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:{{DRV links|Clarice Phelps|xfd_page=Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Clarice Phelps|article=}}
No consensus to delete; "at least a few of those recommending keep put forward reasonable arguments that were not fully refuted."The lorax (talk) 14:11, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
:*Just to further comment on something that's been raised below - I don't think it would be a great idea to modify the notability guidelines to allow us to have an article on this person. Comparisons to low notability standards for other subjects would be better addressed by raising those standards. Hut 8.5 21:06, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
- Endorse A clear policy based decision, clearly explained and well argued. Despite the fact it contradicts my own contribution I could not argue an appeal against the closure on policy grounds. Time to drop the stick methinks. WCMemail 20:56, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
- Comment: I don't like the idea of editors !voting in an AfD and then also !voting in the delrev, so I'm not voting here. The closing statement was thorough and clearly the closer put a lot of time and thought into it (just reading the damn thread alone). I echo Hut's statement that the only chance for that article to be kept was if there had been consensus "that the subject should be exempted from the usual notability guidelines"–specifically, whether [https://www.ornl.gov/news/clarice-phelps-dedicated-service-science-and-community this] article and other articles/videos from the subject's employer could be considered to establish notability despite it being a non-independent source. I was sad to see the canvassing issue eclipse the debate, and I don't think the rewrite of the article during the AfD was noticed by everyone who voted on the earlier version of the article. In a perfect world, I would have liked to see the discussion relisted and editors taking a second look and focusing on the "independence exception" rather than the other side issues, or have the AfD closed as a "no consensus without prejudice for immediate refiling" to offer a "clean-start" AfD. But even if one of those two things had happened, it's not at all clear that a different result would have been achieved, because the independence exception got some but not a lot of support in the discussion (and clearly didn't sway the closer or anybody voting here). Other than calling my arguments weak (they were brilliant, damn it!), I find no fault with the closer in making this close. Levivich 21:06, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
- On declaring a status of involved, consider commenting at WT:DRV here. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:08, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks for letting me know about that discussion, and per that let me unambiguously disclose I !voted keep in the AfD (about ten times). Levivich 23:24, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
- FWIW, the canvassing issue didn't really impact my reading of the consensus. TonyBallioni (talk) 22:22, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
- No, your closing statement was impressive in that it addressed almost all the arguments raised, rather succinctly, which makes clear you went through it carefully and picked through all the weeds. But I think the canvassing accusations (and the at times personal back-and-forth) polluted the discussion itself. I don't think it really matters, though, because the "clean start" AfD discussion that I want to have about an "independent coverage exception" for things like astronauts and gov't nuclear scientists can be had at another article's AfD; it doesn't have to be this one. Levivich 23:24, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
- Sad Endorse. (Uninvolved with the AfD and topic.) Very good closing statement that reflects and distills the discussion. I note a simple explanation: No independent secondary sources that discuss the subject in depth. The word "independent" is the key challenge in this case. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 23:30, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
:: Modify to "sad endorse". It (google cache) looked like a good article. I am very surprised at lack of independent coverage, but it seems to be true. Even local newspapers discussing her mentoring of local women and school students would help a lot. I see one , [https://www.knoxnews.com/story/life/2017/07/30/ywca-tribute-women-finalists-and-special-award-winners/496987001/ this single paragraph bio], which I would count as one of the 2 to 3 minimal independent sources. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:33, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
- Endorse closure as delete. A straightforward application of policy based on consensus. This is not to denigrate the shrewdness of the closer who cut through the flim-flam to the essence. (I was a participant in the Afd and voted delete). Xxanthippe (talk) 08:27, 12 February 2019 (UTC).
