I said, real policy. As in, nobody worth their salt should invoke it. Aboutmovies (talk) 07:34, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- That was clearly a mistake. My Mac has a tendency to fight between the keyboard and the touchpad, while I was simply trying to quote you. I apologize. What you re-added actually makes you look worse. All policies are 'real.' Policies are the same as rules. Your argument is getting stronger however. The message that if anyone invokes IAR they are de facto not 'worth their salt' is compelling and frightening. Law type! snype? 07:44, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Strong delete Clearly not notable. The woman needs help, not an encyclopedia entry. This kind of thing happens across the country and around the world every day. Nothing unique here to merit an entry. B.Rossow talkcontr 18:18, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment to Crotalus and Brossow !votes: Under WP:BIO she is obviously notable: A person is presumed to be notable if he or she has been the subject of published secondary source material which is reliable, intellectually independent and independent of the subject - all of this is satisfied in our case. There are news sources year after year about her. As for WP:BLP, the "negative" aspects of her life are the only ones covered by sources. It's like saying that we must not have an article on Ted Bundy (or that such article is biased) because it mostly talks about his homicides. --Cyclopia (talk) 18:49, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- A basic search on Amazon quickly turned up several full-length biographies on Ted Bundy, printed by reputable publishing houses. If you can find an actual biography of Miriam Sakewitz from any reliable source, I will be happy to change my vote. Your analogy simply does not hold up well. In my opinion, if we can't write a "biography" without trawling through local news sources and patching it together from that, then it is not only a BLP violation but also original research by synthesis. *** Crotalus *** 19:07, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Based on this criteria, we would need printed full-length biographies for all BLPs, and we should eliminate any article based on news sources. It's your opinion, fine, but that's definitely not what WP guidelines and policies state. As per WP:SYNTHESIS, please take time to read it thoroughly. What is says is not Do not combine material from multiple sources (which is not only perfectly legit, but encouraged) but Do not combine material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources, which is not the case here. Face it: there are several reliable external sources on the subject, with coverage spread over several years. It is notable by all possible interpretations of WP:BIO, and there's nothing violating WP:BLP. It is notable. All this AfD seems just a big case of WP:IDONTLIKEIT. --Cyclopia (talk) 21:43, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Can we focus on this article and stop wasting time? Comparing someone of marginal notability, covered almost exclusively in one local newspaper, to a world-famous serial killer is ridiculous. Lara 23:12, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It would be ridicolous if people weren't doing arguments for deletion which do not hold. The argument made by Crotalus applies as much to Ted Bundy as much to our lady: the macroscopically weird comparison was by purpose to show that the argument didn't hold. --Cyclopia (talk) 11:30, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Are you intentionally trying to disrupt this discussion? Because your argument is completely false. Like, just completely. And judging by the claims on your user page, I can't fathom how you could possibly believe this laughable argument yourself. The irony of this post here from you alone is just staggering. Your argument doesn't hold. It's just ridiculous. The length of biographical material about Ted Bundy in his biography is more kb than this article total, with references. This article contains no biographical material. It talks about precisely one aspect of her life. WP:UNDUEWEIGHT, paragraph 4. An article should not give undue weight to any aspects of the subject, but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject. You said yourself, the only thing available in sources on this woman is negative info. That is because she is not notable, her crimes are notable, in Oregon, not her. No one reports anything about her, just her crimes or repeated crime, however one would put it. Lara 14:30, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Please take time to read again WP:AGF. I am not here to disrupt anything (and I don't know what claims are you talking about); I am here because I am worried about a deletion which takes place, in my opinion, on no better grounds than people not liking the article. That said, just screaming "it is completely false", "ridicolous", "laughable", won't help your point getting through: please try to stay civil and cool, it will help both of us. Now, I actually thank you to have cited WP:UNDUEWEIGHT, because it exactly states why the article is as it is: should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject. Since the main aspect of significance to the subject is her repeated and notable pattern of hoarding, most of the article is correctly devoted to that. However I would be happy to support a move of the intact article to Miriam Sakewitz hoarding case, if this would make everyone feel better. --Cyclopia (talk) 14:38, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I'm well-versed in AFG, thank you, and I'm doing pretty well to maintain it. I did, after all, ask you rather than just drop a nasty-gram on your talk page. Now, back to the discussion, you completely misunderstand UNDUE. It's the significance to the subject. This article is entirely about her crimes. Her life is more than her crimes. To her (the subject) this aspect of her life is not all-encompassing. Thus, we should not have an article on her crimes presented as a biography of her life. Support rename. Lara 14:56, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I guess there is a disagreement on how we understand UNDUE. I understand "significance to the subject" as referring to the subject as an article subject, not as the real person herself. This is fairly obvious in my view, first because WP:UNDUE does not specifically takes into account BLPs, so it's unclear how we can talk of "significance to the subject" when we discuss about Abelian groups, second because we can never know what is significant for the article subject herself. Maybe Garry Kasparov finds that his sons and daughters are the center of his life, yet his biography is mostly devoted to chess and makes only a passing mention to his family. So this interpretation makes little sense, as far as I can see. What is notable about her is her crimes, and what is notable about Kasparov is chess, so these articles give the correct weight to these aspects of thier life. That said, 1)if you personally think the article is biased, fine, but this is not ground for deletion, because AfD is not cleanup 2)as stated above, I would be happy to support a move to Miriam Sakewitz hoarding cases (or something like that), so that no undue weight argument can apply. --Cyclopia (talk) 15:15, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- "I understand "significance to the subject" as referring to the subject as an article subject". It really works either way. The subject in this article is the woman. The article is about her crimes. In that you agree that the article should be retitled, it appears to me you agree that considering the entire article is about her hoarding, it's not appropriate to title it as a biography. I'll admit I don't understand you're point of view. Whether the "subject" is a person or an object or a place, how much weight is given to any aspect of it should be proportional to its significance to the subject. Nothing to do with the article itself. How important is this information when considering the subject in his/her/its entirety? That's what UNDUE is about. Lara 12:13, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- We agree on the move -to me it's more or less a cosmetic affair, but I have no reason to disagree with it, and it maybe helps to focus better the thing. In fact, I would have moved it myself this morning, but it seems I cannot, probably since article is semi-protected. If someone can do the move, let's do it. --Cyclopia (talk) 12:18, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per WP:NOT#NEWS. snigbrook (talk) 22:21, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Weak delete. On one hand, she seems to pass WP:N for the subject at hand. On the other hand, you have a case of WP:LOCAL, WP:NOTNEWS, and WP:BIO1E. It's granted then that extreme animal welfare cases tend to get known across areas, but I'm going weak because this seems to be a unique case. I can go either way, but this doesn't seem to fit in with Wikipedia's scope - almost seems to cross that WP:ABOUTEVERYTHING line. --Dennis The Tiger (Rawr and stuff) 22:46, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep. I understand the good intentions of not wanting to bring attention to this unfortunate woman, but her activities have received international media coverage for a three-year period. She passes notability standards, and I don't think we should be excising notable content because of our distaste for the subject matter. Dozens of major media outlets have deemed her actions notable and newsworthy. The following are examples from mainstream news outlets (excluding Oregon newspapers), including UK newspapers and National Public Radio, which have concluded, in the exercise of their editorial judgment, that Sakewitz is notable: (1) Rabbit Collector Charged with Animal Neglect, National Public Radio, February 21, 2007; (2) Oregon woman obsessed with rabbits back in jail, San Francisco Chronicle, July 2, 2009; (3) Oregon woman obsessed with rabbits arrested again, Guardian (UK), June 18, 2009; (4) Elle ne respecte pas ses distances avec les lapins et file en prison, French news outlet, (5) Woman jailed over rabbit obsession, Scotsman (UK), July 3, 2009; (6) Polish press article about Sakewitz, June 18, 2009; (7) Oregon Woman Obsessed With Rabbits Arrested Again, Fox News, June 17, 2009; (8) Rabbit-obsessed US woman found in hotel room with a dozen bunnies, Telegraph (UK), July 3, 2009; (9) Police: Bunny-hoarding woman busted again, UPI NewsTrack, June 18, 2009; (10) Woman's obsession with rabbits earns jail, Houston Chronicle (TX), July 4, 2009; (11) Oregon woman obsessed with rabbits again arrested, Associated Press Archive, June 17, 2009; (12) Hare-brained woman in jail -- Oregon 'Bunny Lady' obsessed with rabbits, The Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN), June 18, 2009; (13) Oregon's 'Bunny Lady' hops back to court, Northern Wyoming Daily News, June 18, 2009; (14) Oregon woman obsessed with rabbits is back in jail, Lewiston Morning Tribune (Idaho), July 4, 2009; (15) OREGON Woman obsessed with rabbits back in jail, The Lawton Constitution (OK), July 4, 2009; (16) Heard around the West (article concerning Sakewitz), The Cortez Journal (CO), August 29, 2009; (17) 'Bunny Lady' arrested again in Ore., The Bismarck Tribune (ND), June 18, 2009; (18) American woman obsessed with rabbits back in jail, The Waxahachie Daily Light (TX), July 3, 2009; (19) Rabbit crazy, The Orlando Sentinel (FL), June 17, 2009; (20) Rabbit-obsessed woman arrested, Rutland Herald (VT), June 18, 2009; (21) Oregon woman obsessed with rabbits back in jail, Omaha World-Herald, June 17, 2009. Cbl62 (talk) 01:43, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Not to beat a dead bunny, but here are more articles from major outlets: (22) Rabbit case isn't bunny, The Daily Mirror (London), July 4, 2009; (23) Unhappy Bunny, The Sun (London), July 4, 2009; (24) Rabbit woman caught on hop, The Yorkshire Post (UK), July 4, 2009; (25) Woman jailed for breaking rabbit rule, Western Mail (UK), July 4, 2009; (26) Furry Sad Tale, The Sun, June 22, 2009; (27) Bunny lady is back in jail, Kansas City Star, July 4, 2009; (28) American woman obsessed with rabbits sent back to jail after she's found in hotel with bunnies, The Canadian Press, July 3, 2009; (29) RABBITS DISCOVERED IN TIGARD HOTEL ROOM, US State News, June 20, 2009; (30) Bunny girl is jailed, Birmingham Evening Mail, July 4, 2009. Cbl62 (talk) 02:00, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete I don't care how many news outlets on a slow day or stringers in need of a wire piece wrote about her, she is as insignificant as my cat. Policy/guideline wonk all folks want, but this is one event, one trivial and useless event in the pursuit of collecting all human knowledge. If you can prove that this advanced your intellect, then vote keep. Other than that, we have about eight reasons for what Wikipedia is not that applies to this article. IDONTLIKEIT cuts the other way with ILIKEIT. Save the inane for other outlets, these are living people for god's sake, let's step outside the confines of a pseudonymous account and use some WP:COMMONSENSE (since linking to things seems to be en vogue). Keegan (talk) 02:36, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I understand it's your opinion that she's "insignificant," and many would agree. But at least 30 major news organizations, including National Public Radio, the Associated Press, the Canadian Press, and several newspapers in the UK have a different opinion. If we made these decisions based on our own personal views of notability, then the objective standards of verifiability and reliability fall by the wayside. Cbl62 (talk) 03:00, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Let's see if I can put this more succinctly.
