Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 February 25

25 February 2011

Serene Branson

Serene Branson (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)

Should have been closed as "No consensus for deletion" rather than "Delete." Long before the on-camera episode of speaking gibberish which gained her worldwide news coverage (leading to WP:BLP1E arguments for deletion,) the subject had at least two instances of significant newspaper coverage as well as a local Emmy nomination. The raw count was 25 deletes, 24 keeps, showing near parity. The closing admin chose to ignore 2 of the "deletes" and 8 of the "keeps," leaving 23 delete arguments against 16 keep arguments, which still does not appear to amount to a consensus. Several more of the "deletes" could have been ignored, based on their denial that the award and two newspaper articles provided any support for prior notability. The original nominator argued finally for a "No consensus close" and I believe his judgment is correct. Edison (talk) 01:17, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

• I'm going to ignore the numbers entirely, if no one minds. They tend to distract from determining consensus. It's not a vote, so the exact numbers don't matter.
  Anyway, the issue here is clear. Pretty much everyone favoring delete mentioned WP:BLP1E, and few who favor retention did much to rebut this argument. A couple of users mentioned some awards she won (such as you, Edison). However, these claims to notability were weak and not accepted as beating out the BLP1E argument (I note that the former does not matter, but the latter does). Phantomsteve made a good call on this one. Endorse his closure as properly reflecting consensus.
  The claim that Safiel requested a no consensus closure seems to be a bit of a red herring, as well. Stifle made the comment, just before Safiel requested a closure, that any result would end up at DRV (*cough*). Safiel probably read this and misinterpreted it to mean that consensus does not exist, rather than that consensus isn't well-liked by some. If I have misinterpreted his reasoning, he can feel free to correct me. Cheers, everyone. lifebaka++ 03:59, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn and undelete This is a tough case for the closing admin. This is a clear "no consensus". So, the real question, is does "no consensus" default to keep. Normally it does, except for BLPs with contentious material and week sourcing. So, is this a BLP exception? No. Here, we have largely non-contentious material (early misreports, but not a lot of serious disputes about event) and strong sourcing (of the event). There's an entirely reasonable argument for doing a merge (probably to the station), which requires using sources from this article (necessitating undeletion). There's also a case for making it an "event", not a bio article. Keepers did refute the 1EVENT argument. The only thing they didn't refute, which annoyed me, was the issue of whether a regional Emmy matters. I think nobody did a great job in the AFD in addressing all the issues, up to and including the most recent and comprehensive reporting. A new AFD in the future would be a good opportunity for a better discussion. --Rob (talk) 04:14, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
• Endorse deletion - To "whine" doesn't accurately reflect what this DRV is; the Brit's notion of a "whinge" just seems to capture the essence far better than us colonials can muster. This is whingeing, the classic case of filing a DRV not over admin wrongdoing or mistakes, but because one disagrees with the result. All that needs to be said here is that the closer evaluated the strength of the arguments rather than engage in rote bean-counting. The keepers tried valiantly to dig up some past scrapings of notability such as regional awards, but what that sort of action amounts to is a sort of wikipedia-form of confirmation bias; they have already concluded that the person is notable, so they go out and cobble together whatever scrips and scraps can be found to support the already-formed conclusion. This effort failed, the results were judged to be insufficient in overcoming the concerns of WP:NOTNEWS and WP:BLP1E. This is DRV; Deletion REview. Not D2G; Deletion 2nd Guessing. Tarc (talk) 04:35, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Comment Please discuss the merits of the case without continuing the vituperation you found necessary in the AFD. Edison (talk) 04:43, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
    • Protip; it helps to read past the first line of the post. Tarc (talk) 05:03, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
      • No contribution to the discussion, just more insult and vituperation. Edison (talk) 04:12, 26 February 2011 (UTC)
        • Enough with the strawmen, please. If you can address the points I actually raised...DRV is not for second-guessing, the closing admin considered and discounted the regional emmys and such as not being sufficient, etc...then feel free. Tarc (talk) 06:04, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

