Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bruce Marks

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. RL0919 (talk) 05:34, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Bruce Marks[edit]

[Hide this box] New to Articles for deletion (AfD)? Read these primers!

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

Bruce Marks was a state legislator that served for less than a year 20 years ago and has lost every other election he's run for. Marks was using this article for lengthy self-promotion since at least 2011, when he was doing it with an actual account, last contributing to it in June 2021. His private legal career is not of relevance, even if he did briefly file lawsuits in support of the former President of the United States. TL;DR: Fails basic WP:GNG and basic WP:V. Should never have been an article. KingForPA (talk) 05:31, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I forgot to add that it also fails WP:NPOL, WP:COI, and runs afoul of WP:INVALIDBIO! KingForPA (talk) 05:48, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions. Curbon7 (talk) 07:53, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Pennsylvania-related deletion discussions. Curbon7 (talk) 07:53, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy keep: You seem to have misread WP:NPOL. This subject easily passes that criterion as he was a state senator. Curbon7 (talk) 07:51, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
- A further point for the nominator: please do not remove wikilinks to this subject from other articles. Curbon7 (talk) 07:57, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  - Being a state senator for less than a term without significant media coverage merely meets the secondary criterion of NPOL. It does not, on its own, establish notability. Unless it can be demonstrated that he's had significant coverage outside of being loosely connected to the former President, he still fails to meet NPOL. To quote: Just being an elected local official, or an unelected candidate for political office, does not guarantee notability, although such people can still be notable if they meet the general notability guideline. Thanks! KingForPA (talk) 08:20, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    - KingForPA, You are completely disregarding criteria 1. "Politicians and judges who have held international, national, or (for countries with federal or similar systems of government) state/province–wide office, or have been members of legislative bodies at those levels.". It doesn't matter how long he served as a state legislator for, he could've served for a single day and he would still pass this criteria. Curbon7 (talk) 08:23, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      - Please see note 14: This is a secondary criterion. People who satisfy this criterion will almost always satisfy the primary criterion. This is not a case where the primary criterion is satisfied. Thanks! KingForPA (talk) 08:26, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
        KingForPA, In certain cases, like with WP:NFOOTY, consensus has dictated that barely passing that criteria is considered a fail. However, the community consensus regarding WP:NPOL is that a subject that passes it is ipso facto notable. See this recent AfD from a few days ago as an example: [1]. Curbon7 (talk) 08:36, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
        Well, no, I wasn't saying it barely passed, I was saying it didn't pass at all. If Marks counts as notable, then Wikipedians have a hell of a lot of work to do, seeing as numerous current members of the Pennsylvania General Assembly don't have an article. Maintaining this single article that consists entirely of self-promotion and content copied-and-pasted from a small number of sources, including several that fail verification, because a group of 4 people (including yourself) interpret NPOL as declaring state legislators automatically notable, seems like a cut and dry case of WP:BURO, unless more independent, verifiable sources can be located reasonably. KingForPA (talk) 08:51, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. We have lots of articles on elected officials who didn't serve a full term, because they died or resigned. Eastmain (talk • contribs) 10:44, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep passes WP:NPOL was a Pennsylvania State Senator.Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 16:17, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep held a seat in a parliament; that's enough to pass NPOL. Nothing to stop a concerned editor from cleaning up the peacockery. Regards, --Goldsztajn (talk) 21:51, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
SNOW keep – NPOL is interpreted to afford automatic notability for state senators such as Marks. And regardless, he has received significant media coverage: see [2], [3], [4], [5], etc. This is why NPOL exists: just because you don't see the sourcing right off the bat doesn't mean it isn't there. (Any issues with COIs or due weight can be dealt with through the ordinary processes; deletion is not cleanup.) Extraordinary Writ (talk) 00:19, 20 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep and clean up. I entirely agree that the article has a history of conflict-of-interest/promotional editing, but that in of itself is not a reason to delete if the subject is otherwise notable - which as a former US State Senator this person is. firefly ( t · c ) 10:36, 20 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Clear pass of WP:NPOL as a member of the Pennsylvania Senate. --Enos733 (talk) 15:43, 20 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Our rules for state legislators do not require the person to have completed any specific minimum number of terms to become notable enough for an article; if he's served in the legislature at all, then he's notable, because state legislators are one of those fields where it's extremely important, verging on mission critical, for us to be a complete and comprehensive reference for all of them. If there are COI problems here, they can be dealt through the normal editing process. And yes, one of the reasons we have SNGs like WP:NPOL in the first place, instead of just having WP:GNG alone, is precisely because there can be, and regularly is, a significant difference between the body of sourcing that exists and the subset of sourcing that Wikipedians have actually found and used (and that's especially true when a subject served in the 1990s and thus his sourcing might have to be retrieved from archived media coverage instead of just sitting out on the Google.) Bearcat (talk) 14:02, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment While I disagree with KingForPA's criteria for deletion, they bring up an important facet of this situation. If Marks has been using this for self-promotion, or it has become the target of those with an outside COI, it should probably be under some sort of page protection (or at the very least tagged with a POV warning). However, this is not the venue for that. Bkissin (talk) 15:01, 24 August 2021 (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.