- Does someone who hoarded and killed rabbits, and is a living person subject to a single event of notable nature, advance the goal of the summation of human knowledge? If your answer is yes, than you (the generic you) have identified trivial as encyclopedic. This is not encyclopedic. This is a news story. This is harmful to the purpose of Wikipedia. How many people wrote about her carries no weight as to her actual significance, the news reports are tabloidic in nature to feed upon consumers and generate advertising revenue and those who would rather talk around the office cooler about the rabbit killer lady than Kibera or other thoughtful things. Wikipedia is not a tabloid, we should not host content on living people that is to serve for a trivial purpose at the behest of "Oh isn't that weird, let's make fun of her!" Wikipedia is not Us Weekly. Period. Keegan (talk) 03:16, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Oh, and by the way, most of those stories are recycling the AP story with a different headline. They're "filler stories" to fit in gaps in the typeface, not original stories. Keegan (talk) 03:24, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- National Public Radio is not a tabloid and is not motivated by ad revenue. You may think that news organizations should not cover this story, but the news organizations (and not tabloids) disagree. Cbl62 (talk) 15:01, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- My answer is yes, because this case is not trivial. It has been repeatidly covered by different sources over three years. I may agree with you on the kind of articles who covered the case, but fact is that it has been reported by several sources. We're not here to judge information, we're here to report it. --Cyclopia (talk) 11:30, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Yea, the reference section doesn't indicate notability. It indicates 1/ There isn't much going on in Oregon worth reporting on, 2/ Danks is apparently infatuated with this Bunny lady and cannot find anything better to write about, and 3/ Other people found this woman and her hoarding (the ONE thing she's notable for) interesting enough to regurgitate. Wikipedia doesn't need these sort of biographies. In fact, they're exactly the sort of biographies we need to rid of. They're unencyclopedic liabilities. Lara 04:29, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Strong Delete nn person whose idiosyncratic actions got in teh news, NNNN YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 03:27, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete - Non notable as per WP:NOTNEWS. –Juliancolton | Talk 03:31, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep multiple references over mutiple years. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 03:47, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete with fire and salt per basic human decency. She may have lacked it, but we do not lack it. SirFozzie (talk) 06:15, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Decency is not a criteria to decide what goes in WP or not. See WP:CENSORED. --Cyclopia (talk) 11:30, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- See Wikipedia:Basic dignity. Also see the extensive discussions on our biography of living persons policy, including past deletion discussions (QZ and Brian Peppers, for instance) in which "basic human decency" has been repeatedly cited as a reason to delete marginal articles that reflect negatively on barely-notable living people. *** Crotalus *** 21:03, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- So you want to protect the person charged with over 250 counts of animal neglect (a form of abuse), and convicted of ten (plea bargain and judicial efficiency reduced the number of counts) counts along with some other criminal charges. Yes, let's protect the criminal who abused helpless animals. Aboutmovies (talk) 21:51, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- No need to go into moral arguments here (which do not belong to encyclopedia building, I personally have no strong opinions on bunny freezing), the page he cites contains his own refutaton: unless these actions in and of themselves have become highly notable, and sourced in multiple reputable locations. -that's precisely our case. As for Brian Peppers, if it has been deleted solely on the grounds of "dignity", it should be restored ASAP. --Cyclopia (talk) 09:44, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Note: This debate has been included in the list of Oregon-related deletion discussions. —Aboutmovies (talk) 07:45, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. —Aboutmovies (talk) 07:49, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Note: This debate has been included in the list of Crime-related deletion discussions. —Aboutmovies (talk) 07:50, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete When I see articles like this covered and see real encyclopedic articles missing like Kolkheti National Park .... Echoing what Jenna said these people should not have articles because of petty crimes they committed. I'd hapily delete all the biographies about people who committed small crimes and happened to havebeen reported in the state news as well as articles of minor local accidents that have no signifance to the rest of the world. We are not a newspaper. People say wide coverage in reliable sources determines notability but in some cases like this we really need to think whether it is necssary to include such articles. I can't help reading it and thinking, "Who cares?". I appreciate that some effort has gone into it but do we really need to mention it in an encyclopedia? Himalayan 08:28, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep. I don't feel strongly about this article one way or the other, but scanning through the arguments above, it seems that Aboutmovies is making a pretty solid argument stemming from policies and guidelines, while the nomination reflects a significant misunderstanding of policy, and many of the "delete" votes seem to reflect a complete lack of knowledge or even awareness of policy. For instance, the one immediately above: WP:OTHERSTUFFDOESNTEXIST. These discussions are not votes, they're supposed to be reasoned explorations of how a policy applies in a certain case. In the absence of any clearly articulated and policy-based reason why the article should be deleted, we should default to keep. -Pete (talk) 09:03, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It fails WP:NOTNEWS. If you believe we "all have a complete lack of knoweldge of policy" let's look at this article. It is a biography so should indicate notability of that person. The only information I see about this person other than the "rabbit case" is that "Miriam Elaine Sakewitz worked as a financial systems analyst for a mortgage company in Beaverton, Oregon". Yet we give her an encyclopedia article as we could to any employee of a mortage company or any tom dick and harry who happened to stoop to a low enough level to get themsevles reported. How about we start biogaphies for juvenile offenders who steal cars, if it makes the news automatically they are really notable as actual people? The event is certainly not of major signifance so clearly fails WP:BIO. Why is this a notable person who is deserving of an encyclopedia article? What actually has she done to contribute to the world excect refridgerating a load of rabbits and making a name for herself because of such stupidity and cruelty. Anybody could do that and they suddenly become awarded by having an encyclopedia article alongside really notable people who have actually done things in their field to qualify for an article. Just because a few news agencies happened to like the story about the rabbits and published it does this automatically mean we should do the same and treat wikipedia as a newspaper to report every single event and petty crime ever reported in the world? This is an event that happened to be published in newspapers, wikinews should deal with it not us. As a biography her entire life is entitrely non worthy of an article. Biographies should not be created to report single events. Himalayan 09:44, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- NOTNEWS is not part of BIO. BIO has ONEEVENT, and as stated repeatidly, there is neither one event here, nor does ONEVENT call for deletion, it calls for deciding if the article should be under the event or the person. Next, we go by notability, not fame, not importance. And, this person, unlike the person who broke into my car, made world-wide news. That is, there is quite a difference. And we assert notability through the sources. As to contribution, again, not what we look for, that's why we articles on killers and hookers. And as to liking, or the other arguments that this is just unusual, well BIO in the lede states: interesting, or unusual enough to deserve attention or to be recorded. So yes, we do find unusual, or interesting things to be quite notable. Lastly, this case helped to lead to some attempts at changing state law due to her legal arguments concerning seized property, known as Oregon Ballot Measure 53 (2008), which passed. Aboutmovies (talk) 10:23, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I ask again. Why is this story notable to the rest of the world, was it widely reported in Nepal for instance did it really make global headlines? I can see it was reported in a number of UK papers but it seems the press will print anything these days! The thought that somebody gets an encyclopedia entry alongside George Washington and Los Angeles for freezing a bunch of rabbits seems ludicrous it really does. Now I'm not saying that the case was not covered in notable US papers but I think the information could be best displayed in a list or a Crime in Oregon article or something which discusses criminal history and cases which were reported as notable without resorting to an actual article about that person. Cases like this are best discussed in a general article like I mentioned. Why is there not a priority for instance to write a decent article about Crime in Oregon that is notable and there is no reason why a good articles couldn't be written on it and you mention this case within it. From an encyclopedic point of view I'd much rather have a concise and well researched article about crime and cases in general in Oregon than read about one person who got arrested without having even basic data on crime rates and history of crime in Oregon. I would support a merger into such an article and a condensed summary of the case rather than an article about the person. In a lot of cases of this sort of nature I really think they are best discussed in general articles briefly or not included. Even an article about Animal hoarding in the United States you could mention a few cases like this and others which have reached headlines but try to think of this from a biographical viewpoint and it is not a notable biography. If the fact that they froze a bunch of rabbits is really that notable it can be mentioned in general articles where the context is more appropriate than having an article about a single animal hoarder. In my view it is far better to have articles about Crime in Oregon and Animal hoarding in the United States than to just describe one event out of likely many similar cases. Himalayan 11:34, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Your ideas are interesting, in that the article could maybe be merged to something like the examples you cited. However since these articles still do not exist, this article should stay until someone takes up the challenge to write such articles. Since AfD is not for cleanup, it seems we agree the article should be kept for now. --Cyclopia (talk) 12:15, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- If you find at least some of the info from a criminal perspective interesting and encyclopedic then this is exactly what I'd suggest so we don't lose anything which anybody considers valuable. If you mentioned the case in a paragraph in an article about crime and history of crime in oregon etc is would seem a much better place to mention this case I think, from an actual biographical viewpoint I think this article is seriously devoid. It is of course our job to reproduce existing notable information but in a lot of cases I think we go into certain cases in far too much detail especially when there seems to be lacking general articles on crime in Oregon, I think we should be encouraging more general articles like this, the thing is they take a lot more time to write and are alot more demanding as they require much more research than single cases do based on newspapers sources, but we are an encyclopedic after all so we should seriously find the best way of summarising notable knwledge and covering them fairly. I would bet that we are missing information on probably some notable murder cases in Oregon. In my view it is best summarised in a single article or two and if the topic is of major note, like the Washington sniper attacks etc then a seperate article. But starting biographical articles about isolated cases, especially in the absence of general info about crime I think is the wrong way to try to tackle the subject. And this goes for a high number of articles we have about criminals and detainees and crime cases we have at present. I would strongly suggest the write moves the article to his workspace so if in the future he wants to write an article about crime in Oregon in general and mention such cases in a paragraph or so (which I'd support) then he won't lose any of his work. Eventually this article could easily be redirected into a general article discussing crime and perceived notable cases of crime in Oregon etc. Himalayan 12:48, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- This is fine (I am unsure if I agree, but it is a reasonable position), but it would be better discussed on the article talk page. In the meantime, do we agree your motion is to keep and merge instead then delete? --Cyclopia (talk) 13:18, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- My recommendation would be to move this article to User:Aboutmovies/Miriam Sakewitz and then write a general article and much needed article about Crime in Oregon at a later date and mention this breifly using some of the info. So I stand by the delete as a biographical entry but I'd support an article about crime in Oregon that is well resarched and mentions a number of notable cases in its history condensed into comprehensive article and briefly mention this case if it is really of note. Then the name can be redirected. Himalayan 13:45, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- This is fine (I am unsure if I agree, but it is a reasonable position), but it would be better discussed on the article talk page. In the meantime, do we agree your motion is to keep and merge instead then delete? --Cyclopia (talk) 13:18, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- If you find at least some of the info from a criminal perspective interesting and encyclopedic then this is exactly what I'd suggest so we don't lose anything which anybody considers valuable. If you mentioned the case in a paragraph in an article about crime and history of crime in oregon etc is would seem a much better place to mention this case I think, from an actual biographical viewpoint I think this article is seriously devoid. It is of course our job to reproduce existing notable information but in a lot of cases I think we go into certain cases in far too much detail especially when there seems to be lacking general articles on crime in Oregon, I think we should be encouraging more general articles like this, the thing is they take a lot more time to write and are alot more demanding as they require much more research than single cases do based on newspapers sources, but we are an encyclopedic after all so we should seriously find the best way of summarising notable knwledge and covering them fairly. I would bet that we are missing information on probably some notable murder cases in Oregon. In my view it is best summarised in a single article or two and if the topic is of major note, like the Washington sniper attacks etc then a seperate article. But starting biographical articles about isolated cases, especially in the absence of general info about crime I think is the wrong way to try to tackle the subject. And this goes for a high number of articles we have about criminals and detainees and crime cases we have at present. I would strongly suggest the write moves the article to his workspace so if in the future he wants to write an article about crime in Oregon in general and mention such cases in a paragraph or so (which I'd support) then he won't lose any of his work. Eventually this article could easily be redirected into a general article discussing crime and perceived notable cases of crime in Oregon etc. Himalayan 12:48, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Your ideas are interesting, in that the article could maybe be merged to something like the examples you cited. However since these articles still do not exist, this article should stay until someone takes up the challenge to write such articles. Since AfD is not for cleanup, it seems we agree the article should be kept for now. --Cyclopia (talk) 12:15, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I ask again. Why is this story notable to the rest of the world, was it widely reported in Nepal for instance did it really make global headlines? I can see it was reported in a number of UK papers but it seems the press will print anything these days! The thought that somebody gets an encyclopedia entry alongside George Washington and Los Angeles for freezing a bunch of rabbits seems ludicrous it really does. Now I'm not saying that the case was not covered in notable US papers but I think the information could be best displayed in a list or a Crime in Oregon article or something which discusses criminal history and cases which were reported as notable without resorting to an actual article about that person. Cases like this are best discussed in a general article like I mentioned. Why is there not a priority for instance to write a decent article about Crime in Oregon that is notable and there is no reason why a good articles couldn't be written on it and you mention this case within it. From an encyclopedic point of view I'd much rather have a concise and well researched article about crime and cases in general in Oregon than read about one person who got arrested without having even basic data on crime rates and history of crime in Oregon. I would support a merger into such an article and a condensed summary of the case rather than an article about the person. In a lot of cases of this sort of nature I really think they are best discussed in general articles briefly or not included. Even an article about Animal hoarding in the United States you could mention a few cases like this and others which have reached headlines but try to think of this from a biographical viewpoint and it is not a notable biography. If the fact that they froze a bunch of rabbits is really that notable it can be mentioned in general articles where the context is more appropriate than having an article about a single animal hoarder. In my view it is far better to have articles about Crime in Oregon and Animal hoarding in the United States than to just describe one event out of likely many similar cases. Himalayan 11:34, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It fails WP:NOTNEWS. If you believe we "all have a complete lack of knoweldge of policy" let's look at this article. It is a biography so should indicate notability of that person. The only information I see about this person other than the "rabbit case" is that "Miriam Elaine Sakewitz worked as a financial systems analyst for a mortgage company in Beaverton, Oregon". Yet we give her an encyclopedia article as we could to any employee of a mortage company or any tom dick and harry who happened to stoop to a low enough level to get themsevles reported. How about we start biogaphies for juvenile offenders who steal cars, if it makes the news automatically they are really notable as actual people? The event is certainly not of major signifance so clearly fails WP:BIO. Why is this a notable person who is deserving of an encyclopedia article? What actually has she done to contribute to the world excect refridgerating a load of rabbits and making a name for herself because of such stupidity and cruelty. Anybody could do that and they suddenly become awarded by having an encyclopedia article alongside really notable people who have actually done things in their field to qualify for an article. Just because a few news agencies happened to like the story about the rabbits and published it does this automatically mean we should do the same and treat wikipedia as a newspaper to report every single event and petty crime ever reported in the world? This is an event that happened to be published in newspapers, wikinews should deal with it not us. As a biography her entire life is entitrely non worthy of an article. Biographies should not be created to report single events. Himalayan 09:44, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment. In response to Aboutmovies' comment that NOTNEWS is not part of BIO, that is irrelevant. WP:NOT is not part of BIO, but that doesn't mean that parts of NOT cannot be applied to articles that are categorized as bios. Almost any policy can apply to a biography. Lara 15:08, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Lara, you're right -- WP:NOTNEWS is as applicable here as it is anywhere else. But I don't see the part of NOTNEWS that would apply. The most relevant sentence seems to be the one that says routine coverage of sports, announcements, and tabloid journalism are not sufficient to establish notability. Ignoring the grammatical error in the policy (I don't think coverage of tabloid journalism is what was intended), where's the problem here? The article in its present state cites The Oregonian, The Dalles Chronicle, and The Hillsboro Argus. None of which is a tabloid. Furthermore, an editor above reported that there are additional stories from London, Missouri, Texas, Tennessee, etc. etc. I don't know if maybe some of those are tabloids, I'm not so familiar with them…but surely we can agree that not all of them are?
