Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Pamela Goldsmith-Jones

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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. Wifione Message 14:55, 9 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Pamela Goldsmith-Jones[edit]

Pamela Goldsmith-Jones (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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WP:BLP, relying entirely on primary sources with not a shred of reliable source coverage in sight, of a mayor. The city is large enough that she might qualify for a properly written and properly sourced article, but at 44K it is not large enough to confer an automatic presumption of notability on a mayor, and even the most notable mayor on earth wouldn't be entitled to keep an exclusively primary-sourced article. Delete. Bearcat (talk) 02:08, 18 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions. Bearcat (talk) 02:08, 18 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of British Columbia-related deletion discussions. Bearcat (talk) 02:08, 18 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, czar ⨹ 02:48, 25 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete No independent coverage and being a small town mayor doesn't grant automatic notability.131.118.229.17 (talk) 21:46, 25 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
What a strange IP. It seems to log on just to vote in scores of AFDs. I have no idea what to make of it.ShulMaven (talk) 01:08, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep West Vancouver is not a small town. It is not even a town! -- Earl Andrew - talk 00:37, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Regardless of whether it has "town" or "city" status, a municipality with a population of 44K cannot confer notability on its mayors under WP:NPOL — for a place of this size, it's WP:GNG or bust. And even the mayor of the largest city in the world would not get to claim an entitlement to keep an unsourced article. Bearcat (talk) 03:18, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
It takes a lot more than three sources to get over GNG. Bearcat (talk) 08:37, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
How many would it take in this case? --Cerebellum (talk) 09:46, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, NorthAmerica1000 10:04, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Keep AFD is not about having a particular number of sources actually in the article. It is about GNG notability. Notability depends on the existence of notable aspects of the topic, notable aspects for which sources exist - even though they are not presently actually in the article at present. The test is - more or less - what turns up on a google search. Not the # of sources presently in the article. ShulMaven (talk) 13:27, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Googling her instantly brings up this long magazine profile [4].ShulMaven (talk) 13:34, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Of course, if she wins the seat in parliament she's running for, she is notable as soon as the outcome is announced. Perhaps more to the point, articles get built during contested elections, so there is little point in deleting this now since someone or orhter is almost certain to start it again. That , however, is not my argument for keep, which is that subject meets GNG. ShulMaven (talk) 13:43, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
WP:NPOL confers notability on people who win election to parliament, not on people who merely run for election to parliament — merely being a candidate in an election that the subject hasn't won is not accepted on Wikipedia as a claim of notability. If they don't have sufficient notability to get an article under a different inclusion guideline independently of the candidacy, then coverage of the candidacy just constitutes WP:ROUTINE coverage of a WP:BLP1E, which is not the route to coverage in Wikipedia — because while it's true that they might win, it's also true that they might not win.
And deletion is not a permanent ban on the subject ever having an article, either — people whose articles have been deleted in the past can and do become eligible for articles again if and when their substantive claim to notability changes. So the fact that a person might win a future election that they're running in does not have any bearing on the discussion; they can have an article if and when they do win, but articles about unelected candidates virtually always end up getting turned into campaign brochures (or ideological battlegrounds in which the candidate's campaign staff whitewashes the article and then an opposing candidate's campaign staff dirtwashes it) during the election. Which is precisely why we don't allow articles about unelected candidates: Wikipedia's policies around the notability of politicians are specifically designed to prevent those things from happening, since we're not an advertising, public relations or campaign venue. Bearcat (talk) 18:31, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Every mayor of every place on earth always gets media coverage somewhere — so if this amount of sourcing were enough to get a mayor included in Wikipedia then every mayor of any place at all would always qualify for an article without exception, and our standard policy that some mayors are notable and others are not would be eviscerated. Bearcat (talk) 18:21, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak keep - I'm seeing 5+ reliable local sources that have articles focused primarily on her. That seems like it would pass the bar for notability. NickCT (talk) 15:09, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
It takes more than five sources to pass GNG. Bearcat (talk) 18:21, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Bearcat, please cease making up your own numerical rules and standards, as discussed here: [5].ShulMaven (talk) 21:48, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The "rule" in question is an established precedent, duly created by a broad consensus of users on a myriad of past AFD discussions on comparable topics. I am making up exactly nothing of my own, and I will not tolerate being accused of anything of the sort. Bearcat (talk) 22:00, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • It doesn't take 5 sources to pass GNG, it takes two non-routine, in-depth pieces in reliable sources. Three at most. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 23:34, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
