Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Colorado Springs church shooting

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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 keep. krimpet✽ 04:20, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Colorado Springs church shooting[edit]

Colorado Springs church shooting (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)
  • Keep

1) Developing event, seems notable at the moment 2) why is this article less worthy of wikipedia the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arvada_missionary_shooting 3) Geeting a lot of attention in the news right now major discovery may make it more notable --Java7837 (talk) 23:00, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]


  • Keep as above. Needs work though. ''[[User:Kitia|Kitia]]'' (talk) 23:01, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete for God's sake. This belongs on Wikinews, read the damn thing. It's just another shooting, "On Sunday" as in today. Take it to Wikinews where it belongs, and if there is lasting cultural or historical impact then that will become apparent in time. Guy (Help!) 23:09, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Addendum: see wikinews:Four people shot outside New Life Church in Colorado Springs, USA - you can edit there as well. That's the place for this story. Guy (Help!) 23:13, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge to something. Wikipedia is filled with people who want to be the first to create an article or the first to nominate one for deletion. While the heartfelt response is to vote to keep, it isn't going to matter one bit to the families of the victims whether the crime becomes a Wikipedia article. There will be other occasions today where four or more people die a violent death, but CNN and Fox will not find those to be newsworthy. Mandsford (talk) 23:50, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Transwiki or merge to Wikinews. :-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:01, 10 December 2007 (UTC) Wikinews FTW![reply]
  • Delete not being cynical but one two deaths do not establish notability, unlike the 9 dead in Nebraska earlier in the week that did establish notability at afd. Thanks, SqueakBox 05:28, 10 December 2007 (UTC)Merge with [[New Life Shooting, clearly more notable than appeared yesterday. Thanks, SqueakBox 05:31, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak delete, per SqueakBox. We probably don't want to include every shooting where a single person dies. However, it wouldn't be terrible if the article's kept, since it's clearly verifiable, well-documented, and a least semi-notable. Superm401 - Talk 05:38, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
A merge with Arvada missionary shooting may be a good idea. Superm401 - Talk 05:40, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I suggested that on both talk pages, if in fact the events are linked. Which then makes them more notable due to the scope of the event. My vote is Keep. Chris (talk) 05:44, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Note-Colorado Springs and Arvada police are working together at this hour, so they see a possible connection too. Chris (talk) 05:45, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • They are looking if there is a possible connection, they didn't see any yet. Secret account 05:48, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
relax, dude, nobody said otherwise. You don't have to comment each time someone votes to keep. Chris (talk) 05:59, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of Colorado-related deletions. —Chris (talk) 06:04, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of Christianity-related deletions. —Chris (talk) 06:07, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.221.239.26 (talk) 06:07, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep, notability established by the media coverage. Merge with the other incident if and after connection is found.--Vsion (talk) 06:31, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Until a Later AfD to Review as it is a developing story; we cannot approach this AfD if not enough time has passed to determine its notability. Let us reconvene in 6-12 months and reconsider this AfD. On a side note, there are many articles on Wikinews, but I have noticed that Wikinews spends a great deal of time before fully publishing articles on noteworthy events days after it happened. In those days, with thousands of visitors, people have to depend on the Wikipedia article. Do not believe that having only one source of information on Meta-Wiki is necessary. Zidel333 (talk) 12:31, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Part of the problem is that Wikinews is short on contributors; people write news on Wikipedia and there are only a small core of contributors on Wikinews. They could use some help. --David Shankbone 19:11, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Keep, This is a very notable shooting when coupled with the Arvada Missionary Shooting. We still do not know details about the attacker, but as of the moment, this appears to have been a well planned out and coordinated attack on two religious sites in Colorado. This article will continue to be expanded, and I'll make a personal effort to update it with as much information as possible. Despite what some others have stated above, this isn't "just another shooting" as it involved two locations and the shooting of 10 different individuals by a person dressed in body armor and who used improvised explosives. The fact that this shooting was stopped midstream by an armed security guard is the only reason that it likely didn't have a much higher shooting count. A single person shooting 10 individuals is very uncommon, especially when it occurs in two different locations like this one and is targeted against religious sites. Ghostmonkey57 (talk) 14:53, 10 December 2007 (UTC)Ghostmonkey57[reply]
  • Keep - I came to Wikipedia to look for information about this incident. Delete later if it turns out to be non-notable. Barrylb (talk) 15:37, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Wait. If this turns out to be related to the Arvada missionary shooting, then this would be notable, as it would become a multilocational spree killing, which is completely different. If they are not related, then delete, as this is otherwise just another murder. This article was created too soon, but also nominated for deletion too soon as well. RyanGerbil10(Говорить!) 16:19, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