- I agree with Am and Cyclopia and Himalayan that there is a reasonable question about the title of the article (and consequently the depth/areas of its focus)…but I still don't see any good argument for its deletion. -Pete (talk) 16:13, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per SirFozzie. Not only is this unfortunate person subjected to a durable on-line article about her compulsion, it has appeared as a DYK on the main page. We are unlikely to ever see a Britannica article on this or any similar subject; we should not immortalize people in this fashion. Kablammo (talk) 15:59, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Kablammo, even though your argument has no basis in policy, I want to address it. Wikipedia can be the outlet where a fair and respectful article counter-balances disrespectful and unfortunate coverage in other outlets. I'm not saying that's the necessarily the case with this article in its present form, but I believe it's a good goal. There is no opportunity here to eliminate coverage of Sakewitz from the Internet overall; but it is within our power to make sure that at least one piece of coverage – and one that is likely to come up frequently on search results etc. – is NPOV, complies with BLP, etc. etc. -Pete (talk) 16:13, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- We should not place undue emphasis on aspects of a person's life which are perceived to be negative. Here, the only reason for notability is those aspects, and she has not achieved the notoriety of, for example, a serial killer. And rather than her story being a "one-day wonder" of the type often reported in media, we are in effect immortalizing her. As for Wikipedia being a force for good on these, I have come across too many articles where such negative information has remained for long periods of time without challenge. Articles are written, DYKs collected, and they thereafter languish. We should not be blind to the influence Wikipedia has-- for some reason Google's methods place it high on search results; this article ranks #5 now. What possible enclyopedic purpose is served by this piece? Kablammo (talk) 16:38, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- And such emphasis is not undue, since these aspects are the only ones covered by sources. I am very neutral on Wikipedia being a "force for good" (or "for evil", FWIW). What I care of is that Wikipedia yields reliable and unbiased information on notable subjects. Period. Basically all of WP policies are practical details on this, if you think about, and there should be no other real concern (WP:BLP is included: it just emphasizes that policy should be enforced more rigorously in case of BLPs). Now, the influence that WP has, if we respect WP:BLP (and the article does), is completely irrelevant to the concerns of WP itself. And as for the encyclopedic purpose served by the piece, it is easy to answer: it yields sufficiently reliable and unbiased information on a notable subject. That's exactly what encyclopedias are for -no more, no less. --Cyclopia (talk) 16:52, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- We should not place undue emphasis on aspects of a person's life which are perceived to be negative. Here, the only reason for notability is those aspects, and she has not achieved the notoriety of, for example, a serial killer. And rather than her story being a "one-day wonder" of the type often reported in media, we are in effect immortalizing her. As for Wikipedia being a force for good on these, I have come across too many articles where such negative information has remained for long periods of time without challenge. Articles are written, DYKs collected, and they thereafter languish. We should not be blind to the influence Wikipedia has-- for some reason Google's methods place it high on search results; this article ranks #5 now. What possible enclyopedic purpose is served by this piece? Kablammo (talk) 16:38, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Kablammo, even though your argument has no basis in policy, I want to address it. Wikipedia can be the outlet where a fair and respectful article counter-balances disrespectful and unfortunate coverage in other outlets. I'm not saying that's the necessarily the case with this article in its present form, but I believe it's a good goal. There is no opportunity here to eliminate coverage of Sakewitz from the Internet overall; but it is within our power to make sure that at least one piece of coverage – and one that is likely to come up frequently on search results etc. – is NPOV, complies with BLP, etc. etc. -Pete (talk) 16:13, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The article begins with saying "Miriam Elaine Sakewitz (born c. 1962) is an American animal hoarder who pled no contest to misdemeanor crimes related to hoarding in Oregon.". This itself is totally the wrong way to approach this event. It is as if "animal hoarding" is her career or profession or something. She is a working class every day office worker who happens to be mentally ill who has an obsession with rabbits, who the press made a big deal of on one day. The fact remains that she was a plain office worker who was reported for animal cruelty. Why is this such a big deal? The RSPCA investigate thousands of animal cruelty cases every day, many of them far more horrific and few of them every make headline news and the ones I know that have occurred in Wales to date we do not have articles for even though sources could probably be found. Why is it notable for the world to know about a Welsh farmer in Powys who didn't feed his cattle for months? In the same way I ask how it actually helps the knowledge of wikipedia to have an article about a women who stored rabbits in her freezer. We do not need to reproduce every single event that gets reported in the news. This article is appropriate for wikinews that is why we have a news site seperate from the encyclopedia because we are not a newspaper and should not be covering biographies of people who mistreat animals. This sort of thing could be mentioned briefly in a general article about cimre/animal hoarding but NOT in its own article. I remember a while back I created an article about a baby case in Bangladesh who was born with two heads. The case itself was very notable as it was a medical phenonemon and was widely reported around the world. However it was soon put up for AFD and in the end the info about the event was merged into a general article about the medical condition which I fully agreed with as it is the best way to mention information without it being of major note in its own right. Himalayan 17:15, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- That is a good, commonsense approach. What is notable is the condition, not the person who suffers from it (much less the trivial detail of court proceedings on that person). We don't need an article on the person. Kablammo (talk) 17:26, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- who the press made a big deal of on one day :Not "one day", not "one day". Please do not state falsehoods. There are years of coverage for repeated episodes. If it was just a news of one day, it would be a completely different thing.
- Why is this such a big deal? Because it has been covered repeatebly by third party sources.
- The case itself was very notable as it was a medical phenonemon and was widely reported around the world. However it was soon put up for AFD. It was one case, and as such it fitted NOTNEWS and BLP1E. But here we talk of repeated coverage along several years, for repeated episodes. To stay within your example, it's more alike to someone giving birth to several two-headed twins during several years. --Cyclopia (talk) 17:38, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Week keep. I don't find the article particularly interesting, however, this is like interpreting the Bible or the Constitution and finding whatever meaning you want to find. WP:NOT#NEWS states: "Routine news coverage of such things as announcements, sports, and tabloid journalism are not sufficient basis for an article." GNews shows that there is significant coverage in reliable sources outside the local area including NPR, FOX, and European news agencies (i.e. it is not simply "routine news coverage"). This is sufficient to pass WP:GNG and Wikipedia:Notability (criminal acts) (and the perp section of the later). WP:ONEEVENT applies to whether or not biographical content should be forked from an article about an event; it does not supercede WP:GNG. WP:BLP1E states: "If the event is significant, and if the individual's role within it is substantial, a separate article for the person may be appropriate." I imagine that "significant" is open to interpretation; however, if it means "notable", then it passes WP:GNG. Location (talk) 19:09, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Mmm, or one could just look in google books to determine notability, plain and simple.. unlike the Washington sniper which is an incident of major signifance. If this person is really of note and has been for years in many seperate incidients you would expect at least some book/journal mentioning of her and her bunnies. You know why it isn't? Because no credible publisher is going to want to write about this woman, she is daily newspaper fodder, nothing else and doesn't deserve recognition in this way. Himalayan 19:14, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- We could, but then we would be ignoring many aspects of WP:GNG, including WP:N, WP:V and WP:RS which don't require us only to evaluate GBook hits. Location (talk) 19:24, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per WP:BLP1E. We have enough BLP vios out there without magnets like this attracting (fill in your favorite term) like this. Kill it,... Kill it with fire, Kill it with a sledgehammer - just kill it. — Ched : ? 19:29, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- WP:BLP1E is not relevant, as repeatedly showed above. As for it being a "magnet", WP can deal with it with semiprotection, protection and (hopefully soon) flagged revisions. Deletion is not needed. --Cyclopia (talk) 20:03, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- With all due respect to the editors who worked on this article, it is a violation of our BLP policies and guidelines. I'm sorry, the one event (animal abuse) doesn't merit an encyclopedic entry. — Ched : ? 21:46, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- OK then, since she also received coverage for breaking into and stealing the animals from the police, then that's a separate event as there was no animal abuse there, and thus notable, right? Plus then the parole violations which did not include animal abuse, just violating the parole. Aboutmovies (talk) 06:11, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep. Meets WP:GNG. The application of WP:BLP1E seems invalid in this case, as the article is not about one incident, but rather a longtime pattern of behavior which attracted international attention over a period of several years. If people disagree with policies and guidelines, they should focus their efforts on changing those policies and guidelines, rather than misapplying the standards that are on the books in an effort to "game the system". -Hit bull, win steak(Moo!) 20:19, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- All due respect to Hit Bull, but if people don't understand our BLP policies and guidelines, and the reasons they've been established, then they shouldn't be making snide comments, and insinuations. Look, I'm all for including all the material that we can here; but this sort of article just doesn't muster up. We're not a tabloid here, or to quote directly: "The bare fact that someone has been in the news does not in itself imply that they should be the subject of an encyclopedia entry.". The lady had a bunch of rabbits, that brought her legal trouble. I appreciate the desire to save articles, but I'm sorry, this one just doesn't belong. "game the system"? .... Pfft, please. Please actually read the policies and guidelines again before you make any further erroneous accusations. — Ched : ? 21:46, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I don't subscribe to any accusation and I am sure you are in good faith. However the snippet you quoted doesn't support deletion here, because she hasn't just "been in the news": she has been the subject of multiple articles on multiple sources and, most importantly, over years for multiple episodes, with her actions as the main subject. That's what is required for notability, as WP:BIO clearly states. --Cyclopia (talk) 21:53, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- delete unencyclopedic trivia. fodder for a slow news day. Pete.Hurd (talk) 20:59, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- (futher, per NOTNEWS "News coverage can be useful source material for encyclopedic topics, but not all events warrant an encyclopedia article of their own. Routine news coverage of such things as announcements, sports, and tabloid journalism are not sufficient basis for an article.") this article is merely coverage of tabloid journalism. Pete.Hurd (talk) 17:33, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete an absolute disgrace of an article should be deleted forthwith. Article creator should be blocked as should the admin that added this to the mainpage. RMHED. 23:56, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Now that would be a little harsh. Let's assume good faith here, even if I agree that the creator's concept of what is notable on wikipedia is a little out.. He created the article in good faith believing it was acceptable plus he does use reliable sources and doesn't inplant his own POV, at least it is accurate. At least acknowledge that.. Himalayan 09:22, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete Per WP:BLP1E, she only has an article because of the rabbit incident.--Giants27(c|s) 01:54, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per WP:BLP1E and a sense of decency. Such an article is beneath the dignity of Wikipedia (that's saying something!) and can only exist to subject a living person to ridicule. RayTalk 04:34, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete Even if it's not technically BLP1E, I think it's problematic. Having an article on someone who has committed a series of newsworthy crimes doesn't seem appropriate. I'm not sure if this is stated somewhere clearly as policy, but I don't think marginally notable people who engage in controversial acts should be included. It's just too dicey. ChildofMidnight (talk) 05:03, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete. Per Alison. There's nothing remotely encyclopedic in this article, and having the article should not form part of the subject's punishment. Kevin (talk) 11:25, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per Wikipedia Review ;-) Mike R (talk) 13:29, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per WP:BLP1E. We're an encyclopedia, not a alleged criminal directory or Reuters-like news source. hmwith☮ 13:57, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete. The only reason for the stories is because the papers think they are amusing little tidbits to pop in. These sort of stories going around the world isn't a sign of notability, it's a sign that the paper needs something to fill it up with. The crime itself is not notable, beyond perhaps a mention in Hoarding. And it is 'one event'. The woman is only known for one thing, hoarding rabbits. That it has occurred over a period of time is irrelevent. Quantpole (talk) 15:55, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It is not irrelevant. Following your criterion, all Stephen King is known for is basically one thing, writing novels, and as such it would be BLP1E. Of course Stephen King and Ms.Sakewitz have vastly different notability degrees, but in both cases they are known for several noteworthy actions repeated in time. The "reason for the stories" is also completely irrelevant for the discusson. The hidden or not-so-hidden agendas behind sources coverage are irrelevant provided the sources are not biased.--Cyclopia (talk) 16:27, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Miriam Sakewitz 2
