Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/X-Day (Church of the SubGenius)

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. Black Kite (talk) 10:04, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

X-Day (Church of the SubGenius)[edit]

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This page is an advertisement for an event that has an annual attendance of only 100 people (as admitted on their own web page), yet attempts to compare itself to Burning Man, which has an attendance of 50,000. The links are all to the group's own web site and one "free press release" site. A Google search for "X-Day" produces links to the group's own site, this Wikipedia page, Malcolm X, and a Japanese manga. Any club can produce an attendance of 100 people on any "event" night, and we don't have Wikipedia pages for every single nightclub out there. This article does not meet Wikipedia's notability standards. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TeamEquestria (talk • contribs) 11:03, 1 April 2012

Delete I'd say merge with Church of the SubGenius at best, but without independent sources there's no point in merging. --Colapeninsula (talk) 12:12, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Events-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 13:48, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Keep I came here today to look up some details on X-Day. If I did, then it's probable that many others have done or will. It's bona-fide encyclopedic content, but really needs some proper sources & citations. Wayne Hardman (talk) 07:32, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Keep This is encyclopedic content about an event that has been mentioned in many newspapers and magazines over the years, as well as on television and all over the Internet. When you Google "X-Day" you get 317,000,000 results, most of them being unrelated ones, but that is because other people have used the term X-Day besides the Church of the SubGenius (for instance, the X-Day manga, which is completely unrelated). X-Day is also the most important event in the theology of the Church of the SubGenius, and is mentioned in virtually all SubGenius publications.

What this article needs is more citations of the many times X-Day has been mentioned in the media over the years, in order to prove its notability. However, it is difficult to do an Internet search to find these citations; for instance, most newspapers only started posting their articles online a few years ago, and it is hard to figure out the right Internet search terms to find legitimate sources that actually relate to this topic while bypassing everything that is unrelated or not a reliable source, especially given the 317 million Google search results for X-Day. But I am certain that plenty of reliable independent sources to prove notability DO exist; they are simply hard to find on the Internet because of all the unrelated information that comes up when you do an Internet search. I would recommend not only that this article be kept, but that everyone debating here, both pro-and-anti-deletion, thoroughly search the Internet for reliable, independent sources about X-Day, and add any that they can find to this article.

Furthermore, I do not think that X-Day ought to be considered as merely an "event" and judged by the notability guideline for events, as it is far more than an event to those involved in the Church of the SubGenius. As a historical example, the crucifixion of Jesus Christ is considered a very important event in the religion of Christianity, but it is far more than just a mere event, and is central to the theology of that religion. Even though there are not any reliable historical records of Jesus being crucified from any independent sources at the time, outside of the Bible, Jesus's crucifixion is still considered very notable. While the Church of the SubGenius is a much smaller religion, X-Day has just as great a theological importance to followers of the Church of the SubGenius, even though most of them do not attend the annual celebrations in person. Every ordained SubGenius minister is promised eternal salvation on X-Day, regardless of whether or not they show up to the annual celebrations, and most SubGenii are too busy with other things in their lives, too short on money, or too afraid of what might happen to them if they show up to attend in person. X-Day also has quite a similarity theologically to the Christian Rapture, involving the faithful being all saved at once, and everyone else being Left Behind. And the Rapture is not mentioned in the Bible even once, yet it is notable, as a theological concept, even though there are no records of the Rapture ever taking place as an event. If the Rapture were judged by the notability guideline for events, it would not be notable, since it has not even happened and there are no records of it happening. But the Rapture is notable theologically, and meets the general notability guideline, which is why there is a Wikipedia page on it. Therefore, since it is not just an event but also a matter of religious theology, the notability guideline used in this dispute should be the general notability guideline, not the notability guideline for events. Using a different notability guideline for this than the one used on the Rapture would be treating different religions differently and violate the neutral point of view policy.

In conclusion, none of the criteria at Wikipedia:Deletion_policy#Reasons_for_deletion are met. The only possible criterion which could be applied to this article is "Articles for which thorough attempts to find reliable sources to verify them have failed", yet nobody has done a thorough attempt to find reliable sources, only very brief attempts that didn't even go past the first page of Google search results. --Yetisyny (talk) 08:47, 7 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Keep: A Google News archives search for "subgenius x-day" finds articles in the Washington Post, St. Petersburg Times and Chicago Tribune. Notability is clearly met. The present state of the article not having these sources is not a reason to regard the event as non-notable. MartinPoulter (talk)

Keep: In addition to the good reasons cited by Yetisyny, Reverend Magdalen's custody case would never have occurred without the X-day drill. The whole saga should probably be mentioned and references cited in this article, is it was widely covered in the US National press for the years it stretched on. jzp (talk) 21:04, 8 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, a small event, yes. But a small event with coverage in multiple independent sources. Meets WP:GNG. Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 00:18, 9 April 2012 (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.