• • A "classic" case would be where there is a clear consensus to delete. The closing admin themself acknowledged, by giving a detailed explanation, that this isn't a typical obvious close. So, there's no need to insult somebody for requesting a review. This is exactly the type of case to bring to DRV. There are two separate issues: was deletion appropriate and was the close as delete appropriate. I would suggest what you're doing here, and to some extent, what the closing admin had done, is to make their own AFD arguments. That is what you, and closing admin did, is what really belonged in the original AFD discussion. But, the issue for the closing admin, and this DRV, isn't whether there should be a deletion (which I supported), but whether there is a consensus for deletion. There is no consensus. One issue, which nobody seemed to properly raise, is that 1EVENT, doesn't necessarily call for deletion. A merger is equally appropriate for dealing with that. In fact, there was no discussion whatsoever about a merge, by ether side. Generally, there was a poor discussion in the AFD. So, a new AFD, now, or later, would be a legit option. --Rob (talk) 04:55, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
    • Just wrong and misguided all around, and a very warped notion of what consensus actually means here. Everyone presented their arguments, and the closer considered the actual arguments made rather than doing a simple tally. Consensus doesn;'t mean "everyone agree", it means "what is the general leaning of the overall discussion. In this case it was, clearly, to delete. There would also be no merit at all to an article on the event. What event is there? A woman was confused on-camera for a few seconds and some news outlets talked about it? Big fucking deal. There is no lasting historical impact of an on-screen mishap. Tarc (talk) 05:03, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
      • Yah, we're all misguided, because we disagree. Anyhow, I'm not advocating a simple tally. It's ok to discount week arguments that ignore or misrepresent policy. However, both sides actually misconstrued policy. 1EVENT doesn't require deletion, as many implied. In fact, it often results in merge, which wasn't even discussed. So, if you want to discount bad arguments, do so on both sides. Using your logic, any discussion that occurred would be a "consensus" for deletion. What is the purpose of having a discussion if an admin substitutes their own view of what should happen? There are exceptions, where an admin can delete, despite the lack of consensus, in the case of BLPs. But, this isn't such a case. Anyways, are you seriously telling me there is a clear consensus that this shouldn't even be kept for a merge? (e.g. restore history, but keep the redirect currently in place). --Rob (talk) 05:20, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
        • I really have little time or patience to deal with ARS-tinged talking points, i.e. "an admin substitutes their own view". You disagree with how the admin read consensus. Whoop-de-doo. DRV's should not be abused by simple "I disagree" filings. Tarc (talk) 14:29, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

• Endorse- after reviewing the discussion and the closing rationale, I find that the closing admin acted sensibly. DRV is for correcting it if the admin makes a mistake or acts improperly, not just because someone doesn't like the result, and I cannot see that the closing admin has done anything wrong. Reyk _YO! 09:30, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
• Endorse as being just (but only just) within administrative discretion. It is very helpful to have a detailed analysis by the closing administrator, in this case nicely presented. I do not think that less weight should be given to arguments "per someone else". If my opinion is the same as someone else's it is entirely appropriate I should say so and not have to do a copy and paste. However in this AfD no one seemed to vote in this way: the nearest was "delete per all previous arguments" for which I think less weight is appropriate. It is a shame the AfD nomination was not explicit on the BLP1E matter because less experienced editors might not have felt the need to adddress this aspect. Never mind, the nomination was on grounds of notability and BLP1E was raised early in the discussion. I wonder whether significant material was added to the article in the course of the discussion (the "other notability" argument did seem to gain support as time went by) making earlier comments less apposite. The closing administrator did not address this aspect so maybe it did not apply. I agree with the closing admin that many of the keep votes were weak on rebutting BLP1E but to my mind there were sufficient cogent arguments that "no consensus" would have been the best call. However, it is close and not at all as head counting would have suggested. I think it reasonable to live with a "delete" close. What can I say about Tarc's arguments? I'd best say nothing. Thincat (talk) 11:30, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
• Comment: It would be nice if people actually read WP:BLP1E and WP:ONEEVENT sections they like to reference, and also consider the context they exist in. WP:BLP1E is specific to BLPs (obviously). It is designed to protect otherwise private people, who get caught up in a single event. So, if a private person had a speech impairment, known only to family/friends/co-workers got a similar YouTube moment, deleting would be appropriate to let them keep their anonymity. A TV reporter for a major outlet, is not a private person (yes I know being a reporter doesn't make her notable). WP:ONEVENT suggests that the article be made about the event, or be redirected to an appropriate larger topic. At this stage, there is now a redirect. So, the more relevant current question to ask, is should the history of the page be restored, so it can be used in the target article. A merge/redirect is a more common way of handling public figures, who's individual notability is minor, and are closely associated with a larger topic (in this case, the station). When the AFD began, there was nothing worth keeping, but over time, more developed. It makes keeping (which may or not mean a separate article) a reasonable alernative. Still, not a single "delete" or "endorse" has cared to address the point. I think, sadly, both saids, have used cookie-cutter arguements, that can be copy-pasted to a million articles, without noting distinctions, or changes over time in the process. --Rob (talk) 15:12, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
• Endorse per my typical DRV test; the closer did not give weight to something to which he should not have given weight, nor did he omit to give weight to something to which he should have given weight, nor did he arrive at a decision at which no reasonable administrator could have arrived. Stifle (talk) 15:28, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn to no consensus. The BLP1E point was wrong (notability is for being an Emmy award winning journalist plus recipient of Frank Shakespeare award for Outstanding Achievement in Journalism -- source was noted in the article). Therefore the BLP1E-based "deletes" should have received no weight, leaving no consensus.—S Marshall T/C 16:07, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