- Reluctant endorse, without prejudice to revisiting the issue in an RfC. (I did not participate in the AfD.) There is no question that, in terms of current policy and practice, this AfD was correctly closed. But I can't help but echo {{u|S Marshall}}'s sentiment above: "Imagine you're having a conversation with an intelligent and thoughtful person who's unfamiliar with Wikipedia, and you're trying to explain to them why we have to delete this article about a researcher, achiever and educator but we're not allowed to delete articles about porn stars, individual TV episodes, or the list of Crayola crayon colours. I couldn't do that without making our whole culture sound really badly thought out. Could you?" The application of our rules leads us, in this instance, to delete an article that has much more merit as part of an encyclopedia than many other articles routinely created or kept at AfD. This indicates that the rules are, in this case, preventing us from improving the encyclopedia – a textbook case in which WP:IAR should apply. I'm still not calling for overturning the closure on the basis of IAR, because I strongly believe that Wikipedia should work based on broadly accepted, predictable rules, and that if these are found to be deficient, they should preferably be amended rather than ignored. I'm not sure what, if any, amendment to academic notability standards would be appropriate to solve this problem – the standards are reasonably strict for good reasons, in order to keep out self-published cranks and fringe figures – but I would welcome proposals by other experienced editors in the course of an RfC. Sandstein 17:10, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
- Endorse. The closer made sound evaluation of the consensus present in the AfD discussion, giving appropriate weight to the strength of argument and applicable policies. I also think we need to be alive to the harm that can be caused by biographies of people of marginal notability, to which inappropriate editing can often go unspotted and unreverted for too long. Whilst I appreciate the points made by Sandstein and S Marshall above, I think they point towards consideration needing to be given to whether tougher notability standards ought to apply elsewhere, rather than giving me pause that we may have got the result wrong in relation to this particular article. WJBscribe (talk) 17:17, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
- Comment I agree with Sandstein and S Marshall. Clearly closed correctly by the rules we have. And maybe any reasonable set of objective rules would have gotten us to the same point. I tend to be a fan of articles on things like individual TV episodes, or the list of Crayola crayon colors. I don't even have an objection to articles on porn stars. But academics should see more coverage here IMO. It would be nice to have this article. Hobit (talk) 19:27, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
- Endorse. (I argued to delete in the AfD). Based on our current rules, the decision was clear. There may be a need to revisit our rules that currently make us have articles on many unremarkable footballers but lack articles on many outstanding scientists. However, our notability and verifiability rules are there for very good reasons, and relaxing them for certain classes of articles should not be done lightly. We might end up with articles about every single scientist who ever had their institution write about them, or list everyone who has more than a handful of publications. It might actually be more useful for the future than our collection of sports statistics. However, I find it difficult to argue against WJBscribe's point that we should be very careful before relaxing our standards for BLPs. —Kusma (t·c) 20:58, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
- Comment/Sad Endorse After reading over the discussion, the closing admin read the discussion correctly. Closing it as a keep or no consensus would be super voting. At the same time, this sad episode in Wikipedia's history shows just how slanted our notability guidelines are. WP:NFOOTY and WP:NPORN are well known to be laughably low bars for inclusion, while WP:NPROF seems to be a bar that takes a lifetime to cross. I think that we need to have a wider discussion about if our current special notablity guidelines are doing what they are suposed to do. I understand WJBscribe's point as a former OSer, but there has to be a better way than what we are doing right now. --Guerillero | Parlez Moi 21:13, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
- FWIW, more as a meta point than anything else; but NPROF is generally not seen as a hard guideline to pass. It is objective and provides one of the clearest standards of notability that we have, while also making it easier for those who are notable and don’t have coverage in independent sources to demonstrate that they are significant enough in their fields to be included. Unfortunately, Clarice Phelps did not meet any of these standards. The next option would be the GNG, which does require independent sourcing. She had none. While I did not have an opinion before closing this, upon reflection of the discussion here it seems to me this AfD is working exactly like our policies and guidelines should be working: preventing someone who is a relatively minor researcher and is not by any measure a standout in her field from having an article. TonyBallioni (talk) 21:36, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
- I went looking and had to narrow the categories, but in my first shot I found these (a) Dutch (b) football (c) defenders (d) born in 1988 (e) with 1 professional game (f) who have a Wikipedia article: 1, 2, 3. We also have every TV episode ever, every model of every car ever manufactured, porn stars, train stations, and five million more, but we can't find room for a nuclear chemist at a top gov't laboratory because she's too minor of a researcher (she's on their website front page now). I wouldn't describe this as working exactly like our policies and guidelines should be working. Count me among those saddened by the consensus reached at this AfD. Seems the need to adjust our notability guidelines in multiple areas is self-evident, whether it's done by loosening or tightening or some of each. Leviv ich 08:10, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
- Comment: Some of this discussion should probably be moved wholesale to WT:BIO. In the meantime:
- there are reasonable arguments that were not fully refuted. If there were reasonable arguments that weren't countered, then it would be nice if they were specified, but it's invalid anyway, since weighing of consensus in no way requires that one side's arguments are fully countered.
