Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Terry Van Horne

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 keep. Ron Ritzman (talk) 01:43, 27 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Terry Van Horne[edit]

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I am proposing this to AfD as the next step following a possibly questionable removal of a PROD. The PROD rationale was "concern = Article lacks NPOV - fails WP:BLP must be written conservatively and with regard for the subject's privacy. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a tabloid: it is not Wikipedia's job to be sensationalist, or to be the primary vehicle for the spread of titillating claims about people's lives, and the possibility of harm to living subjects must always be considered when exercising editorial judgment." The reason for the PROD removal was "I do not see the same issues as the nominator, I do not see it as anything other than the summary of events" without any further explanation or reference to Wikipedia policy. The PROD proposal is accurate, and to say that the article is not NPOV is putting it mildly. This article is not a biography - even broadly construed - it is an attack page. My first reaction was to consider removing all but the first two paragraphs of it. Of 9 sourced references, the majority are from the Post-Gazette, including pure opinion pieces and articles that are not even about the subject; two sources are merely copies of election results, one is a contact page from the House of Representatives, and another is a copy of the Pennsyvania Constitution. This Wkipedia article appears to be muck-raking and defamation in a gutter-press style practiced by some newspapers that achieve their sales from sensationalism. I advocate speedy deletion G10. This AfD however, will permit the community to decide. Kudpung (talk) 04:32, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep per WP:POLITICIAN members of state assemblies such as the Pennsylvania House of Representatives are deemed to be notable. If there are issues such as WP:NPOV and WP:UNDUE then those should be fixed within the article. For what it's worth I don't see these. Van Horne's rebuttal is included in the article and it does look on the surface that the controversy may have cost him a subsequent election so it's notable in the context of his political career. That however is something to discuss on the article's talk page. Deletion review isn't the place for fixing articles. Valenciano (talk) 06:14, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per my prod rationale that Kudpung has quoted above, Shift to Keep as Ray has done a nice repair job. ~~though without prejudice to creation of a more balanced bio as the subject is notable.~~ NB I previously prodded the article. Ϣere SpielChequers 09:12, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Pennsylvania-related deletion discussions. -- Kudpung (talk) 04:35, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politics-related deletion discussions. -- Kudpung (talk) 04:36, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions. -- Kudpung (talk) 04:37, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - Article needs to be balanced out, but just as Wikipedia should not be a venue for attack pages, neither should it be a venue for hagiography and the sweeping of unsavory tidbits under the rug. Resolve this problem through normal editing process. Carrite (talk) 16:34, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. The issues raised by the nominator can be fixed by editing, without requiring deletion, with, if necessary, oversight or revision deletion or whatever it's called these days. The nominator's first reaction in this case was the correct one, rather than the call for deletion of an article on a notable subject. Phil Bridger (talk) 16:51, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Cleanup was not particularly difficult. Severe NPOV issues on articles about notable subjects should only be a cause for deletion when they cross the WP:ATP threshold. This was not the case here. Ray^Talk 21:23, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per WP:POLITICIAN. Kudos to Ray for fixing-up this one. Location (talk) 20:32, 21 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, no items so bad as to require wholesale deletion of an article about a clearly notable subject. Would suggest restoring the Veon bit; as someone who lived in Beaver County while Veon's time in office was ending and time in trouble was starting, I can testify that this is an important element in regional politics that shouldn't be left out, and the fact that Van Horne hasn't had any legal trouble about it means that it's not problematic from the NPOV angle. Nyttend (talk) 22:53, 22 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Subject clearly meets WP:POLITICIAN. POV problems are a reason for clean up, not deletion. Edward321 (talk) 00:10, 23 October 2010 (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.