  That is quite a lie there. Many of the calls to delete, or responses to the award-harping, dismissed them as regional and of little significance, in terms of establishing notability. Tarc (talk) 00:19, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

  • More vituperation from Tarc: if you disagree with him you "lie." Edison (talk) 04:13, 26 February 2011 (UTC)
    • Yup. You'll find that Tarc's an expert at giving the absolute maximum amount of offence possible without quite saying anything that would get him blocked or RFC'd. He's been getting away with it for years.—S Marshall T/C 09:22, 26 February 2011 (UTC)
      • My dear Mr. Marshall, one hardly needs to be an expert to recognize demonstrably false assertions. Please, re-read the AfD and note what those who cite WP:BLP1E are actually saying rather than what you appear to be projecting. I'm reading down the list right now, and find many that clearly address the issue of either regional Emmys or that Frank Shakespeare thing, or both. You are certainly welcome to believe otherwise, that these two awards establish prior notability, but I'm afraid that many editors do not agree with you. When someone says "Item X confers notability", the burden of proof is on said person to, y'know, prove it. No one did to anyone's, esp the closing admin's, reasonable satisfaction. On the contrary, those on the deletion side of the matter clearly explained that the "emmy" was a regional award for local news coverage, and the Shakespeare thing was something given by a student political organizational. Local coverage generally does not translate into notability. So back to my original remark, you claiming that 1E-based deletes were wrong and should have been discounted is, as seen above, demonstrably false. Quod erat demonstrandum. Tarc (talk) 02:12, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

