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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 no consensus. A discussion about a merger may be a good way forward. Mark Arsten (talk) 23:13, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

German Acupuncture Trials

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German Acupuncture Trials (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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There is insufficient depth and breadth of secondary coverage to warrant a standalone article on this topic (a number of clinical trials on acupuncture in the 2000s). After deletion, a mention of them might be considered for the main acupuncture article, though with other later trials being cited there it is not clear if they would even deserve a mention. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 06:43, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is an article about 3 very large RCTs which were instigated at the behest of a number of German statutory health insurances. They are notable because on the basis of their result (among other), the Federal Joint Committee (Germany) decided to reimburse acupuncture treatment for low back pain and knee pain. We have one reliable secondary source and three reliable primary sources here. There also is an article about this at the German Wikipedia since ages... User:Alexbrn and User:QuackGuru are trying to take this article apart because of anti-acupuncture bias. They already deleted most of the article on the grounds that the sources were not reliable (the primary ones because they are primary, the secondary one - from the Federal Joint Committee itself - because it allegedly was not independent), without consensus. I've appealed to the Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard already, but the case is still pending. --Mallexikon (talk) 06:56, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak keep. The article is a pitful stub, but it shows reliable refs, and Google Book search for "German Acupuncture Trials" gives a number of reliably looking hits. I think the topic could be expanded beyond a stub, and likely has inherent notability. German speakers may be able to comment on German sources. Ping me if there are any major developments and I can revise my vote. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 07:44, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'd like to point out that it was Alexbrn himself who reduced the article to a stub right before he tried to have it deleted. And there was no consensus about his deletion of sourced material. The discussion about the unreliability of the sources he alleges has just started. --Mallexikon (talk) 08:38, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. Removing 90% of referenced article's content, and then AfD-ing it, is problematic enough that a user conduct discussion may be merited somewhere else. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 08:55, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would support this. petrarchan47tc 18:43, 22 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note that your iVote was marked as Delete in the Stats. petrarchan47tc 18:43, 22 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Would be happy with Blue and Scray's suggestion. However once it is summarized it can likely be merged into a section on "society and culture" in the accupucture article.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 03:37, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep, as it is notable for its direct consequences in the German health care system and the huge debate it triggered. There's sufficient secondary sourcing. And WP:COATHOOK hardly applies since these trials showed quite clearly that verum and sham acupuncture had the same efficiency - which puts it at odds with the beliefs of Traditional Chinese medicine. --Mallexikon (talk) 13:26, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete, Wikipedia is WP:NOT news; if this information is eventually covered by reliable secondary reviews, it will then be incorporated into acunpuncture. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:31, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • Reinforce my stance per Bluerasberry, delete and merge the negligible policy content to acupuncture. There is no reason to keep a lot of what most certainly is a medical article because of some press on societal/policy impact. For that, we have WP:MEDMOS#Sections, which allows for a "Society and culture" section in medical articles. Keeping a coatrack will ... keep it a coatrack. What content can be salvaged can be included in the appropriate section at acupuncture. There is unlikely to be more to say on this topic than the policy/societal impact, so the acupuncture article can accommodate that. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:39, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
However, if the article is kept and once the primary sources are deleted it might be merged into the acupuncture article. We would have to evaluate the article based on secondary sources. QuackGuru (talk) 04:04, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Germany-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 19:29, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Events-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 19:29, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Law-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 19:29, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Medicine-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 19:30, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. Ample evidence of effect on insurance coverage makes it notable; I'm less equipped to judge medical notability, but the NHS reference, for one, suggests it may also be notable in that area. Yngvadottir (talk) 19:46, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately, the "NHS" content had been added to the article in a misleading way. The NHS runs an information service called "NHS Choices" which routinely reacts items of medical news; here it was giving an equivocal response (not the sure "conclusion" as was written in the article). In reality the NHS position comes from guidance published by the National Institute of Clinical Excellence, and this draws no more on GERAC than on any other set of evidence. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 05:09, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete and incorporate into acupuncture; it's because of the latter/parent topic that the trials are notable. -- Scray (talk) 20:21, 20 November 2013 (UTC) Keep based on User:Bluerasberry's formulation below (i.e. remove inadequately-sourced medical content, and focus on sociopolitical impact of the trials, where their notability rests). -- Scray (talk) 16:20, 23 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment this is currently a massive WP:FRINGE failure by relegating criticism to the bottom of the article. It does also appear to be overly detailed. WP:FRINGE says we need to appropriately marginalise pseudoscience, so delete is my view. Barney the barney barney (talk) 20:26, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep: Regardless of any scientific merit of the study, the impact on German insurance policy appears to be notable and well-documented. Balance issues should be dealt with on the article talkpage, not AfD. --Carnildo (talk) 02:28, 21 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep but the article does need changes. It should be kept because these clinical trials are notable - the Spiegel and Focus articles are reliable sources and supplemented by others which also seem to be good. This article should not have coverage of acupuncture or opinions on acupuncture - it should only talk about the results of this trial and how those results have been used to influence policy in Germany. This is not a medical article - rather this is an article about a clinical trial and its impact on society and politics. All information without a citation should be removed. Content which is cited only to the report of the research study itself or other primary sources should be removed. Other people in this RfD claim that this article makes statements about acupuncture which are unrelated to this study - if those are here then they should be removed, but I do not see them. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:43, 21 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Bluerasberry wrote: "Content which is cited only to the report of the research study itself or other primary sources should be removed." ← yes, but does that leave us with any more than some contemporary news reports/reaction and a few mentions subsequently? I fear not - not enough for a standalone article anyway ... Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 05:40, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Alexbrn, if it does, then that is sufficient. The articles in Spiegel and Focus are enough to carry this because those are major publications talking about a topic of public interest. There are more sources besides those. This is a project which has been in the news repeatedly for more than five years, has been promoted by multiple organizations which heavily influence health policy, has affected millions of people, and which has consumed 7 million euros for the project and many more millions in the reaction. Cutting away the primary sources leaves a lot. I have to backtrack about saying no primary sources at all because I reconsidered that Germany might have no equivalent of the United States clinicaltrials.gov to give a third-party opinion about the minimal amount of information which the public ought to have when clinical research is happening in their community. I would want this article and all articles on clinical trials to include study specifications which define the research, but that would not contribute to notability or influence any deletion discussions. If the article is worth keeping then a bit of reference data is worth including, from primary sources or otherwise. Blue Rasberry (talk) 11:29, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Bluerasberry, are you familiar with the "Society and culture" section per Wikipedia:MEDMOS#Sections ? For what reason would the negligible salvageable text about policy not be included in a Society and culture section at acupuncture? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:42, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This is not an article about a medical topic so medmos does not apply in that way. All the medicine can be stripped out of this article and a major research project remains, and one can still talk about participants, funding, media reactions, and many other things having nothing to do with medical practices. This article should not make medical claims about acupuncture, so medmos guidelines about keeping medical content out of non-medical articles do apply. Users should go to acupuncture to read about the medicine. Blue Rasberry (talk) 12:45, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
You say it is not an article about a medical topic but the current article is a medical article about the trial itself. Using a source to describe itself is obviously a gross WP:WEIGHT violation. The GERAC trial itself is being used in the article to describe the trial itself. We must use sources independent on the subject matter. Using a primary study from six years ago is obviously a gross WP:MEDRS violation. Editors think it is okay to use any source they like and continue to ignore policy. The primary sources are being misused to describe in extreme detail about the trial itself, among other low level details. The article is littered with too many primary sources that do not show it is notable. For example, The Joint Fed. Committee is a primary source because they were part of the event. Even if the The Joint Fed. Committee was a WP:SECONDARY source there are now newer sources on the topic. That means The Joint Fed. Committee fails MEDRS and SECONDARY. The Joint Fed. Committee study is also being used to discuss the trial itself. The article should be mainly about how the results of the trial influenced policy in Germany. The trial itself in not what this article is supposed to be about. The details about the trials itself is