- Keep Im not going to join the notability discussion..but im questioning if this discussion is based on what she has notability for more than is she is notable or not. You can achieve notability for different things just aks Paris Hilton.--Judo112 (talk) 15:47, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep This is multiple related events over years, not 1E. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 16:03, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep - Per Aboutmovies. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 16:13, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- BLP?. Even if the article is deleted, we have her being labled as 'likely mentally ill' in the permanent record of this Afd. You would have to keep the article to judge whether that claim was true or not. What a pickle. MickMacNee (talk) 16:29, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- What is funny is that this label has came from the nom. --Cyclopia (talk) 16:33, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- (edit conflict) - that's why we have courtesy blanking, and this AfD will be courtesy-blanked when it's over, regardless of the outcome. Furthermore, and more importantly, this project-space page is not indexed by search engines whereas the article under this woman's name is. It's clear, too, that the commentary is my (and others') personal opinion and not stated as fact in the main article - Alison ❤ 16:52, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I am well aware of the normal procedures. It is still a permanent record which is readable when somebody clicks on the soon to be redlinked Miriam Sakewitz, opinion or not. MickMacNee (talk) 18:08, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- (edit conflict) - that's why we have courtesy blanking, and this AfD will be courtesy-blanked when it's over, regardless of the outcome. Furthermore, and more importantly, this project-space page is not indexed by search engines whereas the article under this woman's name is. It's clear, too, that the commentary is my (and others') personal opinion and not stated as fact in the main article - Alison ❤ 16:52, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Not to mention she was compared to a serial killer. Lara 16:49, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete not so much per ONEVENT/BLP1E, but per "Wikipedia is not news" and basic notability. This is the kind of subject that shows that "significant coverage in independent reliable sources" is not always a good measure of notability. Collecting a bunch of rabbits just doesn't make you very important. News sources sometimes write about something unimportant, but that odes not mean we have to. Using good judgment is not (yet) forbidden on Wikipedia. The closing administrator should however be consider the canvassing from Wikipedia Review. I hope that even discounting for this, the consensus is still that this is not a person we should cover. --Apoc2400 (talk) 16:41, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
That the British media for instance chooses to widely cover "people" like The Beckhams, Jordan, Peter Andre, Kerry Katona, Jade Goody in the same way the American media is obsessed with Lindsay Lohan, Lionel Richie's daughter, Paris Hilton and Britney Spears and well the Beckhams again does not mean every one of them actually reasonably deserves that amount of coverage. The way in which things are covered in the media and what they choose to pick up on does not neccessarily have to be reflected on wikipedia. I would have thought that wikipedia is a way of trying to neutralise and filter but newspapers report into something more productive. Meaning that newspapers often print stories that will sell newspapers as they may be particularly curious, funny or just plain bizarre even though the subject itself may not be of long lasting note. SO I think some mention of this case is appropriate in an article about hoarding or crime in Oregon but presented as a notable person in its own right doesn't seem right to me, not in an encyclopedia which is intended to last many decades. Himalayan 17:25, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete, per BLP1E. No long-term significance and no possibility of producing a balanced NPOV article about this person, since all the sources are about their criminal acts. Tim Vickers (talk) 17:30, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete, per BLP1E and NOTNEWS and a near impossibility of producing a NPOV account about the person. nableezy - 17:35, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete, as has been stated BLP1E and NOTNEWS are applicable here. Little I can add that has not already been said. Shereth 17:37, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep/Rename - Media coverage meets the threshold to establish notability. Propaniac (talk) 17:39, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete: only notable for one thing, and Wikipedia is not a news service. Sceptre (talk) 17:45, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Canvassing incident has been reported to AN/I. --Cyclopia (talk) 17:47, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per not news, one event, and notability. Verbal chat 17:48, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per Biographies of people of marginal notability can give undue weight to the event, of WP:BLP1E. Absolutely nothing else noteworthy can be said of this woman outside of the controversy. I do not believe that the "one event" policy was ever intended to mean a singular instance or occurrence in time as some argue above. All of the "Bunny Lady" happenings certainly qualify as an "event". Tarc (talk) 17:48, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per using some common sense. Grsz11 17:50, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete. Good grief. Did someone change our mission statement from "Wikipedia is an encyclopedia that incorporates elements of general and specialized encyclopedias, almanacs, and gazetteers" to "Wikipedia is a list of every single thing ever mentioned in a newspaper" when I wasn't looking? My local paper currently has a story about a police community support officer who has been cautioned after falling asleep on duty. Maybe we should have an article on her, too. – iridescent 17:51, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Welcome to today's battlefield. Good thing I wore my fireproof underwear. Merge to Hoarding as a somewhat notable example of the issue; BLP issues and rather singular reason for being covered suggests she's not notable for anything beyond that. Tony Fox (arf!) 17:53, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep Notable, and whether she "needs" this article more than she does some help, she's worked hard to deserve it and now gets to reap the rewards of her actions in (I'm sure unwelcome) attention. Worth keeping, because coverage of hoarding benefits from recording notable case studies of the behaviour. Andy Dingley (talk) 17:55, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- This is a good example of why the article should be deleted. We don't need to serve as a means to punish someone for their crimes. That's not what Wikipedia is for. "Encyclopedia," that's what people seem to forget. But as Andy accurately pointed out, Wikipedia can and does harm living people. Lara 18:58, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per nom, Lara, Iri, pretty much lots of other people. Appearing in a newspaper is not the minimum requirement for a person to appear in Wikipedia, never has been, never should be. This is a classic WP:BLP1E thing, and the event itself isn't much worth covering EXCEPT MAYBE as a single-sentance mention in another article like Hoarding. And even then I am not convinced that ANY mention would not violate WP:UNDUE. --Jayron32 17:56, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete This does appear to be newsworthy, but I don't see how that makes it encylopedia-worthy. The guideline that applies most here is WP:BLP1E. Peacock (talk) 17:57, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete As much as I dislike this perceived WR cabal, the article is a clear delete, per WP:BLP1E. ƒ(Δ)² 18:01, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per Fails Notability - This says "Several journals simultaneously publishing articles in the same geographic region about an occurrence, does not always constitute multiple works". All sources from the Oregonian are thus only count as one source for notability. As such, there is no proof of extensive coverage enough to warrant this BLP article. Ottava Rima (talk) 18:03, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- By the way, most of the other sources listed above happen to be wire services or contain no new information. They also fail for providing notability. I find it intellectually dishonest that the individual quotes the AP hosted by multiple papers as if it was those individual papers providing that article. Ottava Rima (talk) 18:07, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete. Although BLP1E is inappropriate by its own terms, the subject is simply not notable for the purposes of writing an encyclopedia. There are all sorts of people who get repeated pro forma news coverage, and some get widespread coverage for no reason other than that it's easy for a newspaper to write a snappy headline. The article and its sources amount to very little more than the rap sheet of someone convicted of petty offenses, and if multiple murderers aren't notable enough for their ow articles, neither is a serial rabbit keeper. Especially balancing the potential harm from holding the subject up to ridicule against the infinitesimal encyclopedic value. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 18:05, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Cyclopia brought this article to my attention via his "anti-BASITES" canvassing on ANI. It's clear that it should be deleted per Alison, Lar, Lara, Ottava Rima, and others. Cool Hand Luke 18:10, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment. What happens to the Bunny Lady redirect?. MickMacNee (talk) 18:11, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- If the article is deleted, Bunny Lady, Miriam E. Sakewitz and Miriam Elaine Sakewitz will all be deleted per WP:CSD#G8 - redirects to nonexistent pages - Alison ❤ 18:18, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete: A woman who killed some rabbits is not notable. WP:1E clearly lays this out. –túrianpatois 18:32, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete pere NOTNEWS, BLP1E, whatever other argument you may want to use. Just because a whole bunch of newspapers reported about this non-event doesn't mean that Wikipedia is duty-bound to violate this poor woman's privacy. 99.166.95.142 (talk) 18:35, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete Not notable; those wanting it kept will thus, I assume, create articles on everybody "famous" for a single criminal event where the media have coined snappy soundbite headlines. I'd also like to point out for those who care, I am not and never have been a WR member... Minkythecat (talk) 18:37, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per NOTNEWS and BLP1E and a lot of others. This person simply is not notable, nor is the "event" itself. Resolute 19:02, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete: This is the sort of subject that newspapers cover occasionally, as a curiosity or a change of pace. It's not the sort of subject that encyclopedias should cover. We depend substantially on newspapers for sourcing, but our priorities and mandate diverge from theirs in some respects. This is a good example of the distinction; this sort of thing appears in the news from time to time - yes, even in reputable, reliable news sources - but it doesn't really belong in an encyclopedia. If you want a policy soundbite, I guess I'll go with WP:NOT#NEWS. MastCell Talk 19:03, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep This is clearly not a case of one event as there are multiple events and this person is the focus of them with abundant notability. The not news argument doesn't stand up either because this person is not a routine case but is quite exceptional. And Wikipedia is not censored. Colonel Warden (talk) 19:04, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per nom. Tabloid rubbish like this on living persons should be restricted to the tabloids. It's very little more than a bit of local gossip. --Malleus Fatuorum 19:19, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete or transwiki Subject is notable but not encyclopedic.--Tznkai (talk) 19:22, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I am trying to restrain myself now from commenting, but this really I don't understand. Is there an "enciclopedicity" guideline I ignore? --Cyclopia (talk) 19:24, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes, as has already been pointed out to you about 20 times above. Routine news coverage of such things as announcements, sports, and tabloid journalism are not sufficient basis for an article. Even when an event is notable, individuals involved in it may not be. Unless news coverage of an individual goes beyond the context of a single event, our coverage of that individual should be limited to the article about that event, in proportion to their importance to the overall topic. When you're done with that, you can start on Presumption in favor of privacy and People who are relatively unknown. – iridescent 19:27, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Oh, I see. Not impressed, because, as repeated and confirmed ad nauseam, it's not one event, so the whole argument quite falls on itself. --Cyclopia (talk) 19:33, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- a non exhaustive list of things Wikipedia is not. Notability in general, means that something is sufficiently interesting or important that it deserves notice. That doesn't mean it can or should be written about in an encyclopedia as its own article. This does not advance Wikipedia's overall mission.--Tznkai (talk) 20:07, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- And what on WP:NOT is covered by this? This notion of "not encyclopedic" seems very close to WP:IDONTLIKEIT (I really don't like it, but I don't think that's sufficient reason to throw it off the project). JoshuaZ (talk) 21:27, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- a non exhaustive list of things Wikipedia is not. Notability in general, means that something is sufficiently interesting or important that it deserves notice. That doesn't mean it can or should be written about in an encyclopedia as its own article. This does not advance Wikipedia's overall mission.--Tznkai (talk) 20:07, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Oh, I see. Not impressed, because, as repeated and confirmed ad nauseam, it's not one event, so the whole argument quite falls on itself. --Cyclopia (talk) 19:33, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes, as has already been pointed out to you about 20 times above. Routine news coverage of such things as announcements, sports, and tabloid journalism are not sufficient basis for an article. Even when an event is notable, individuals involved in it may not be. Unless news coverage of an individual goes beyond the context of a single event, our coverage of that individual should be limited to the article about that event, in proportion to their importance to the overall topic. When you're done with that, you can start on Presumption in favor of privacy and People who are relatively unknown. – iridescent 19:27, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per nominator. Wikipedia is not a tabloid. Full disclosure: This discussion was brought to my attention by Cyclopia's contributions. Risker (talk) 19:42, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Strong keep well referenced article, in which the nominator agrees on "there are plenty of media references out there and quite a few ghits". WP:ONEEVENT is probably the most misused policy in AFDs. Ikip (talk) 20:13, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It's not well-referenced though. You really need to look past the seemingly large number of nice-looking footnotes. The sources in this article are exclusively newspapers. An encyclopedic article shouldn't be written on an individual if the only available sources are newspapers. –Juliancolton | Talk 20:49, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- A google book search proves notability, or lack of. Himalayan 21:19, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Note: This article was written well enough to be a Did you know? on the main page Ikip (talk) 20:18, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Some people would not consider such a main page appearance as something for Wikipedia to be proud of... --Jayron32 20:32, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Indeed. Blatant hoaxes have been approved to appear on the main page in the past. –Juliancolton | Talk 20:50, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- >_>