- if Phelps were male that she wouldn't have been nominated for deletion (Twitter). Those working in the sciences, including those with stronger sourcing and claims than Phelps, do get nominated (example). The root problem here was that people (reasonably) believed the initial overstatement about her level of responsibility for the discovery of Ts.
- NFOOTY is too lenient. Agreed, but there's a functional reason for having them as separate articles, because they normally appear on multiple pages (at one page you could merge/redirect; at two or more, you can normally only sensibly keep or delete), and there's a benefit to explicit interlinkage. There's a few other SNGs where this logic applies. I have an idea which I'll post sometime at WP:VPI; I expect it to have a broad range of unpopularity.
- NPORN is too lenient. Either you've not seen nominations anytime recently, or appear to be in IDONTLIKEIT territory.
- Those who have their organisations publicise them should receive an article despite not otherwise meeting GNG/ANYBIO/ACADEMIC. Scientists only? Why not administrators, attorneys, auditors, anaesthetists and accountants? Only government organisations? Why not non-governmental or private organisations of a similar function, repute and size?
: (participant in the AFD) ~Hydronium~Hydroxide~(Talk)~ 23:26, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
- (AfD nominator) NFOOTY may be ridiclous (but it may be based on the sport rags covering players - implied coverage). However, NPROF as it is already relaxes GNG by a wide margin. Academics who pass GNG by dint of their own publications often have no indepependent coverage on themselves. As for Phelps - a b.sc with few publications and a little bit of STEM PR from their employer - is not close to meeting NPROF. Such employee profiles and promotion are available in many occupations - and establishing a SNG allowing us to establish notability on such grounds would open the NOTSOAP gates. Finally - the BLP concern - our article on Phelps containd at least two wildly inaccurate assertions - we stated she was a PhD when she in fact holds a b.sc. In addition we stated she was the first African American woman to discover an element - which is possibly inaccurate in that there may be a prior such individual and it overstates Phelps role. Our rather severe bio falsification had ramifications outside of Wikipedia - a few non-Wikipedia people/orgs tweeted about a Dr. Phelps based on our false coverage.Icewhiz (talk) 05:06, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
- Overturn This was a blatant supervote. The closer acknowledged that there were different good faith views but rather than recording the lack of consensus, they enforced the view which they preferred, citing only guidelines but not a single policy. This manner of closing is contrary to the emphatic guidance of WP:DGFA, "When in doubt, don't delete." The outcome is especially outrageous when compared with the close of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cody Claver – a parallel case of weak notability. The male footballer got the benefit of the doubt while the female scientist didn't. Andrew D. (talk) 11:08, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
:*I understand this because it looked like a supervote to me at first as well, but then I read the discussion again with more care. Source-based arguments do carry a lot of weight at AfD, and aspirational commentary about the kind of articles we ought to have are generally defeated by close evaluation of sources. It's normally right to do that. I really do feel that Wikipedia has followed its own rules here. But I think we've followed them off a cliff. I think you're right to say NFOOTY is a very inclusionist guideline. There's a general issue with SNGs producing inconsistent results because some of them are more inclusionist than others, which is a matter we've discussed several times at DRV. That might be a useful basis for the RfC Sandstein mentions.—S Marshall T/C 01:05, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
::* No, the rules were not followed. I explicitly cited 4 separate policies and they were ignored in the close just as WP:DGFA was ignored. The closer cited some guidelines but guidelines are weaker than policies, not stronger, and they specifically say that exceptions are permitted. This is exactly the sort of situation that WP:IAR was written for as the encyclopedia is clearly worse as a result of this action. Other action such as the RfC isn't going to put this right because the football fans are showing up in numbers to defeat it and, in any case, deleting more stuff would just make matters worse – annoying even more people to no useful purpose. Andrew D. (talk) 14:00, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
:::* They were quite roundly rebutted with policy - [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Clarice_Phelps&diff=881720391&oldid=881716893 diff] - the lack of independent reliable sources make an article meeting WP:V and WP:NPOV impossible (I'll note the rather laughable [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Clarice_Phelps&diff=881728339&oldid=881722766 reply] - of seeing no V problems - when the article at the time was falsely misrepresenting the subject as a PhD (holds, in fact, a b.sc and is apparently a m.sc student)). Given the subject is a WP:BLP, lack of sourcing is a serious issue. Furthermore, relying on the subject's employer's PR is a WP:NOTSOAP issue. Icewhiz (talk) 15:25, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