not notable and not the direction of an encyclopedia entry. Editors have turned the article into their own personal WP:COATHOOK article. An editor thinks identifying a primary source is pointy. The editor's explanation on the talk page makes no sense. All the medicine cannot be stripped out of this article because editors at the article think it is a medical article. If the non-notable medical claims are removed from the article there may only be a few sources on how a clinical trial impacted the society and politics. The current state of the article makes it impossible for editors at the AFD to determine if the topic is notable. Two articles in Spiegel and Focus are not enough to claim this article is notable. Again, the primary sources are being used in this article to make statements about the acupuncture trial itself to discuss medical information that is unrelated to how a clinical trial impacted society and politics. Do you see the unrelated medical information and do you think that information must be removed? QuackGuru (talk) 18:33, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
QuackGuru (talk · contribs) is right. WP:FRINGE. Barney the barney barney (talk) 18:43, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I have heard this from another anti-acupuncture editor as well: Acupuncture allegedly is WP:FRINGE - since "WP:FRINGE applies to all Alternative medicine articles on WP by definition" [1]. Without being an acupuncture proponent, I strongly object to this view. I mean, just read the Acupuncture#Pain section: there's over half a dozen meta-reviews there finding evidence that acupuncture is effective. I personally agree that the clinical benefit is too small to bother. But how can you compare this to things like Creationism? --Mallexikon (talk) 02:51, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I am not "anti-acupuncture" but I am anti-quack (which is relevant, I suppose). So, you are saying that a medical system that claims to cure a wide variety of human ailments by sticking needles into certain parts of the body to control an undetectable energy called "qi" is not fringe? Seriously .. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 09:01, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Primary sources are continuing to be dumped all over the article to make medical claims that is unrelated to the impact on society and politics. Blue Rasberry, do you support the primary sources being use to make medical claims? Editors think the article is about the trial itself and not necessarily about "how a clinical trial impacted society". QuackGuru (talk) 19:12, 24 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
QG, the Federal Joint Committee (Germany) is an independent body that decides over which therapies are reimbursable by the statutory health insurances in Germany and which not. It did not set up the GERAC trials or even ask for them. I explained this to you a couple of times already now: [2], [3], [4]. The report they published about the GERAC trials thus is a secondary source - and probably the most important one in this article since based on this report, they decided that acupuncture is reimbursable (in certain conditions). --Mallexikon (talk) 02:09, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
See WP:SECONDARY: Primary sources are original materials that are close to an event, and are often accounts written by people who are directly involved. The dated Joint Fed. Committee report is part of the event because they decided to reimburse acupuncture treatment for low back pain and knee pain. That makes them a primary source because they are part of the event. The low level details about the trial itself are not important because this is not supposed to be a medical article. QuackGuru (talk) 02:28, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
God damn it! The Federal Joint Committee is the body that approves what new cancer medication will be paid for by the statutory health insurances next year! They are NOT part of GERAC, the just reviewed and evaluated them (together with a couple of other acupuncture trials)! What "event" do you keep mumbling about? --Mallexikon (talk) 03:30, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
There seems to be consensus here that if this article stays, it should focus on the historical event which was the granting of a certain status to acupuncture in Germany which qualified it as eligible for insurance claims. The committee that was central to this decision was a prime participant and the documents it emitted are primary documents. We need secondary sources with independent commentary on what happened. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 09:10, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see a problem in using an independent source other than the Federal Joint Committee regarding information about the FJC's own decisions. But regarding GERAC itself, the FJC's paper constitutes a highly reliable secondary source (a review of several acupuncture trials, actually). Why are you trying to deny this? --Mallexikon (talk) 11:17, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's not independent of the events and so far from ideal except maybe for the most mundane facts, or things which are otherwise validated by good secondary sources; for anything in the biomedical space (details of the trials e.g.) it fails WP:MEDRS and cannot be used. (But as has been said by others, there should be no biomedical content in this article anyway). Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 11:40, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