• Endorse -- closer's detailed rationale makes it clear they did not make an obvious error in evaluating consensus. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 16:31, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn and undelete. First, the closer erred in giving !votes early in the discussion, before coverage of the subject had fully developed, the same weight as those after detailed coverage had emerged. The !votes over the first day or so, when the coverage was mostly "weird event" type stories, overwhelmingly favored delete (and properly so). Expressed community opinion shifted drastically after the medical diagnosis was disclosed, and coverage focused on genuinely newsworthy matters. Moreover, given that Branson has voluntarily accepted her role, at least for the present, as the "public face" of the medical condition involved, the protective aspects of BLP1E clearly don't apply. Second, in cases like this, where the community is divided over basic aspects of the policy involved, it is not the role of the closing administrator to settle the policy debate without a clear consensus, particularly since the level of support for the conclusion reached is clearly lower than than the level required to reach consensus on the policy debate itself. BLP1E has historically been problematic situations like this; although incorporated into a policy, it provides only rough guidelines as to how editing discretion should be exercised, and therefore is a matter where it is particularly appropriate to recognize the lack of community consensus, in the absence of substantively objectionable content. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 16:44, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn to no-consensus. Classic case of the closer using his own judgment, not the community's. When policies are unclear about the interpretation, the interpretation is decided not by whatever admin cares to volunteer to make a closing statement, but buy what the community thinks. Otherwise we would close inconsistently 700 different ways, according to the views of the individual admin. I would have one view on w what the policy meant, and close in accord with that. PhantomSteve would have another, and close accordingly. There is no intrinsic reason why his view is better than mine, or mine better than his, or why the view of whoever closes this is better than either of us. The admins are supposed to have a basic understanding of policy. They are not screened to be experts in the interpretation of it--if they were, nobody at all would pass rfa, for there is no disputed question where 70% of the people here agree on the right interpetation--if there were, it would not be disputed. The role of the closer is to determine what the good faith community thinks about the matter. They do this by discarding the views of people with clearly invalid arguments not based on policy, and , usually, spas. Then they see what the consensus is. If there is none, they are supposed to say so. When rules contradict, and half the community who cares to be present says one thing and half the other, the closer does not get a casting vote. Anyone who does more is going beyond their remit and undertaking things for which they are not qualified. Nobody at Wikipedia is qualified to say authoritatively what the interpretation of policy is. Not even an individual member of arbcom is, for policies within their scope: they decide as a body. Not even an individual member of the WMF board, for those policies that come within their jurisdiction--they too decide as a body. Not even the WMF attorney--he does decide what we can legally do, but aside from that, not what our policy is. No admin has a role beyond anyone else here in making policy. They have the role of interpreting it in accord with the way the community wants, and the only individual decisions they can make are when they determine what it is clear the community wants--whether explicitly, at xfd or rfc, or implicitly when they do admin tasks like speedy deletion. If the decision is not clear according to the community view at xfd, the admin may not make it. That's a supervote. There are some cases that might look otherwise: If the decision needs IAR, he can do that, but he must be reasonably sure the community will support him. If the editors present at an xfd are not representative or sufficient, he can decide that, and continue the discussion. If it is absolutely clear the community always interprets a policy one way, and the temporary majority seems to say otherwise, he can continue the discussion or even close in accord with the known general view, if this is unambiguous.

Here we have a case where it is ambiguous. I'm not sure myself. Normally, if this received only sporadic local coverage, there is no question that BLP policy would prevail, and the article deleted. But the NYT wrote an article giving this a general significance with respect to public health, and other newspapers did similarly. hat's pretty strong evidence that it's of relative importance beyond the event itself. Is it enough to prevail? I suspect there will be further publications using this event as an example,and if there are, it will determine it in the direction of keep, but I wouldn't want to say my suspicion is conclusive. Frankly, I just do not know. The course of this discussion and the previous one indicates that neither does the community.

There is room for a compromise solution, at the moment it's a redirect, but a redirect to an article without any relevant content at all. A redirect and merge is a possible compromise close, that avoids having the article under her name. I can see saying that, or I can see saying no-consensus. when it's as equivocal as this, I can't see any admin reasonably making their own keep or delete decision. The only people who think its a reasonable close are, as usual in a divided situation, the people who agree with it. ILet me for argument's sake adopt Stifle's test: I think no reasonable administrator should have closed in this manner. Not that the closer is unreasonable generally, just mistaken in this instance. DGG ( talk ) 22:06, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

• Extremely long-winded, but once again DGG attempts to substitute his own opinion for that of the closer's. Once again, that is not a valid reason to overturn a deletion discussion. Tarc (talk) 00:19, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

• overturn to NC per S Marshall. Just with those awards and the bits of local coverage she qualifies under WP:BIO without the one event. That said, I'd strongly favor using WP:UNDUE and the spirit of WP:BLP to limit coverage of the "one event" to a couple of sentences.Hobit (talk) 00:11, 26 February 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn per DGG, Hobit, and the fact that WP:BLP1E does not apply to public figures, which an award-winning journalist certainly is. Jclemens (talk) 08:51, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