*Keep or Merge with Arvada missionary shooting --David Shankbone 18:16, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • Strong keep as Keep for now. Too soon to tell if this will be notable or not, especially with relationships(?) with regards to Arvada missionary shooting. If it is related, then the spree killing should be covered. Yaf (talk) 18:46, 10 December 2007 (UTC) Yaf (talk) 19:50, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Wait I'm going to agree with everyone else, events are still unfolding, lets see where things go. Hawk-McKain (talk) 18:53, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per WP:NOT#NEWS, there is not even a suggestion that this will develop into an article suitable for an encyclopedia. GRBerry 20:22, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge with Arvada missionary shooting per new info on shooting at [1]. Obviously this subject is notable.--Alabamaboy (talk) 21:07, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge with Arvada missionary shooting under another title. Matthew Murray was the same killer in both incidents which occurred within 12 hours. A disgruntled missionary shooting up the biggest youth mission headquarters in the USA and then shooting up one of the most important megachurches in the country is certainly notable, but since they are so connected it makes no sense to have two articles. Maybe it should go under Matthew Murray (shooter) or something like that. NTK (talk) 21:56, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually it's even more notable than you point out. Murray wasn't a disgruntled missionary, he was a person who "hated Christians" according to LE Officials. The Hate Crime aspect of the article is worth noting. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071210/ap_on_re_us/church_shootings Ghostmonkey57 (talk) 22:23, 10 December 2007 (UTC)Ghostmonkey57[reply]
  • Strong Keep For now. It is still a developing and it is impossible to tell right now whether or not it will be Wikipedia-worthy. Just the fact that the media is addicted to it should validate it's worthiness. 70.56.245.210 (talk) 23:32, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep, probable merge once the authorities have identified the shooter for both incidents is the same perpetrator. Rationale for keep: mass killings/spree shootings are typically covered in the open WP encyclopedia.N2e (talk) 23:55, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Additionale rationale for WP notability: stories that this may have been a spree shooting that was ENDED by a civilian who was lawfully carrying a concealed weapon under their state's concealed weapons license. If this turns out to be correct, then the notability would, it seems to me, be Spree Shooting Ended by Civilian with a CWP. That is a notability of a different kind; one of a stopped spree shooting that could have been worse had the CWP civilian not been there and used force to halt the attack. We should not only count the bodies for notability. N2e (talk) 00:07, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Wikinews is for journalism, Wikipedia is for encyclopedia articles. It's important to understand the difference between encyclopedic coverage and journalistic coverage, and there is a huge difference. Every possible way of looking at it suggests Wikipedia is better than the alternatives when it comes to encyclopedic coverage, while Wikinews is not very competitive with other journalistic outlets. That is one reason why we need articles like this on Wikipedia. Moreover, people want encyclopedic coverage of events. They want one article that covers it from beginning to end, drawing on information from many sources, providing detailed context and illustration. Journalism is about providing a "right now" look at something, and is difficult to make much use of after the event is over. Journalism is only of interest to researchers after an event is history... someone wanting information on this event in 10 years would have to read dozens of newspaper articles from the time of the event and the weeks/months/years following it up... whereas they'd get all that information from reading one encyclopedia article. You could learn about the Watergate scandal, for example, by reading through your local newspaper's back issues for 3 years on Microfilm. I've actually read several months worth of such coverage, and it's fascinating. But it's not practical... most people should just read about it an encyclopedia. --W.marsh 01:32, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep for now. Revisit in a month or so once the dust has settled. Anchoress (talk) 04:48, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep for now. Highly notable event. Ultimate impact is yet to be seen, but for now it's an obvious keep, as far as I'm concerned.Umlautbob (talk) 06:07, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • move to close afd per WP:SNOWBALL. Chris (talk) 06:25, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Agree, please let us close the debate. It is probably holding back development of the article. Barrylb (talk) 06:34, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I strongly agree, it's extremely obvious that this was a very notable and unfortunate event. As we are learning more information as the days go on, and the article will continue to develop. This should stay in wikipedia. Ghostmonkey57 (talk) 14:48, 11 December 2007 (UTC)Ghostmonkey57[reply]