There is an article about Healthcare in Germany. The section about Healthcare in Germany#Regulation can cover how the trial impacted healthcare in Germany. It is redundant to have a separate article about the trials unless you want to keep a Wikipedia:COATHOOK article. QuackGuru (talk) 00:50, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Here is another example of primary sources used in the article to discuss the trial itself. Any attempt to delete any medical information about the trial itself is being restored. So this is not an article about "how a clinical trial impacted society". QuackGuru (talk) 01:34, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Is there anyone still questioning the notability of the article? The entire discussion seems to have gone off track and I don't see how this is supposed to be a coatrack article as you claim, since it only describes these studies and the consequences of them. -A1candidate (talk) 10:49, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's a coat rack. Take for example the statement (in Wikipedia's voice, mark you) that the osteoperosis osteoarthritis trial result "amounts to significant superiority of acupuncture and sham acupuncture over standard treatment, but no statistical significant efficacy difference between real and sham acupuncture". This is an out-of-date medical trial being laundered through a non-WP:MEDRS source, in the face of subsequent reliable secondary medical commentary (Howick) which tells us that trials such as these cannot reliably be used to deduce clinically significant results. What we have in this article is a smörgåsbord of bogus health information and POV-pushing; this needs to go. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 11:53, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Did you mean "osteoarthritis" instead of "osteoperosis"? In any case, the sentence which you're quoting appears to be taken from the results of the trials. Whether these results are out-of-date or not isn't the issue here. -A1candidate (talk)
QED. This article is being used to relay poor-quality biomedical information, which runs counter to Wikipedia's aim to ensure that "biomedical information in all types of articles be based on reliable, third-party, published sources and accurately reflect current medical knowledge". Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 12:15, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
QuackGuru - Yes, I confirm, the primary sources used in this article and the information they reference ought to be removed. Alexbrn also raises serious and valid concerns that this article has problems, including these:
  • the trials' results have been disproven
  • this information is outdated
  • medical claims are made here contrary to MEDRS
  • this article is not NPOV
  • the article itself is written in a way which does not correctly interpret the sources
  • primary sources are being used inappropriately
  • acupuncture itself is not based on a scientifically sound premise
  • "This article is being used to relay poor-quality biomedical information"
I will grant all of these points. The only counterpoint I have to all of these is that the subject of this article has gotten significant coverage in reliable sources written by authors who are independent of the subject. None of the concerns stated address this article's meeting Wikipedia's inclusion criteria or constitute an exclusion criteria. As A1candidate says, the concerns posed are not addressing the notability of the subject of this article. Blue Rasberry (talk) 12:18, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
To be clear, the primary sources are only being used to discuss acupuncture medical information about the trials itself. The current version is definitely a coathook. After the medical information that describes the trial itself is removed, it can be merged into Healthcare in Germany#Regulation and/or acupuncture. It is notable to discuss the outcome of the trials at the Healthcare in Germany article but there is no reason to have duplicate information in a separate article. There is not a decent paragraph about the outcome of the trials in Healthcare in Germany#Regulation. Once the coathook information is removed there may only be left a small paragraph. The result in the end will likely be a merge. QuackGuru (talk) 18:42, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps this should be merged. I propose this:
  1. Settle this deletion discussion.
  2. If it is kept, purge content inappropriate for inclusion into Wikipedia.
  3. If it is kept, then after content is purged, consider the merge.
I feel that content needs to be pulled. I am not sure what the article will look like after that, and I see no reason to try to imagine this before the deletion discussion is settled. The merge would be determined by how much content is here; if what is left would be WP:UNDUE to put anywhere else then it should stay here. If the article is kept then I will be around to clean the mess, and I would also talk by phone or Skype with anyone who wishes to talk to make the cleanup more expedient. Blue Rasberry (talk) 19:42, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The problems can be fixed but it will be difficult to purge content inappropriate for the article when there are very determined editors who want to keep the current article as is with all the coathook material. We agree that the possible merge would be determined by how much content is left after the text is summarised. QuackGuru (talk) 20:32, 25 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The main problem here is going to be determining which sources can be used for what. As it is right now, the strategy of QG and Alexbrn seems to be to impeach as many sources as possible in order to keep the article a stub... In the discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#GERAC it has been pointed out repeatedly that primary sources are not forbidden in general, but merely need to be used carefully. GQ and Alebrn don't seem to be able to accept this consensus. On top of that, they are stubbornly trying to impeach the Federal Joint Committee report with ever-changing and abstruse arguments (alleging it is primary when it clearly is secondary, alleging it is biased when it clearly is independent, alleging it is too old when WP:MEDDATE clearly doesn't apply). --Mallexikon (talk) 01:43, 26 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This is not a medical article about the acupuncture trials. You created an unintentional WP:POVFORK. The Federal Joint Committee report is being used to discuss the trial itself. Discussing the details about the trial itself creates a WP:COATHOOK. Mallexikon believes this is a medical article about acupuncture information.