Worth noting too, that 1/ DYK is not an indication of quality and 2/ that hook was under discussion and a consensus had formed to pull it before it was put up. Three hours on the page and someone noticed it and it was yanked for failing the BLP portion of the DYK criteria. Lara 02:52, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- >_>
- Indeed. Blatant hoaxes have been approved to appear on the main page in the past. –Juliancolton | Talk 20:50, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Some people would not consider such a main page appearance as something for Wikipedia to be proud of... --Jayron32 20:32, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete BLP1E, common decency etc (full disclosure: I came upon this afd as a result of the ANI post in which someone was complaining about canvassing on WR) ViridaeTalk 20:56, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete and delete the redirect with it. Pure BLP1E. Sam Blacketer (talk) 20:59, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- keep This article meets WP:BIO. So we must then ask are there other policies which would overide notability? The answer to that is no. WP:BLP1E does not apply since there are continuing sources over a long timespan. There have also been claims that there is a problem of "basic human decency". These claims are at best noxious in their implication that people who don't agree with deletion lack basic human decency. Do the writers of the reliable sources used in the article lack basic human decency in writing their articles? I would think not. So it is puzzling to claim that the standard is different here. Moreover, different people have different standards. Some people think that basic human decency would require us not have cartoons of Muhammad. Apparently many here disagree or find that position to be not neutral. Appeals to basic human decency are often a way to let our own personal moral systems intrude into NPOV and I'd rather not do that even if I have some emotional sympathy with the attempted arguments. Claims that this is an attack page are also unfounded- the content is neutral and well-sourced. The claim that we should not in general have any articles that rely primarily on newspaper accounts has no founding in policy or guidelines. Moreover, people would not make that claim in other cases where we have primarily newspaper and magazine articles such as Dan Kaminsky. Thus, such blanket claims are not grounded. Claims that the article is hurtful to the subject are also not substantiated. If the subject has seen the article and finds it hurtful they can request deletion and we can discuss that argument then (at which point for a variety of reasons I would favor deletion). That has not occured. Without such an event, claims to basic human decency or claims that there is any BLP reason to delete are not supported by policy, guidelines, or logic. JoshuaZ (talk) 21:25, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Perfect abstract of this AfD. Whoever you are, thank you, I couldn't have said it better. --Cyclopia (talk) 21:43, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I don't understand why we have to wait for the subject of the article to assert shes been harmed before deleting the article?--Tznkai (talk) 20:35, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Because you are making a questionable assumption that the individual is harmed by the article. If the individual tells us that we can conclude that. Without that we simply have speculation that such harm might potentially occur. We shouldn't be deleting content on the off chance that to some people it might in certain unlikely circumstances cause harm. That's all the more so true given that OTRS is an easy way for subjects to contact the project about concern they have. There are additional methods such as using the article talk page. If the individual tells us she is being harmed I would favor deletion since she isn't a willing public figure. But we have no good reason to think this article is doing harm. JoshuaZ (talk) 20:52, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- You're severely misinterpreting WP:BLP1E. All it says is that if the person is notable for one event, or in this circumstance, behavior that they should not be the subject of a biographical article. It doesn't matter if you have over 9000 relaible sources on the person, if they all report the same event/behavior it's still inappropriate for us to have an article on this marginally notable person. Chuthya (talk) 21:03, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I'd say it is you that is misinterpreting WP:BLP1E. 1E = one event. We are talking of several events over the course of years -please look at the article. The large majority of notable people are notable for a single prominent aspect of their life, which leads to multiple notable actions in time. They can be writers, actors, politicians or, in this case, peculiar animal hoarders. --Cyclopia (talk) 21:23, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- claims to basic human decency or claims that there is any BLP reason to delete are not supported by policy, guidelines, or logic. Claims to basic human decency don't derive their strength from being supported by any of those things (except, to a degree, logic). In fact, your words here are an example of the problem that a claim to basic human decency is meant to help fix: we need to look on people as people, not just as encyclopedia topics. And, actually, that is supported by policy -- WP:BLP: The possibility of harm to living subjects is one of the important factors to be considered when exercising editorial judgment. (Note that it says possibility of harm -- which supports Tznkai's point and destroys yours.) In each case, it's a question of priorities: This case is not so unusual (despite the numbers -- hey, they're rabbits! the numbers can get big pretty easily) that all the worthwhile information can't be folded into the article on the larger topic. Claims to basic human decency are supposed to inform our decisionmaking. It's right there in the policy I quoted. I don't see evidence in your comment that you've accepted that part of Wikipedia policy. Therefore you're arguing against policy. Howdya like them syllogisms? JohnWBarber (talk) 02:36, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- One would hope that when discussing issues that have people get highly emotional about quite easily that one would try to stick to logical arguments. So yes, logic matters. Moreover, guidelines and policies are important for understanding what constitute human decency when there is disagreement about what that is. To use the perennial example, if someone claimed that having depictions of Muhammad violated basic human decency you would presumably have no objection to a response of the same form. Moving on to your claim of BLP, the problem is that anything at some level has some potential for harm. Yet, we don't consider all those cases to be reasons for deletion. In this particular case, given that very large number of sources covering this individual, the probability of harm arising from the presence of this article is extremely small. Indeed, as I've pointed out before, a well-written, neutral article on an individual as one of the top google hits likely does less damage than the default status if without it the first page of google hits would instead have a non-reliable source or a tabloid or a mocking article. Thus, in a circumstance like this, the probability of harm is vanishingly small: if anything, it is likely that an article on Wikipedia overall reduces harm. Thus, unless we have some reason to think otherwise (most obviously being contact from the subject of the article stating her opinion), we should evaluate this with the understanding that a probabliity of harm is minscule. JoshuaZ (talk) 00:09, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Since the possibility of this article being anything but tabloid journalism in the guise of an encyclopedia article is far more minuscule than our causing the harm and the distress that WP:BLP discusses, applying that policy here means we delete, which still allows for encyclopedically useful information to be put into the article about the overall phenomenon. We base that on a consensus, using our collective, common-sense editorial judgment for that. In fact, WP:BLP goes on at length about our obligations to living people. This passage (at WP:BLP#Presumption in favor of privacy is particularly telling for this discussion (for "ethical implications" you could substitute "basic human decency" if you refactored the sentence slightly):
- Wikipedia articles that present material about living people can affect their subjects' lives. Wikipedia editors who deal with these articles have a responsibility to consider the legal and ethical implications of their actions when doing so. It is not Wikipedia's purpose to be sensationalist, or to be the primary vehicle for the spread of titillating claims about people's lives. Biographies of living persons must be written conservatively, with regard for the subject's privacy.
- WP:BLP also links to a statement from the Wikipedia Foundation board, which urges all projects to 2.Taking human dignity and respect for personal privacy into account when adding or removing information, especially in articles of ephemeral or marginal interest [3]. In fact, this article is of such marginal interest for anyone interested in the overall encyclopedic topic that the worthwhile information in it doesn't amount to enough to justify an article at all. A full article on her just encourages editors to pile on unencyclopedic details where a passage in another article would encourage an amount of detail helpful to readers who want to understand the subject. Wikipedia articles, unless deleted, last longer than many newspaper articles on the web, and they encourage individuals and even news organizations to continue publicizing certain information (there are many examples of journalists getting information from Wikipedia, whether they then confirm it or not). The potential for harm is greater than the potential for education. JohnWBarber (talk) 03:33, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Considering, I am considering for sure the possibility of harm. I also consider, for completeness, the harm done to a much larger subset of living subjects: namely, people reading WP. Such considerations lead me to think that the vanishing possibility of some harm done by merely restating what's already fully covered by lots of Googleable sources is minor with respect to the (also minor but not as minor) damage done to WP credibility (and WP readers, which are millions) by creating another precedent in which we refuse to cover notable subjects for arbitrary, emotional reasons. As for the policy, it talks of harm (which is an actual event, or its possibility), not "basic human decency", which is POV. --Cyclopia (talk) 02:52, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Now that's strange. I was clearly addressing JoshuaZ, and began by quoting from him, yet you, Cyclopia, say "I" in your response as if I were addressing you, Cyclopia. You are two different individuals -- right? To address your point: Editorial judgment (a/k/a "common sense" in many circumstances) is an irreducable part of decisionmaking on Wikipedia, and just because we need it to apply policies and sometimes go beyond them doesn't mean that when we do so we do it for "arbitrary, emotional reasons". There are lots of subjects we don't cover for very good reasons. Basic human decency is -- POV? Then the words I quoted from BLP just above is also POV. You're going to have to accept that Wikipedia has a point of view about basic human decency. We (officially, at least) favor it. JohnWBarber (talk) 03:34, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Oh, I just knew that would have happened. No, I am not a SP (nor a MP) of JohsuaZ, who I didn't know until this thread, thank you. I just happen to have very similar opinions to his own here (not always: you can find in this very thread a disagreement) and I just said that (for example) I am considering that (If JoshuaZ considers it or not, I don't know). Now, editorial judgement is for sure an irreducible part of WP. But it should be based on grounds as objective a possible. The words you quoted from BLP are not very much POV, because it talks of harm. Harm is an event. It is a possibility, that has to be considered. It is something. Decency is not something: it is a personal point of view, no more than "beauty", and everyone has his/her very own threshold on that, and it is also a touchy subject in a discussion, because it is considered offensive by many to be considered "not possessing basic human decency". So, either you link me a policy discussing explicitly that we must strive for decency, using this very word (and I'd go challenging it, because it would be a policy based on thin air), or please acknowledge that "possibly causing harm" and "not decent" are two very different things. --Cyclopia (talk) 19:42, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Now you're hiding behind words rather than following the spirit of the WP:BLP policy, which clearly applies here. Classic wikilawyering. An appeal to decency is an appeal not to possibly harm, where it's reasonable to think we might harm someone. It is reasonable to think so here. You're urging us to violate policy, which can be done under WP:IAR when it's in the best interests of Wikipedia, but (even if it were in WP's best interests, and it isn't) you'd need a consensus for it, which you don't have. JohnWBarber (talk) 03:02, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Please take time to read WP:AGF. I have no interest in wikilawyering or in urging anyone to violate policy. If anything, I am urging to follow policy and not throwing it away with arguments based on subjective views like "not encyclopedic" or "not decent" (more on that later). I think to understand the spirit of BLP policy: the article should not do harm. Is it doing? Can it do it? That's the question, and the answer is that googling the name of the lady readily brings out lots of articles on her actions. The contribute of WP is, therefore, irrelevant because it just repeats what's already publicly and readily available.