  • Keep as per User:Rigadoun's comments at the top. If necessary, this article can be merged into the New Life Church article later, but as it stands now, this AFD is premature. --Eastlaw (talk) 21:28, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep, unquestionably notable. Everyking (talk) 21:38, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep, or condense and merge with New Life Church article. JBFrenchhorn (talk) 09:38, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong merge and weak keep after that. Works better as one single article.--h i s s p a c e r e s e a r c h 15:46, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong delete -- essentially a just double murder, albeit one that happened to garner lots of coverage for a couple of days. I suggest all encyclopedic content -- two paragraphs at best -- be merged into New Life Church and (for the related Arvada article) Youth With A Mission. (Incidentally, both those articles mention the shootings and we should leave things at that.) We've survived without a separate article on the Don Imus firing and on the Minneapolis bridge collapse; nothing compels us to have individual articles on these shootings either. Biruitorul (talk) 17:08, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Except we can't merge and delete... if you want to keep the content, it's a keep decision. --W.marsh 22:54, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Do amplify. As far as I know, we can delete the shooting articles and merge (at least some of) the content into the church articles. Or merge and redirect. In any case, that's the sort of thing I'd like to see, but the main thing is to delete the shooting articles. And in any case, of course we can merge and delete...why wouldn't we be able to? Is there something that prevents it? Biruitorul (talk) 23:52, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • The GFDL requires attribution of any text we copy from another GFDL document, in this case, the merged article. Traditionally we've held that to mean a merged article can't be deleted, since the history needs to be preserved (or a history merge performed). Merging and deleting gets rid of the article history being merged, and would seem to be a violation of the GFDL. --W.marsh 00:44, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • Well, thank you for that explanation - I wasn't aware of that. In that case, I stand by my call to delete, and perhaps slightly expand the shooting sections in the church articles. Biruitorul (talk) 02:52, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Anything is notable if it has received sufficient press attention to qualify as such. Mass murder, double murder, attempted murder, accidental injury, whatever--what matters is whether it has received the necessary level of attention to qualify as notable. It is bizarre to suggest that "what we can survive without" is an ideal. Human beings can survive without a lot of things, but we prefer not to, because life's so much better when we have those things. Likewise, an encyclopedia can exist with a shabby minimum of coverage, but it would be so much better to have comprehensive coverage. Separate articles on the Imus controversy and the bridge collapse (the bridge article is 90KB! You're supposed to break out subarticles at less than half that length!) are also desirable. Everyking (talk) 23:54, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • You're a strong inclusionist talking to a rather strong deletionist/mergist, so I don't expect to bring you around to my side. Nevertheless: in general I'm highly sceptical of articles that deal with matters that occurred in 2007 (or, starting next month, 2008) in the United States - not because I'm totally against current events as articles, but because such articles tend to be the result of a rather shortsighted creative process whereby the latest headlines of the day are quickly converted into articles, without due consideration for whether they in fact belong in an encyclopedia, of whether they have a lasting cultural impact or wider importance outside a few news cycles. Examples of stuff I'd zap on sight if I were dictator here are 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and especially 7 (although it is well-written). But I suppose you should be thankful I'm not in charge, else a lot more would go, and I that you're not, for if you were I imagine we'd retain even more material. Biruitorul (talk) 02:52, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Uh, This wasn't just a Double Murder. This was a quadruple murder and a shooting of 6 others. Additionally, this would have resulted in dozens of other deaths if it had not been stopped by Ms. Assam. The armed citizen aspect to the story makes it unique among shooting sprees, as very few other mass shootings have been stopped by an armed citizen already on scene. This is an event that will be talked about for years to come, like it or not. Hence it should remain on Wikipedia. Ghostmonkey57 (talk) 17:07, 13 December 2007 (UTC)Ghostmonkey57[reply]
No, it was a double murder; the other double murder is treated in a separate article. What "would have" happened is of no concern to us, whose job it is to record facts, not speculations. Crimes are stopped by armed citizens every day: see the Civilian Gun Self-Defense Blog. True, not all those are mass murders, but the More Guns, Less Crime thesis is already covered on Wikipedia, and there's no real evidence that a separate article on this particular incident is needed. And again, neither you nor I know how for long it will be talked about: it's equally liable to be forgotten in a few months (at which point a second AfD may be more likely to succeed, once the excitement of the moment has died down). Biruitorul (talk) 00:25, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No, it was a quadruple murder, perpetrated in two locations. Trying to separate the event into two incidents, so that both can be deleted will not work. The events were interconnected and one. This is the equivalent of saying that the Battle of Gettysburg was 3 different events, (Day 1, Day 2 and Day 3) rather than one large battle. Let me ask you, other than your stated reasons for wanting to limit articles on wikipedia, what other reasons do you have for wanting this article deleted? Ghostmonkey57 (talk) 17:46, 14 December 2007 (UTC)Ghostmonkey57[reply]
  • Keep - per logic of user:Zidel333 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Exit2DOS2000 (talk • contribs) 09:10, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep - more than enough RS to demonstrate N. This would have been even bigger than the Virginia Tech massacre had not an armed citizen taken out the killer. (The killer had 1000 rounds of ammo and multiple weapons.) Should we keep only those shooting articles where there were dozens of murders and delete those articles where an armed citizen prevented dozens of murders? Sbowers3 (talk) 21:16, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, yes, because for better or worse, non-events are by nature speculative and non-notable. Biruitorul (talk) 01:16, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Wikipedia's general notability guideline states that