There is not a decent paragraph in Healthcare in Germany#Regulation, Regulation of acupuncture#Germany or Acupuncture. The content can be merged into the other articles.
See WP:REDUNDANTFORK: "Content forking can be unintentional or intentional. Although Wikipedia contributors are reminded to check to make sure there is not an existing article on the subject before they start a new article, there is always the chance they will forget, or that they will search in good faith but fail to find an existing article, or simply flesh out a derivative article rather than the main article on a topic. Wikipedia's principle of assume good faith should be kept in mind here. If you suspect a content fork, give the creator of a duplicate article the benefit of the doubt. Check with people who watch the respective articles and participate in talk page discussions to see if the fork was deliberate. If the content fork was unjustified, the more recent article should be merged back into the main article." QuackGuru (talk) 17:58, 26 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note. The article is littered with dated sources, original research, text that the failed verification, and unimportant low level details. This is a big mess. QuackGuru (talk) 19:52, 26 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note. The editor who started the article in 2011 said today: What concerns? And why debate them here? The editor continues to think there are no concerns with the article. QuackGuru (talk) 03:24, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
No. I merely asked you what concerns you were talking about, and why you start debating them at the RS noticeboard... --Mallexikon (talk) 04:36, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think the German Acupuncture Trials#Overview section is a WP:WEIGHT violation, among other violations. Do you think there is any coatrack information or excessive details in the article? If yes, what specific information do you think should be deleted. QuackGuru (talk) 20:09, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I filed a report at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive820#GERAC but it was largely ignored. --Mallexikon (talk) 01:47, 26 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. Notable topic covered by significant sources. Nominator DOESNTLIKEIT. The whole tactic of "let's remove the content and sources and then claim the article doesn't have enough content and sources" was pulled on Monsanto-related articles recently by the usual suspects. It's petty, transparent, and intellectually dishonest. Viriditas (talk) 05:35, 27 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. With regard to comments by Mallexikon and GregJackP above: note that the article does not appear to have been in a nuked state while or immediately prior to the AfD nomination, as the content was restored 23:35, 19 November 2013‎ and Alexbrn nominated it 06:43, 20 November 2013. There have only been a few much smaller edits since then. Please avoid casting bad faith accusations (although I don't mean that as a ringing endorsement of Alexbrn). I largely agree with Doc James and Sandy above. The reality is that if we dig deep enough, we can have articles on a very large variety of things, but is it really a well-organized way to present information? As editors we need to figure out how to organize our content so that we can make it highly effective, accurate, and useful. We can summarize these trials at the acupuncture and the few people who want to get into the really nitty gritty can drill down by following the sources. For those who might say I just want to remove this coverage of acupuncture, I'll just point out that if I didn't like acupuncture, I might very well want the page to remain. The results suggest that the effectiveness of acupuncture is basically no more than sham acupuncture; there are flavors of sham but in this case the needles were hardly stuck in—meaning that it is almost entirely an expectancy effect. II | (t - c) 07:39, 27 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I think it was in the nuked stated when I AfD'd it - but I'm now confused as I see only 3 edits for the 19th Nov, and none are at 23:35. However the assumption of bad faith from editors who should know better is disappointing. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 10:44, 27 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It was nuked on 20-Nov at 6:19 [5], then nominated for deletion at 6:43 [6]. I reverted the nukeandpave at 7:00 [7]. QuackGuru nuked the article again at 7:06 [8]. When I reverted again [9], Alexbrn reverted once more and politely informed me that edit warring may lead to a block [10]. When I complained at AN/I about the nuking of sourced material, Alexbrn's response was "I think you mean "of poorly-sourced material" - good stuff eh? We're here to improve Wikipedia, after all ..." [11]. Anyway, judging from the lack of feedback at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive820#GERAC I can only conclude that his behavior is deemed acceptable. --Mallexikon (talk) 04:33, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's not acceptable at all, and if this was brought to arbcom, they would call it disruptive and tendentious. Viriditas (talk) 09:46, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Disruptive? You will have noticed the text displayed above the edit box you used to enter your text: "commenting on other users rather than the article is also considered disruptive". However, since you raise this .... I appreciate you have some expertise on Wikipedia's sanctions, having been on the receiving end yourself for your personalized attacks on other editors (which still appears to be unfortunately an issue) - but it would be a foolish person indeed who would predict how Arbcom would react to any given situation. This article was full of poorly-sourced and undue medical and quasi-medical content that fell afoul of WP's policies and guidelines and my removal of it improved Wikipedia. We're going to get back to that improved state, but it's just we're now going the "long way round" by going through AfD: such are the ways of consensus. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 10:06, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, disruptive, as in, there is a rough consensus that you have disrupted yet another article topic by engaging in the same duplicitous tactics as previously noted in the Monsanto-related topic area. This is not a coincidence, and if arbcom was able to see the entire pattern of behavior by you and the usual suspects, they would agree with me. You aren't fooling anyone. Viriditas (talk) 10:43, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Gosh - it's a devastating case, falling short only in not being backed by facts. AFAIR I have never nominated any Monsanto article for deletion nor stubbed any. Clue: WP:TINC. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 10:50, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe not, but it isn't hard to find a tendentious edit at March Against Monsanto, like this one. I have seen nothing but this type of editing from you, and am very concerned by this. Though you may not have nominated the article for deletion, you voted for it, saying "Delete and merge core content to Genetically modified food controversies. While the topic is notable enough for a section in a larger topic, the lack (?)of multiple high-quality sourcing does not justify a standalone article, and in fact risks erecting a coatrack for pro- and contra- POVs ... which is what we have seen in the edit history here." Alexbrn 6 August 2013 petrarchan47tc 22:19, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. The extensive discussion of the methodology of the trials makes this an article subject to MEDRS. Then that the trials have been discredited would need inclusion etc. The level of notability warrants only some mention in the Healthcare in Germany article as separate edit not a merge. This article would deteriorate into a discussion of methodology for scientific medical studies. If someone can point to substantial discussion of the impact of these trials in multiple quality RS my opinion might changed, but then the article would need a great deal of editing, which IMO would lead to it being a subject better included in Healthcare in Germany. - - MrBill3 (talk) 10:22, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
"MEDRS" is a content guideline; nothing is "subject" to it. Please stop elevating guidelines to policies. If you would like to make it a policy, then follow the procedure. The level of notability is such that the German article calls it "the world's largest prospective, randomized study on the efficacy of acupuncture". It has also been called the most influential and controversial study of its kind. The number of sources on this topic is numerous. It's bizarre to see editors questioning this over and over again. Finally, the quality of a notable article does not lend any weight towards deletion, and is an argument to avoid. The bad arguments in favor of deletion here seem to disappear into nothing when you take a closer look. It's just IDONTLIKEIT covered in treacle. Viriditas (talk) 10:58, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
You have presented convincing arguments supported by more in depth study of the article. I am changing my vote to Keep. There is adequate support for notability. In response: there is wide consensus on MEDRS, my apologies for phrasing that implied it was a policy. When consensus supports following a guideline in an article it is appropriate to follow it for that article. As suggested I will look into having MEDRS become a policy. You are correct a notable article that needs improvement should be improved not AfD'd. This article needs substantial editing but that is a topic for its talk page. Thank you for your input (not so much for your tone). - - MrBill3 (talk) 11:30, 28 November 2013 (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.
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