No, it doesn't. If that were all it took, we'd have to keep an article about every person who ever got into a newspaper twice, e.g. as a coordinator of a church bake sale or head of a local PTA. And that would also vitiate the existing standards for the notability of city councillors and unelected candidates for office, too, because they're also always the subject of at least two or three sources too. One or two sources is all it takes to get over a subject-specific inclusion standard that includes specific "subject is automatically notable if they've accomplished X" options, absolutely — but if you're claiming a generic "doesn't get over any specific standard but is notable anyway because sources" pass under GNG, then it takes considerably more sources than it takes to get over a criterion that grants automatic notability. Bearcat (talk) 02:29, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Bearcat, please read comments carefully because you are all too frequently misquoting people (including me on other pages). What User:Lukeno94 wrote was: "it takes two non-routine, in-depth pieces in reliable sources. Three at most."ShulMaven (talk) 02:57, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Which I "misquoted" how, exactly? Bearcat (talk) 03:18, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The difference between: "non-routine, in-depth pieces" and "coordinator of a church bake sale".ShulMaven (talk) 03:52, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
You think coordinators of church bake sales are never the subjects of non-routine, in-depth pieces in their local media? They are, and more than often enough that they would qualify for Wikipedia articles if two sources were all it took to satisfy GNG — Wikipedia articles about church bake sale coordinators (and smalltown fire chiefs, and winners of high school talent competitions, and on and so forth) really have been attempted in the past on the basis of 2-3 distinct sources. Hell, even I would qualify for a Wikipedia article if GNG were that easy to satisfy. Bearcat (talk) 04:08, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Let's tweak that slightly then. "It takes two non-routine, in-depth pieces in reliable sources that have a wide circulation, such as national newspapers. Three at most." Now THAT is an incontrovertible fact, and if you're denying that, then you frankly need to go and look at any AfD and read GNG properly. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 08:23, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • What you're missing is that "reliable sources that have a wide circulation, such as national newspapers" isn't the standard of sourcing that's been put up for sale here. What we've got in this particular instance is a claim that this particular subject passes GNG on the basis of two articles in limited circulation local interest publications — making my "church bake sale coordinator" example a completely valid analogue to the matter at hand. Sure, two substantive articles in major national newspapers might very well be enough sourcing to get someone over GNG in many cases — but if you're relying on non-major media of purely local distribution, it still takes way more than two articles. Bearcat (talk) 08:33, 6 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I wasn't commenting on the merits of this AfD. I was commenting on the fact that you indeed were making up policy to suit yourself, and yet accused others of spreading untruths. Your interpretation of GNG wasn't remotely similar to how it actually should be used. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 10:57, 6 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I was not "making up policy to suit myself" — in over ten years of contributing to Wikipedia I've never once done anything of the sort. You're correct that two sources can sometimes be enough to pass GNG if those two sources are of the top-calibre The Globe and Mail/The New York Times/The Times of London class of sourcing, and I'm also correct that two sources aren't enough to pass GNG if those two sources are of the limited distribution, local interest variety that describes the two sources that have been offered here. We're not in contradiction at all, nor is either of us wrong about what the GNG policy is — we're simply talking about two different classes of sourcing that don't have equivalent status to each other under GNG. Bearcat (talk) 20:34, 6 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Well, there isn't any number of local sources that can generate notability, which was what you must've been talking about. Only wide-circulation ones count towards notability. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 23:44, 6 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep per Bearian. There are two reliable, in-depth profiles of her, which are considerably more interesting than simply a list of biographical facts and offices held. If she wins the MP election someone will have to write this article again, so what's the point in deleting it now? – Margin1522 (talk) 22:19, 7 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The point in deleting it now is that she doesn't pass an inclusion guideline now. If she passes one in the future (which she also may not), then we'll deal with that when the time comes — but the fact that someone might win a future election is not a valid reason to keep an article about them if they haven't already satisfied an inclusion standard. Bearcat (talk) 21:08, 8 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
No, there aren't two good in-depth references that meet the WP:GNG. There are two limited circulation local interest references which don't satisfy GNG. Bearcat (talk) 21:08, 8 December 2014 (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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