    A topic is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject.

    The extensive media coverage of this event in multiple reliable sources cited in New_Life_Church_shooting#References clearly establishes a presumption of notability pursuant to the criteria established in the general notability guideline. WP:NOT#NEWS has also been advanced as an argument for deletion. Whatever the merits of ever raising WP:NOT#NEWS in any deletion discussion without claiming serious WP:BLP issues[1], WP:NOT#NEWS clearly does not furnish a valid rationale for deletion here. Indeed, WP:NOT#NEWS expressly states that "topics in the news may also be encyclopedic subjects when the sources are substantial"; the massive media coverage of this event cited in New_Life_Church_shooting#References would therefore suggest that it is, indeed, an "encyclopedic subject". The purely subjective assertions of non-notability advanced by editors supporting deletion of this article fail to outweigh the presumption of notability established via the general notability guideline through objective evidence.
  1. ^ WP:NOT#NEWS was added to WP:NOT during the controversy surrounding the events considered in Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Badlydrawnjeff, admonishes editors to "[keep] in mind the harm our work might cause", and advises that "While Wikipedia strives to be comprehensive, the policies on biographies of living persons and neutral point of view should lead us to contextualize events appropriately, which may preclude a biography about someone who is not an encyclopedic subject, despite a brief appearance in the news." The extent to which WP:NOT#NEWS ever applies to any articles other than biographies of living persons that present a substantial risk of causing serious embarrassment, humiliation, or other harm to their subjects is therefore doubtful. Archetypical of the sort of article that clearly qualifies for deletion under WP#NOT:NEWS would be a biography of a person whose sole claim to notability is an arrest for driving while intoxicated, where the event was only covered in two local newspapers.
John254 01:46, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Massive the coverage may have been, but for how long? Two days? Sustained coverage is also something we should be looking for, and this was clearly a transitory even that dominated a couple of news cycles, never (in all likelihood) to return to the fore. Biruitorul (talk) 06:28, 14 December 2007 (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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