Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Harry Whittington (2nd nomination)

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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. Although the majority of participants favoured "redirect", I feel this one is "no consensus" for the following reasons. The Devil's Advocate highlighted a number of sources that might confer notability beyond WP:BLP1E. There might have been a clearer case for "keep" if some of these were in the article so that it is was clear what aspect of the subject's claimed notability could be verified. Sadly they are not, the only two references in the article outside the section on the hunting accident have titles that make it clear that they are actually about the hunting accident and other information is incidental. Counter-arguments to TDA's proffered sources concentrated mostly on the Washington Post article and I find that their arguments pretty much destroy the validity of this source as a means of establishing notability beyond BLP1E. Also TLD's claim that there is frequent state-wide coverage of the subject was not supported by providing any references. However, TLD did provide two book sources. The delete camp did not really counter these, concentrating on the Washington Post article, but it also has to be said that the keep camp did not make as much of them as they could either. The Trials of Eroy Brown has limited preview in gbooks, but Texas Tough: The Rise of America's Prison Empire does not. However, the latter book seems to have significantly more coverage than the first and is on a more directly relevant subject. Texas Tough is, however, previewable at Amazon. The contents of these two books, together with the failure of the delete camp to provide any credible counter-argument to them, has swung me round to "no consensus". SpinningSpark 19:42, 22 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Harry Whittington[edit]

AfDs for this article:
Harry Whittington (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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The last time around, people claimed that there was other coverage beyond his participation in a hunting accident. The article doesn't testify to this, but to the opposite: every citation, without exception, is to an article referring to the accident. My reading of the article text is that his accomplishments are routine and typical of civil servants whom we would not ordinarily consider notable. Therefore WP:BLP1E applies and he should only see mention in Dick Cheney hunting incident. Mangoe (talk) 01:35, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Texas-related deletion discussions. czar · · 02:55, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. czar · · 02:55, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Events-related deletion discussions. czar · · 02:55, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep This particular accident was one of the wierd individual events which will remain sufficiently important to make the participant notable. It doesn't happen often, but it does happen. DGG ( talk ) 03:34, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Great, so when someone puts up Dick Cheney hunting incident for deletion you can go an argue that. But that isn't a reason to keep this article. IRWolfie- (talk)
  • Redirect to Dick Cheney hunting incident. The subject of the article may have had some mention in sources for his legal activities, but his notability apparently comes from his involvement in the hunting incident. WP:BLP1E appears to apply. --Kinu t/c 03:57, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Ugh, I would have preferred that this not be restored with this version, because the guy actually was of some interest before the Vice President shot him in the face. There is some significant coverage pre-shooting, with the overwhelming majority being sources that are behind paywalls. Subsequent to the shooting there have been significant mentions in books that are not about the shooting incident and only one of them mentions it. Additionally, he did an in-depth interview with the Washington Post four years after the event with a large portion talking about him in general.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 05:44, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not seeing this. The oldest version of the article says, in its entirety, "Harry Whittington is an Austin, Texas-based attorney who was accidentally shot by United States Vice-President Dick Cheney in a hunting accident on February 12, 2006." It was started, as anyone could have guessed, on February 12, 2006. My impression is that, while there is some coverage of him, it is largely local in impact and typical of what you might see for a high-but-not-top ranking layer/politico; it tends to read not "here's this interesting guy, who by the way got shot by Cheney," but rather "we would like people to think of this guy as something beyond the victim of an accident." And the way I see most people tending to read the article is "texas lawyer, political guy—oh yeah! He's that guy that Dick Cheney shot!" Mangoe (talk) 12:35, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Frequent state-wide coverage is more than enough to establish notability independent of him being shot in the face. I would be sympathetic to the "only local coverage" comment if "local" meant a specific small community, maybe even a specific large city, but to suggest that coverage in multiple major news outlets across a state is "local" coverage insufficient to establish notability is absurd.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 15:29, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment on possible outcomes: This fellow is the third Harry Whittington we talk about (see Harry Whittington (disambiguation)) so I don't see redirection to the incident as an outcome. If the article is not kept, Harry Whittington will need to redirect to or be replaced by the current disambiguation page, which will then link to the hunting accident article. If it is kept, I think there is still a strong argument for moving him to Harry Whittington (politician) and moving the current disambiguation page to the unqualified name. Even if he's the best known of the three, I would argue that his level of accomplishment is comparable to if not exceeded by the others. Mangoe (talk) 12:35, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I should remind people that BLP1E applies to low profile individuals. He did an interview with the Washington Post years after the incident, so clearly he is not maintaining a low-profile. Even if the one event aspect of BLP1E applied, which it really does not, that would still not be a valid rationale for deletion.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 15:29, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
And was the apparent interview about the Hunting accident? IRWolfie- (talk) 07:59, 10 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect isn't merge. IRWolfie- (talk) 08:00, 10 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. I think there's enough notability and enough sources here to warrant having a biographical article separate from the "incident" article. Everyking (talk) 19:18, 9 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • To respond to your comment above, the interview blatantly disproves any notion that BLP1E applies, even if we somehow ignored all the pre-event coverage of him as a state official or post-event coverage that has nothing to do with the event. BLP1E only applies to low-profile individuals and choosing to do an interview with the Washington Post years after the event is most definitely not indicative of someone seeking to be low-profile. Pursuit of high-level state positions is also indicative of him not being a low-profile individual.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 14:28, 10 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
To the degree I even buy into the way the guideline tries to make a distinction, it seems obvious to me that a "whatever happened to BLP1E subject" interview doesn't turn someone into a high-profile figure. At any rate most of the article is about the accident and his recovery from it; a fairly small section is devoted to the property condemnation case, but surely such condemnation struggles are commonplace. The title suggests a certain wistfulness about not being a better known figure. Mangoe (talk) 15:18, 10 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yep, the reason the interview is there is because he was the guy who was shot. If someone else was shot they would have interviewed them. IRWolfie- (talk) 15:27, 10 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Look at the sources I provided and it is clear he is notable for more than being shot in the face. See WP:POLITICIAN. However, the reason BLP1E talks about a low profile is because of a consideration that someone who is not seeking out the attention given to him or her by reliable sources doesn't wish to be notable and thus should not be considered notable just for a connection to a single event. Doing an interview with a major national press outlet four years after the event, during a new administration, is hardly consistent with someone wishing to maintain a low profile. The simple reality is that BLP1E doesn't apply because he is notable for more than just one event given his prior career in government and hasn't maintained a low-profile given that he did an interview with a major national press outlet four years after the event.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 22:26, 10 May 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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