::::* No, Icewhiz's points were just some of their overblown bludgeoning. The close was not based on any of that as the closer just cherry-picked his own favourites from the torrent of tendentious twaddle. Andrew D. (talk) 18:26, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
:*Without even looking at them, I can tell you how those will go; we've tried this before. All the people who've spent the last decade or more writing these minimally-sourced BLPs will all have their favourite SNG pages watchlisted, and they'll all line up to give you a hundred and one reasons why you can't delete all their work. The RfC will end, at best, in no consensus. That's why, for some years, there was a standoff situation where WP:NPORN was still an official Wikipedia guideline but DRV was completely refusing to enforce it. As an alternative, you could try relaxing the guidelines for scholars but I bet that doesn't get past all our BLP hawks.—S Marshall T/C 18:42, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
::*I worry they were started too soon, but now that they're here, I hope everyone participates, including everyone who !voted at the Phelps AfD. As I understand it, a lot of things at Wikipedia never changed, until one day they did. Leviv ich 01:05, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
:::*I would tend to suggest that there may have been insufficient preparation, and it may be wiser to withdraw them promptly and start a workshop to prepare for an RfC based on hard data. I mean, the way to show that NFOOTY is too inclusive is by counting the number of football-related BLPs and comparing it with the number of academic BLPs (and that would take someone with more technical knowledge than me, but for example there's probably a way to count the number of articles that are in both :category:Living people and a subcategory of :category:Footballers -- sounds like a job for a script). If we don't base the RfC on hard data then we'll get an RfC that's about opinions.—S Marshall T/C 21:36, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
::::*This came up during GiantSnowman's recent arbitration case. As of a few minutes ago, there are 895870 main namespace pages in :Category:Living people, of which 138981 transclude {{tl|Infobox football biography}}. About 1 in 6½. —Cryptic 22:20, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
:::::*That's quite an astonishing statistic. Comparing football counts with academic counts isn't in itself a good gauge of anything because we don't know the overall ratio of reliable source coverage between the two. But one in six is just crazy. Systemic bias in action. — Amakuru (talk) 23:04, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
::::::*As the world's most popular sport, I estimate there's roughly 2,000 professional football teams worldwide (estimate based on a web search and rounded). If they each have 18 players, and each club receives significant coverage (not a bad assumption, either) that means there are approximately 36,000 professional footballers playing worldwide. Some won't be notable, but many teams will have more than 18 players, as well, and this doesn't include players notable for other reasons, for instance national team players. And that's just current players. I'm not surprised the number's that high, but it's also an apples-to-oranges comparison and doesn't imply anything about reliable source coverage. SportingFlyer T·C 03:08, 16 February 2019 (UTC)
:::::::*What would be an apples-to-apples comparison for football biographies? 1 out of 6 strikes me as obvious evidence of an imbalance. Leviv ich 03:18, 16 February 2019 (UTC)
::::::::*I'm not sure numerical comparisons between occupations with completely different coverage levels can ever be comparable, honestly. I agree it shows an imbalance. It does not necessarily show a bias. SportingFlyer T·C 03:37, 16 February 2019 (UTC)
:::::::::* Almost all national team players play on a professional team. I am going to call bullshit on the coverage of many of the 2,000 teams - some of which receive less coverage than college teams in the US (whose athletes we generally exclude). 1st tier teams have coverage. 3rd and 4th tier teams (currently included) are probably mostly covered in very local papers - which would not ususally establish SIGCOV for other bios.Icewhiz (talk) 06:25, 16 February 2019 (UTC)
::::::::::*This is a conversation for a different place, but I disagree with your assumption - third and fourth-tier fully professional leagues tend receive very good coverage. (There's a couple on our list I raise my eyebrow at, but they're also not ones that cause this problem.) SportingFlyer T·C 07:09, 16 February 2019 (UTC)
{{unindent}} Wow, thanks Cryptic for the prompt hard data! I feel that the next question is, how many should there be? (SportingFlyer's probably right about the venue and I have no objection to moving this discussion to wherever is more appropriate.)—S Marshall T/C 18:17, 16 February 2019 (UTC)
- Endorse The closer made a fair discussion of the situation, and I would not have objected if it had led him to the opposite conclusion.Of course local consensus to keep or delete can override any guidelines--guidelines are called guidelines because they only give the usual or general way of dealing with things, and we can make whatever exceptions we have consensus for, and any reasoning that doing so will benefit the encyclopedia by IAR is a fair argument. We make our own rules, and we make our own exceptions. But there was not such consensus to override the general guidelines of GNG and WP:PROF here, so the deletion is valid. The question of whether we are too permissive in other areas is a separate issue -- differnet fields are not comparable. We have recently raised the bar for Pornbio, and perhaps we should raise it further, and conceivably we should raise it for athletes, but these are separate discussions. DGG ( talk ) 09:29, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