- About "hiding behind words": if you mean by appealing to "decency" an appeal to not possibly harm, we agree (we disagree on the possibility of article doing harm,however). However this is a quite unusual interpretation of the word decency, which according to Merriam-Webster means : "conformity to standards of taste, propriety, or quality" [4], which is irredeemably subjective. I know it may sound pedantic, but I feel it's important to properly use words. Thanks for your clarification anyway.--Cyclopia (talk) 03:21, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- AGF doesn't prevent me from calling you out when you're wikilawyering by denying the role that decency is supposed to play in our decisionmaking. "Decency", that dictionary says, is the quality of being "decent", which in turn is defined as marked by moral integrity, kindness, and goodwill [5]. That's the meaning I was using. To see how Wikipedia officially tries to make it a policy to be decent to subjects by being as kind as an encyclopedia with integrity can be while sometimes including information that may hurt someone's feelings, see WP:BLP -- for instance, the passage I quoted to JoshuaZ, above. I think I and others have cited WP:BLP enough to demonstrate that deleting the article is fully within policy. Good arguments have also been made that there is potential harm to the subject in this particular case. Since the Delete side here is within policy, it's a matter of consensus. JoshuaZ wrote: Appeals to basic human decency are often a way to let our own personal moral systems intrude into NPOV and I'd rather not do that Well, we're supposed to let certain moral considerations into a decision like this. It's a feature, not a bug. (It's also part of the essence of professionalism to do so, although Joshua seems to imply otherwise.) It's policy to do so (which is why I can cite BLP about this). Whether we do harm, how much and how much relative to our obligation to inform readers are matters for consensus. JohnWBarber (talk) 04:21, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- One would hope that when discussing issues that have people get highly emotional about quite easily that one would try to stick to logical arguments. So yes, logic matters. Moreover, guidelines and policies are important for understanding what constitute human decency when there is disagreement about what that is. To use the perennial example, if someone claimed that having depictions of Muhammad violated basic human decency you would presumably have no objection to a response of the same form. Moving on to your claim of BLP, the problem is that anything at some level has some potential for harm. Yet, we don't consider all those cases to be reasons for deletion. In this particular case, given that very large number of sources covering this individual, the probability of harm arising from the presence of this article is extremely small. Indeed, as I've pointed out before, a well-written, neutral article on an individual as one of the top google hits likely does less damage than the default status if without it the first page of google hits would instead have a non-reliable source or a tabloid or a mocking article. Thus, in a circumstance like this, the probability of harm is vanishingly small: if anything, it is likely that an article on Wikipedia overall reduces harm. Thus, unless we have some reason to think otherwise (most obviously being contact from the subject of the article stating her opinion), we should evaluate this with the understanding that a probabliity of harm is minscule. JoshuaZ (talk) 00:09, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I don't understand why we have to wait for the subject of the article to assert shes been harmed before deleting the article?--Tznkai (talk) 20:35, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete Not encyclopedic, of marginal interest in its local context, sensationalist and trivial. We are sitting here discussing how "decent" what she did was as a supposed test case is already a clue that this article serves no informative purpose. Simple (if obsessive) press reports of these incidents don't vouch a separate article, lest everything in the news becomes one. Dahn (talk) 21:36, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete, obvious WP:BLP1E. We are not a tabloid newspaper. Are there any sources not on her bunny adventures? –blurpeace (talk) 21:59, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete (Disclosure, I came after the reading the massive AN/I thread). While there is realiable source coverage, there is no where near the type of information needed for a proper biography. This is exactly the type of thing excluded by WP:NOTNEWS. This unfortuate lady has no historic notability that I can see; she simply has a brief burst of notoriety that, absent this article, will fade with the passing of the 72 hour news cycle. The spirit of WP:BLP1E applies as well. Xymmax So let it be written So let it be done 23:21, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I do not see what the 72 hour news cycle has to do with it. These refs span 3 years. Agreed if there were no coverage beyond the 3 days, but that's contrary to the facts. DGG ( talk ) 03:23, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Eh, I could have been clearer - but between this, the article and the AN/I thread there was *a lot* of reading. I know the case involves repeated acts over years, that's why I said the "spirit" of BLP1E applied. If you look at the dates of the sources, there is a burst of reporting after an arrest, court appearance, parole violation etc, then essentially nothing until a new trigger event. She has no lasting notability. Xymmax So let it be written So let it be done 10:55, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Isn't repeated coverage exactly when the spirit of BLP1E does not apply? If coverage resurfaces, even if intermittently, doesn't this mean that her is notable enough to be quickly re-reported when updates happen? There's plenty of notable subjects that are not covered by news every single day. --Cyclopia (talk) 11:21, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- No no no, and your failure to see this, or at least our failure to convince you, is the crux of the issue here. BLP1E is, in essence, an attempt to specify when it is improper to have an article on a person despite the presence of what otherwise would be considered coverage in reliable sources. The coverage here is "only in the context of a particular event" or events in this case, and "the person otherwise remains, or is likely to remain, low profile". Hence, the motivation behind the policy is present here despite the repeated news hits. Xymmax So let it be written So let it be done 23:36, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Isn't repeated coverage exactly when the spirit of BLP1E does not apply? If coverage resurfaces, even if intermittently, doesn't this mean that her is notable enough to be quickly re-reported when updates happen? There's plenty of notable subjects that are not covered by news every single day. --Cyclopia (talk) 11:21, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Eh, I could have been clearer - but between this, the article and the AN/I thread there was *a lot* of reading. I know the case involves repeated acts over years, that's why I said the "spirit" of BLP1E applied. If you look at the dates of the sources, there is a burst of reporting after an arrest, court appearance, parole violation etc, then essentially nothing until a new trigger event. She has no lasting notability. Xymmax So let it be written So let it be done 10:55, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete It's someone who kept lots of rabbits. She's not notable for anything else other than things directly related to this. So, obvious BLP1E. Majorly talk 23:31, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep I found the article well written with references. A book or something would be nice and who know but until then I think that Cbl62 and JoshuaZ showed why to keep it. --CrohnieGalTalk 12:07, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
2nd arbitrary section break
- Delete - I thought I had already voted but... WP:BLP1E. \ Backslash Forwardslash / (talk) 23:50, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per many of the delete comments above; at a minimum, remove the completely ridiculous level of excessive detail. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:33, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I can't see any irrelevant details, if you start from the basis that 'Rabbit Lady' is notable. MickMacNee (talk) 01:55, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- He said excessive - which has nothing to do with notability. It is painful to read the excruciating minutia about her parole violations, the bunny adoptions, when and how she was released on each and every charge, what she did for a living. Oh yeah. I forgot about the bowl containing one goldfish. Law type! snype? 02:07, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Like I said, if the subject is considered notable, there is nothing here that is irrelevant. There is nothing excessive in it, unless you decide the whole sbuject is not notable, so I simply cannot see how Brad concludes it could be kept if trimmed. MickMacNee (talk) 14:59, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete - Regardless of anybody's sympathy or antipathy for the woman, you can't be seriously arguing that any of these references pass the "trivial" test. This is pure judicial ephemera, the rap sheet of a common animal hoarder, of which there are thousands arrested every year. Her life isn't significant in any way aside from providing a macabre curiosity to local broadsheet readers on slow news days. Perhaps most importantly, the article reads like a combination between a court docket and a John Grisham wet dream and is unlikely to improve, since removing the ludicrously overwrought parts would reduce it to a stub. Bullzeye contribs 02:26, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I am seriously arguing that. It has been repeatedly reported by external ,reliable sources over several years. As such it is not trivial, no matter what one can personally think. --Cyclopia (talk) 11:23, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- My bowling club and next-door neighbor are apparently precisely as notable as Sakewitz by your logic, since the first gets their score and name printed weekly in the newspaper and the latter's appeared in the the blotters and dockets just about as often. What part of "trivial" is hard for you to understand? The woman's a freak, one of thousands of disturbed individuals in America, except she gets showcased in the back-pages of the broadsheets because her arrest being a hoarder (despite being neither rare, nor a valid claim to WP:BIO) serves to excite people's baser curiosities, like a tabloid. The biography of her life is otherwise utterly, completely unimportant. Think Brian Peppers. People whose BLPs consist of titilating tabloid-style factoids and nothing of significance, depth, rarity, or broad meaningfulness should not have articles. Period. Bullzeye contribs 20:46, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep The practical question is whether the Guardian and Fox are considered major news sources of international significance, and I think they are. (I know a case can be made for considering them both tabloids with respect to their general standards, but we do still accept them here. If we do, it passes the standards for BLP1E. The article can be retitled and shortened. It is perhaps unfair to treat it at this much length. What is significant is not the personal detail--it's the extremely unusual nature of the relatively minor crime. DGG ( talk ) 03:23, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- DGG, please reread the sources. This is clearly marked as "associated press" and is duplicate AP posting. It is not an independent coverage in the guardian. There is no foreign coverage of it, only AP hostings of it chosen in order to make it seem like there was wider coverage than actually existed. Ottava Rima (talk) 16:14, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- OR, I've read the sources. I always do, and you know it. The facts in the matter are not disputed--the local newspaper is sufficient to establish them, along with the court record. That two national level news sources cover it shows it is of general interest. DGG ( talk ) 19:17, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per many good reasons given above. This is not what this project is for. The article I just read is a mugging of a sad person. Are the "news" outlets cited feeding this? Sure; they are reprehensible, they contribute to the wider toxic envirnoment some call the modern world. Jeers, Jack Merridew 07:07, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete I generally consider myself an inclusionist, but when it comes to weird, lurid stories like this, I think we should act carefully, and wait a while to see what kind of legacy the subject leaves. If it turns out that people are still writing about Sakewitz decades from now, then we could possibly write an article about her. But right now, the recent bursts of media coverage aren't compelling enough for me to vote "Keep" in good conscience. We can do without an article for now. Zagalejo^^^ 07:50, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment Thank you for drawing our attention to the similarly celebrated case of Mary Toft. This demonstrates well that such articles are appropriate here. Colonel Warden (talk) 08:25, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I think you'll find one significant difference; that Mary Toft is well and truly dead ... by some 250 years. Her case has been cited in numerous publications over the centuries, right up until recently. So in reality, they're very, very different cases - Alison ❤ 08:30, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- (ec) With Mary Toft, we can at least look back with several centuries of hindsight, and can determine that her story was passed down from generation to generation. It's too early to tell if Sakewitz's name will go down in history the same way. I kind of doubt it. (And to clarify, I didn't remove the reference to Toft in my comment because I felt it weakened my argument. Rather, I decided that it probably wasn't in good taste to start throwing out names like that when discussing a living person. Too late now, though.) Zagalejo^^^ 08:34, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep There is nothing wrong with this article. It has legitimate news coverage, and isn't just a single event. She became famous for breaking in and stealing the rabbits at a later date, so the famous event had a sequal. So the single event argument made by some, is not relevant. Dream Focus 09:38, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It has legitimate news coverage: WP:NOTNEWS. 