  Let's not invent notability policy that is unsupported by the Wikipedia community, eh? An article about a person who wins 1) a regional award and 2) an award from a student organization is unable to reach even the low-hanging fruit of WP:ANYBIO. Local/regional awards do not make one a public figure. Tarc (talk) 05:22, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

  You're confusing "public" with "notable", eh. You can be a public figure, without being notable. BLP1E is designed to protect non-public (aka private) figures. The policy protects people from having their privacy violated, because they were caught up in a single public event, often unwillingly. So, a private person, of marginal notability may be deleted, in such cases. But, with a public figure, there's no issue of privacy. If the public person doesn't quite warrant a stand-alone article (as is the case here), we can merge/redirect to a larger, notable topic. Serene Branson is obviously a public figure. So, are you going to finally discuss the issue of merger, or are you just going to throw more insults? --Rob (talk) 06:26, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

  Rob, I would have to first toss out a single insult before I could toss out more. If you feel otherwise, stop cluttering up DRV with endless carping and head to WP:WQA if you feel you have a case to make. But no, just because someone has a job on tv doesn't warrant the "public figure" tag. There are thousands upon thousands of reporters across the nation on par with Ms. Branson; they do their job, day in and day out, without a whiff of national recognition or reference. By your, ahem, "standards", any one of these people who does something that goes youtube viral for whatever reason is suddenly article-worthy because they are classified as a "public figure" ? That's where I call bullshit. As for a merger, there's nothing to merge to. She stroked out on-air, you want to make an article about that ? Tarc (talk) 14:34, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

• Endorse Closer gave rational and sound logic behind the final decision.--Yaksar (let's chat) 01:27, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn as no consensus and undelete The strict scrutiny placed on Keep votes used to discard votes without enough of an argument to discard votes for retention was applied only in one direction. Equally incoherent votes for delete were accepted as truth. Arguments provided by keep voters countering the claims of BLP1E seem to have been inappropriately discounted. Rather than engage in a hagiographic analysis of which keep votes should be ignored, the most appropriate conclusion would have been a recognition that there was no consensus. Alansohn (talk) 05:17, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
  • I've gone back over the entire discussion and I cannot find a single delete !vote that I could justify discarding because it was "incoherent". Could you point some out? I would discard two of the keep !votes, one because it had literally no content and one because it consisted solely of personal attacks, but none of the deletes. For the rest of the discussion, the closing admin gave more weight to the delete !votes and less to the keep ones because this genuinely reflected the relative strengths of the arguments presented, not some lack of impartiality on the part of the closing admin as you seem o be suggesting. Reyk _YO! 06:05, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
    • Did you notice that 11 or so of the "Deletes" did not acknowledge that she had any coverage, whatsoever, before the aphasia episode, ignoring the award nomination and the two newspaper articles about her which were cited, as if the YouTube were the only event which had ever been noted by reliable and independent sources? They made it sound as if she were some random soccer mom who stood in public and got on YouTube for uttering gibberish, rather than a TV reporter in a major market who had some minor notability previously. The other Delete voters appropriately noted her modest prior claim to notability, and judged that it was just not great enough. Edison (talk) 07:12, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

• Every single delete vote doesn't have to address every single possible issue in order to be considered valid. I, for example, did not address the local awards because the arguments had been stated numerous times as to why they weren't notable, and I saw no need to re-hash it, preferring to address another issue I felt hadn't been covered enough.--Yaksar (let's chat) 07:20, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

• • • • (ec)Since, from my reading of the debate, the relevance of the minor award and run-of-the-mill local coverage had been thoroughly refuted early on in the piece I see no reason to discard delete !votes that did not bring it up again. Reyk _YO! 07:23, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
        • It still appears that Keep !votes were more casually dismissed than Delete !votes with equivalently slight rationales. Edison (talk) 14:16, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
          • Perhaps because the keeps rested largely on the "she was notable prior to this event" argument, which was largely debunked. Tarc (talk) 14:34, 27 February 2011 (UTC)