::Don't raise the bar for limbo dancers of course; that would make it too easy :) ——SerialNumber54129
- Endorse because the closer was entitled to do as he did. However, along with DGG I think keep or no consensus would have also been within discretion. So far as I know we have no policy against bringing Wikipedia (further) into disrepute. WP:IAR does not really cover that because it can be (and I suppose is being) read in a way to give priority to abiding by the rules over benefiting the reader or the community. However, our guidelines were produced to guide our thoughts with advice intended to be wise, not to constrain us into making poor choices. Thincat (talk) 13:29, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
- I'll note that our SNGs cover most professional athletes but don't cover most professional researchers. I think there is an argument that one of those two things is broken. Now the reason for it is that we rely on coverage, and most professional athletes have coverage in spades while most professional researchers don't. Says something about our society I guess. But as long as we tie independent coverage to notability at all, we're going to be at the whims of society. What people are really suggesting is that our long-adopted measure of notability has serious problems. And I'm not sure an SNG change here or there is going to fix that. I'm a big fan of WP:N. It provides a fairly bright line for inclusion. But it isn't perfect. Hobit (talk) 15:46, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
- –Researchers/scholars/academics are covered by the SNG WP:Prof. Xxanthippe (talk) 21:26, 15 February 2019 (UTC).
- Correct, my wording was poor. WP:ATHLETE would have us include almost all professional athletes. WP:PROF does not have us include most professional researchers. That was the point I was trying to make. Hobit (talk) 19:21, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
- I'm confused by the comments that the closer could have properly closed the discussion as either a keep, or a delete, or a no consensus. How can consensus clearly support one outcome and also clearly support the opposite outcome? If a discussion could reasonably be closed as either keep or delete, isn't it, by definition, "no consensus"? Leviv ich 21:03, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
- Well, since I made such a comment above I'll respond here. The AFD was largely a matter of our notability guidelines rather than any policy and some people rank guidelines as a lot less compelling than policies and others put them pretty much on a par. All guidelines say they admit of occasional exceptions and say that they are to be treated with common sense. To some (most?) people common sense is to abide by the rules of thumb given and to have scarcely any exceptions. Some people take guidelines to be descriptive of what has happened on previous discussions and other people take them to be prescriptive of how one ought to !vote. Some closers discount !votes that go against guidelines (even if a justification is given), others accept them unless they are clearly silly or malicious. Some people assess how "strong" an argument is (not by vehemence, but by persuasive power) others allow people an equal say even if they are not so eloquent. Subjectivity prevails throughout AFD voting and closing, and likewise at DRV. Now, if the close could have been made any way, why was it not necessarily "no consensus"? It is because the closer did not think that it could be closed any way other than "delete". He was certain. How nice to see things so clearly. Speaking personally, at DRV I endorse any close unless I find it highly aberrant and, for me, this one was not. Thincat (talk) 17:01, 16 February 2019 (UTC)
- Overturn as no consensus per Andrew Davidson. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:20, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
- Endorse Closer assessed consensus and the arguments made against our relevant policies and guidelines. Only in death does duty end (talk) 22:37, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
- Endorse the strength of arguments and the numerical vote count are clearly towards deletion. It's not unanimous, but unanimity is not required for consensus. Furthermore, the keep arguments are circular; they effectively say that the article should be kept because WP:N is not a policy, but give no reason other than WP:ILIKEIT to ignore that guideline here. power~enwiki (π, ν) 20:10, 18 February 2019 (UTC)
- Endorse with caveat – this is WP:BLP1E at best. Although I am with WIR in wanting more articles about Black women, I wonder how Clarice would feel if she were included on Wikipedia just for being a Black woman, while other members of the team that discovered 117 were excluded for lack of notability. Latching onto this one article when there are so many notable women of color to write about looks like tokenism. On the other hand, I want to start a general conversation about how our notability guidelines might result in the unintentional exclusion of women of color just because the wider media tends not to cover their accomplishments, and how we can address that within the constraints of notability (broadly construed). Qzekrom (talk) 21:35, 18 February 2019 (UTC)
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