99.166.95.142 (talk) 16:10, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete This is like Brian Peppers all over again. If suitable some material can be merged into the hoarding article. There may be multiple incidents, but the person is merely notable for behavior and petty crimes. Chuthya (talk) 16:11, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- And Brian Peppers should have been kept, and it's a shame it has been deleted, in fact. --Cyclopia (talk) 17:01, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- You really believe an article whose sole purpose was to make fun of the way a person looks should have been kept? 99.166.95.142 (talk) 17:10, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Perhaps you are confusing WP with Encyclopedia Dramatica. They have articles with the sole purpose of making fun of people. It is, indeed, very much unfortunate that coverage of that subject has been left in the hands of ED kids. We instead should cover unbiasedly notable subjects, and avoiding to do so because the subject is somewhat controversial is, in my opinion, a shame. --Cyclopia (talk) 17:40, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It wasn't deleted because it was controversial, it was deleted because the majority of internet memes are really not really notable enough to warrant individual articles in an encyclopedia. Whether its Brian Peppers or the Gay Nigger Association of America, they just aren't worthy. Tarc (talk) 17:53, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Has Brian Peppers ever even been mentioned by a mainstream source? There's nothing relevant at Google News or Google Books. Zagalejo^^^ 17:56, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I admit it's my fault having fueled this Peppers' sub-thread, but maybe's better discussing it elsewhere. --Cyclopia (talk) 18:23, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- That article was deleted correctly as not meeting anywhere near the notability requirements. That it does leave the hits to things like ED is unfortunate but in this particular case cannot be helped. JoshuaZ (talk) 19:51, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Perhaps you are confusing WP with Encyclopedia Dramatica. They have articles with the sole purpose of making fun of people. It is, indeed, very much unfortunate that coverage of that subject has been left in the hands of ED kids. We instead should cover unbiasedly notable subjects, and avoiding to do so because the subject is somewhat controversial is, in my opinion, a shame. --Cyclopia (talk) 17:40, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Brian Peppers's article was deleted and for all practial purposes salted by Jimbo, so if you honestly believe that you certainly have the right to fork and create your own wiki for biographies of marginably notable people. Chuthya (talk) 20:48, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- You really believe an article whose sole purpose was to make fun of the way a person looks should have been kept? 99.166.95.142 (talk) 17:10, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete As Alison, Lar and others have said, what's notable is the one extreme case of animal hoarding not the person involved. Not everything newsworthy is notable, and people known for one crime are explicitly mentioned as not being worthy of an article in our guidelines. At best this should be a footnote in the animal hoarding article. Steven Walling 18:40, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Read it again. WP:BLP1E:"Individuals notable for well-documented events, such as John Hinckley, Jr. (can be kept)". MickMacNee (talk) 22:11, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The attempted assassination of a US President is just a tad more important than this. Just a lil bit. nableezy - 22:16, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- OMG, the utterly ridiculous comparisons keep rolling in. First of all, just as a bunny hoarder is not comparable to a serial killer, she is not comparable to someone who attempted to assassinate a United States President. Secondly, BLP1E's mention of John Hinckley, Jr. is to make exceptions for historically significant events. Clearly, this is not historically significant. Lara 23:16, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Read it again. WP:BLP1E:"Individuals notable for well-documented events, such as John Hinckley, Jr. (can be kept)". MickMacNee (talk) 22:11, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It says "well-documented events" , not "historically significant". Inclusion criteria are based on notability, which is in turn based mostly on sources - the concept of "historical significance" is left to historians to decide. --Cyclopia (talk) 23:21, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Well documented event. Let's just see. google books on assassination "Ronald Reagan": 1,048 results. "John Hinckley" Reagan: 724 results. google scholar "John Hinckley" Reagan: 1510. assassination "Ronald Reagan": 14,300. Do you want to guess the grand total of all mentions of this woman or this event in either google books or google scholar? nableezy - 00:02, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Absolutely wrong. There is a reason they used John Hinckley, Jr. and not some nobody, small-time criminal that was picked up by the media because the story was considered amusing or interesting. Exceptions to BLP1E are for historically significant events and those who played a significant role within them. I cannot believe how policies get mangled in these discussions. Claiming this woman's case is an exception under BLP1E is jaw-dropping. Lara 04:14, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It says "well-documented events" , not "historically significant". Inclusion criteria are based on notability, which is in turn based mostly on sources - the concept of "historical significance" is left to historians to decide. --Cyclopia (talk) 23:21, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Lol. I was merely pointing out a rather obvious mistake in the quoting of policy, because some readers might have actually thought that was true. MickMacNee (talk) 01:08, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete - news coverage doesn't automatically translate into notability; see WP:NOTNEWS for that. Some evidence of a lasting impact is needed. - Biruitorul Talk 01:54, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per Lar and Lara; and per Biruitorul, too. People need to realize that real people are more important than this website. Got that right. JohnWBarber (talk) 01:58, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- That guilt trip is trotted out regularly, but it only really makes sense for people who are not already global headline news. People like to think Wikipedia is more important to the information age than it actually is, when really, it just isn't. MickMacNee (talk) 03:57, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Yeah well, couple that with the fact that this article will not serve any practical use to anyone, so there really is no informative quality lost by not hosting such an entry. The above discussion shows yet again that there are editors out there who would like to treat wikipedia as a collection of weird factoids, who have no real concerns about relevancy of any article (and don't see the point of others having such concerns, because wikipedia is after all not that important), and who don't think it's an issue when we're jeopardizing the reputation of a person with no public profile to speak of - much like starting a thread about this in some forum wouldn't matter. Dahn (talk) 07:10, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I disagree with MickMacNee: I think WP is enormously important and of deep impact. That's why I am struggling for keep. As for practical purpose, imagine yourself being an academic (a psychologist maybe) wanting to review notable cases of animal hoarding. The WP articles would be a nice startpoint where several sources on a notable case have been gathered and can be used. Relevancy of an article is way beyond personal interest, and it has more to do with widespread coverage and widespread knowledge of a subject, and that's exactly why we should keep. --Cyclopia (talk) 11:59, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- "As for practical purpose, imagine yourself being an academic (a psychologist maybe) wanting to review notable cases of animal hoarding." You're kidding me. As for your rationale: WP:NOT - pick a section, any section. Dahn (talk) 17:27, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Not kidding at all. About WP:NOT sections, picked all of them. None applies, apart maybe WP:NOTPAPER and WP:NOTCENSORED. Now what? --Cyclopia - talk 21:32, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- "As for practical purpose, imagine yourself being an academic (a psychologist maybe) wanting to review notable cases of animal hoarding." You're kidding me. As for your rationale: WP:NOT - pick a section, any section. Dahn (talk) 17:27, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I disagree with MickMacNee: I think WP is enormously important and of deep impact. That's why I am struggling for keep. As for practical purpose, imagine yourself being an academic (a psychologist maybe) wanting to review notable cases of animal hoarding. The WP articles would be a nice startpoint where several sources on a notable case have been gathered and can be used. Relevancy of an article is way beyond personal interest, and it has more to do with widespread coverage and widespread knowledge of a subject, and that's exactly why we should keep. --Cyclopia (talk) 11:59, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Yeah well, couple that with the fact that this article will not serve any practical use to anyone, so there really is no informative quality lost by not hosting such an entry. The above discussion shows yet again that there are editors out there who would like to treat wikipedia as a collection of weird factoids, who have no real concerns about relevancy of any article (and don't see the point of others having such concerns, because wikipedia is after all not that important), and who don't think it's an issue when we're jeopardizing the reputation of a person with no public profile to speak of - much like starting a thread about this in some forum wouldn't matter. Dahn (talk) 07:10, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete As a negative BLP1E and an example of tabloid journalism run amok. ThemFromSpace 04:32, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete. This woman's case is not an exception to BLP1E as the evidence of international coverage presented by user:snigbrook is highly questionable. The AP story may have been published by the The Guardian in an "odd news" column or whatever, but it was not published in the international edition of the newspaper, The Guardian Weekly. I have a subscription, and searching the archives for "Miriam Sakewitz" turns up no mentions whatsoever. Ottre 08:44, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per the well-reasoned arguments above that this article is a violation of WP:BLP1E and WP:NOTNEWS. The bulk of articles about her are all local papers. She is not historically significant, or even significant outside of Oregon. Rather to honor BLP and not display her psychosis for prurient entertainment that continue trying to argue that she is somehow notable by being mentioned in her local paper a couple dozen times. If that was all that was required for notability, I'll go ahead and start my own article now. -- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 14:02, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The above two "Delete" votes are based on a misunderstanding of the coverage. As noted in my comments about a mile up this chain, the coverage is NOT limited to local papers or obscure editions of The Guardian. The story has been covered EXTENSIVELY by the Scotsman (UK), Fox News, the Telegraph (UK), Houston Chronicle, The Daily Mirror (London), The Sun (London), The Yorkshire Post (UK), Western Mail (UK), Kansas City Star, The Canadian Press, and at least 20 other non-Oregon papers listed above. If news outlets such as the National Public Radio, the San Francisco Chronicle, and The Sun have run feature stories on you, Collectonian, I think the article would be a useful addition to Wikipedia. Cbl62 (talk) 15:45, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The NPR was done by an Oregon local. The rest I spot checked were all AP reprints/regurgitations, and not original stories and on-line only reprints at that, not included in the original. -- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 16:00, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Indeed. There is a difference between a story being covered extensively and being spread extensively. This isn't a case of news trucks piling in and journalists from around the world jumping on planes. This is little more than one reporter with nothing better to do making a big deal of this woman and others reprinting the story. Lara 16:27, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- One reporter? I count 9 different bylines, and if we wanted too we could add the AP story reprinted many times with that authors name to make it an even ten. Oh, and regarding Danks' "infatuation" statement made above, I believe Danks is a living person, so I personally try not defame living people, as that's a tort. But to each his/her own. Aboutmovies (talk) 21:10, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Indeed. There is a difference between a story being covered extensively and being spread extensively. This isn't a case of news trucks piling in and journalists from around the world jumping on planes. This is little more than one reporter with nothing better to do making a big deal of this woman and others reprinting the story. Lara 16:27, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The NPR was done by an Oregon local. The rest I spot checked were all AP reprints/regurgitations, and not original stories and on-line only reprints at that, not included in the original. -- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 16:00, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The above two "Delete" votes are based on a misunderstanding of the coverage. As noted in my comments about a mile up this chain, the coverage is NOT limited to local papers or obscure editions of The Guardian. The story has been covered EXTENSIVELY by the Scotsman (UK), Fox News, the Telegraph (UK), Houston Chronicle, The Daily Mirror (London), The Sun (London), The Yorkshire Post (UK), Western Mail (UK), Kansas City Star, The Canadian Press, and at least 20 other non-Oregon papers listed above. If news outlets such as the National Public Radio, the San Francisco Chronicle, and The Sun have run feature stories on you, Collectonian, I think the article would be a useful addition to Wikipedia. Cbl62 (talk) 15:45, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
@Cbl62: all of those are online reprints. Believe you me, I have looked carefully at how many papers picked up the story. The Independent (July 4, p 28), Birmingham Mail (July 4, p 4) and Evening Times (July 4, p 10) published the following newswire briefing:
“ | Portland: A woman banned from keeping rabbits after she became obsessed with them has been jailed after police found her in a hotel room with more than a dozen. A judge said 47-year-old Miriam Sakewitz broke her probation and sentenced her to 90 days in jail. In 2006, police found more than 150 rabbits in Sakewitz’s home and dozens more rabbit bodies in freezers. | ” |
Only The Herald and The Guardian published the full, five-paragraph AP story. The Herald version was simply regurgitated, even the title was unchanged. Ottre 17:29, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I sincerely don't understand why the fact being "spread" should hamper the notability of the subject. Almost all newspaper rely on press agencies for most of their coverage, unless it's something gigantic. These newspapers found the news interesting enough to be reported, and all of these, among the hundreds of things covered by APs , chose that. To me that's a mark of notability -they simply had no need to rewrite the thing from scratch. --Cyclopia (talk) 19:20, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Come on. I completely understand the strong reaction on this article, but let's not pretend that the coverage is not extensive enough. NPR picked up the report from a local affiliate and gave it national coverage. And papers across the USA and UK picked it up from both AP, UPI, and Canadian Press stories. This is plainly sufficient coverage to establish notability. If this article fails (and I realize there are valid reasons why it may fail), it can't be on grounds that this is insufficient coverage to establish notability. I don't feel strongly about this lady's article staying on Wikipedia, but the arguments against it need to have integrity, and the argument that the press coverage is inadquate doesn't hold up. Cbl62 (talk) 20:37, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete So an AP hack wrote up a quirky news story, and some newspapers used the copy to fill a few column inches on a slow news day. Big deal. That doesn't equate to "global headline news" as one poster put it, still less historic significance. Newspapers don't have to aspire to being anything more than tomorrow's fish and chip paper; we should. This is what WP:BLP1E and WP:NOTNEWS were made for (even if there were two or three trivial events two or three years apart, the principle is still very much the same). Iain99Balderdash and piffle 17:59, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
On passing I would say if Cyclopedia was really that interested in wikipedia developing he would stop putting all his eggs into one basket, one small article and stop commenting on a losing battle and do work on expanding another article. This article never stood a chance of being kept and we have gone around in circles as many times as Miss Miriam has frozen rabbits. If you really care about wikipedia the encyclopedia work on some of our other 3,042,000 articles and just let it rest. I've told you you can incorporate a summary of this case into another general article, why don't you just do that and give up here, your argument is seen as very weak by most people commenting here for having a biography about this women. You can say you think wikipedia should be a repository of every story and person ever reported in the press but few agree with you, so there seems to be a consensus by the community that we don't want this sort of content in our encyclopedia. It really is not worth spending hours of your time arguing about this woman Cyclopedia. Stating upteen times that you believe she is notable is not going to change what most people think about the subject. If you are genuinely concerned that some psychiatrist or scholar would turn to wikipedia as a primary source and demand case studies your best bet would be to write a detailed article about Animal hoarding in the United States where you can include Bunny Lady and others of her ilk into a summarised article covering this subject, that would be more useful to scholars and more comprehensive than a short article about one person's arrest. Himalayan 19:50, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The personal attacks on Cyclopedia here and elsewhere are disturbing. He is advancing an intellectually honest defense of the project's notability standards. Those standards are important (much more important than the Sakewitz article in isolation). The defense of standards is most difficult with controversial cases like this. While I don't feel strongly about this particular article, the broader standards are important, and I admire Cyclopedia for sticking to an unpopular position. BTW, Himalayan, I think you've added as many words to this discussion as Cyclopedia, so while your comments about Cyclopedia spending undue time on this are unwarranted (IMO), they comments could apply equally to your own adamant opposition to the article. Let's just make a decision on this and move on without engaging in personal attacks. Cbl62 (talk) 20:44, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- My final note on this discussion. Regardless of which way this goes, there are 19 registered users who have voted Keep. So this is not such a clear-cut case as would warrant the statement that Cycolopedia's argument is "very weak" or deranged. Without the canvassing, who knows what the final vote count would have been? My point is that the dimissive comments about Cyclopedia's arguments are unwarranted. Cbl62 (talk) 20:50, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I thank Cbl62 for the nice words -thanks especially for acknowledging intellectual honesty. That said, I am probably taking this a bit too seriosuly, but I completely agree that the problem is not the article itself, but the inclusion standards and controversial cases like this are where it needs to be discussed -it makes no sense to policy the obvious. That said, could both of you be so kind to spell my username correctly? Cyclopedia is a nice nickname but it's not my own -it's Cyclopia actually, like this. Not that I care too much, but there is a User:Cyclopedia (check talk page) apparently, who is not me at all! Thanks. :) --Cyclopia (talk) 21:00, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I agree that Cyclopia doesn't show signs of acting in bad faith. I did say earlier that Cyclopia seemed to be wikilawyering, but I think that's easy to do when arguing policy, and it doesn't necessarily indicate bad faith. JohnWBarber (talk) 04:40, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I thank Cbl62 for the nice words -thanks especially for acknowledging intellectual honesty. That said, I am probably taking this a bit too seriosuly, but I completely agree that the problem is not the article itself, but the inclusion standards and controversial cases like this are where it needs to be discussed -it makes no sense to policy the obvious. That said, could both of you be so kind to spell my username correctly? Cyclopedia is a nice nickname but it's not my own -it's Cyclopia actually, like this. Not that I care too much, but there is a User:Cyclopedia (check talk page) apparently, who is not me at all! Thanks. :) --Cyclopia (talk) 21:00, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- My final note on this discussion. Regardless of which way this goes, there are 19 registered users who have voted Keep. So this is not such a clear-cut case as would warrant the statement that Cycolopedia's argument is "very weak" or deranged. Without the canvassing, who knows what the final vote count would have been? My point is that the dimissive comments about Cyclopedia's arguments are unwarranted. Cbl62 (talk) 20:50, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The personal attacks on Cyclopedia here and elsewhere are disturbing. He is advancing an intellectually honest defense of the project's notability standards. Those standards are important (much more important than the Sakewitz article in isolation). The defense of standards is most difficult with controversial cases like this. While I don't feel strongly about this particular article, the broader standards are important, and I admire Cyclopedia for sticking to an unpopular position. BTW, Himalayan, I think you've added as many words to this discussion as Cyclopedia, so while your comments about Cyclopedia spending undue time on this are unwarranted (IMO), they comments could apply equally to your own adamant opposition to the article. Let's just make a decision on this and move on without engaging in personal attacks. Cbl62 (talk) 20:44, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
3rd arbitrary break
- Keep
Delete Might be the first time I have supported a deletion.Sad and interesting case.However, I beleive neither the individual nor the event(s) are notable. I do not think that this would even be an article but for the new TV show Hoarders. This is a case of WP:NTEMP. This individual should not have a WP:BIO.Nolamgm (talk) 19:54, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I've never heard of that TV show, so no it doesn't exist due to that show. As to NTEMP, not really, as NTEMP says: "but it does not need to have ongoing coverage from news sources." Or basically what that section is for is that once notability is established, we don't delete it three years later because the media is no longer covering it. Though if you are going for short burst, and we have 2.5 year-long burst, how long of a burst do we need in your opinion, is it 5 years, 30 years? Aboutmovies (talk) 06:02, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- After rereading the polices and guidelines of WP, I have decided my !vote for deletion was in error. One of the problems with this, and any discussion on WP is our principle of WP:IGNORE. Users have policies and guidelines, but we are also free to ignore them if they prevent you from “improving or maintaining” WP. We also have the WP:NOTLAW policy and the guideline WP:GAME that says we should not be strict constructionist is applying the policies and guidelines. We also have a variety of essays that try to interpret the various policies and guidelines. Including one essay that tells us not to argue WP:ONLYESSAY or WP:ONLYGUIDELINE. To summarize: we have rules; follow them; not too strictly; but we are not anarchy.We are an online community with a goal to create an online encyclopedia. As even WP:NOTLAW states “[w]ritten rules do not themselves set accepted practice, but rather document already existing community consensus regarding what should be accepted and what should be rejected.” In this and any AfD we should be following the policies and guidelines. The first issue is notability. This individual meets out notability guideline. She has “received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject.” If it is notable then it is worthy of inclusion. This is where this and any AfD should end. Every other issue discussed deals with article name and writing style. The second issue whether the article violates the policy of WP:BLP. The article is not in violation of this policy. It is written in NPOV, it is not original research, and it is cited and verifiable. The third issue is whether the article violates the sub-policy of WP:BLP1E. Violation of this policy does not mandate deletion but only renaming. If the information itself is notable than it should be included. However this article does not require even renaming. It is not about one event. It is about multiple events: seizing the rabbits by police, stealing the rabbits back, conviction, and parole violation. This article should be kept. Nolamgm (talk) 22:02, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per WP:BLP1E and WP:109PAPERS. JohnCD (talk) 20:43, 26 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- You do know 109PAPERS is an essay and not a guideline/policy (and please don't give me WP:ONLYESSAY as an essay saying essays are great is rather circular), and even more importantly says: "Many stories are reported in the news just once on a single day, or over a period of a few days, and then are forgotten." (emphasis added), not a few years (or 2.5 years as is the case here). Which is also the BLP1E problem, but to each his own moral judgments. Aboutmovies (talk) 06:02, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes, I know 109PAPERS is an essay, but citing it saves having to write out at length all the many times it needs saying: "It's been in the papers a lot" does not necessarily imply "It is historically and encyclopedically notable and Wikipedia must have an article about it." JohnCD (talk) 09:55, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- IAR Delete. Arguably, this person passes our notability criteria - she has been the subject of significant coverage from multiple independent sources. However, that is not a good reason to keep the article, which is obviously inappropriate; rather, it is a reason for us to re-address our inclusion policy. Per WP:HARM, we shouldn't have articles on people like this. Just because much of the news media considers a person to be briefly notable, doesn't mean we should. We should be holding ourselves to a higher standard than that of tabloid journalism. Robofish (talk) 00:39, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Finally, a delete !vote that understands IAR is about the only answer here, but do note WP:HARM is an essay, which means it represents views as few as one individual, and the link to it along with the "do no harm" refrain were removed from BLP's lede long ago. Aboutmovies (talk) 06:02, 27 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I agree with Aboutmovies, this is the one line of argument that strikes me as worthy of consideration. I disagree, but would gladly have an open-minded discussion with someone who concedes that it's a case of IAR, rather than something that's required by existing policy, or morally obvious. Aboutmovies, I think you may have missed one or two !votes above that take this position; I don't think Robofish is the first, though he/she may be the first to explicitly name IAR. -Pete (talk) 23:58, 28 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Aboutmovies, based on your last two comments, you should likely read Wikipedia:What does 'per' mean?. The short end of it is, when an editor says "Per WP:XXX" or whatever, they don't necessarily mean "because XXX is a policy we must all follow". Usually what they mean is "because of the arguements made at page WP:XXX, which I will not rehash here in detail because you can click the bluelink and read them yourself." Essays, even those written by one person, can still make salient points which illuminate a discussion. Per "Wikipedia:What does 'per' mean?", arguements should not be dismissed because they reference an essay. --Jayron32 01:35, 28 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes, another essay. Problem is, unless the editor actually says which way they mean, we don't know, despite what the essay says. Many people do actually mean delete/keep/take this action per XXXX, and actually mean do so under the authority of that. I see it all the time. Which is why I personally try to say "see our XXXXESSAY on why we do/don't take this action." Kinda of like were are not supposed to just cite a essay/guideline/policy such as "Delete per WP:BLP1E and WP:109PAPERS". And yes essays can make points, but there is a reason they are not policies or guidleines, and that's because there has not been consensus to do so, and at AfD we are supposed to keep to policies and guidelines ("AfDs are a place for rational discussion of whether an article is able to meet Wikipedia’s article guidelines and policies."). Now, we can make exceptions, but to me simply citing an essay that is possibly a policy reject is not exactly the argument I would want to go with. Aboutmovies (talk) 07:19, 28 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I think it all boils down to clarity. There is nothing wrong in citing essays to condense one's rationale, but I agree that throwing BLP1E and 109PAPERS together like JohnCD did before is indeed a bit confusing, because it apparently puts both of them on the same level. One perhaps should be clearer saying "X per WP:POLICY_OR_GUIDELINE, and also I think WP:NICE_ESSAY is good advice". However, no need to get hot on this, I'd say. --Cyclopia - talk 10:33, 28 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- She's notable for keeping and freezing rabbits? I think this fails the guidelines at Wikipedia:Notability (criminal acts)#Perpetrators, although I suppose one could argue that the "execution of the crime" is indeed unusual. I struggle to see how this could be reworked to be about the criminal act of hoarding and freezing bunnies. Oh, we have an article on Animal hoarding!
Stub it and merge there. Nope, that'd be undue weight for that article. OK, I don't think someone should have a Wikipedia article solely for hoarding rabbits. Delete. Fences&Windows 23:10, 28 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Like many above, you are minimizing the factors that establish notability, and it makes your position far less convincing. This woman has been reported on not "solely for hoarding rabbits," but for repeatedly hoarding rabbits (I count four separate cases), and also for stealing rabbits from the police. If you want to persuade anybody, you'd do well to demonstrate that you've read and comprehended the article before !voting on its deletion. -Pete (talk) 23:58, 28 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.