Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Joshua Packwood

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 no consensus, defaults to keep.--Bedford ^Pray 18:08, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Joshua Packwood

Joshua Packwood (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) (delete) – (View log)

Claim to fame is being the first white valedictorian at Morehouse College. Does not appear notable, however, per WP:BIO. References exist, as this is probably all over the news at the moment, but Wikipedia is not Wikinews. Might be worth mentioning at Morehouse College, but no basis for standalone article at the moment. Kinu ^t/_c 07:31, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

• Speedy Keep - Why do other Wikipedians tolerate people who do this stupid deletion shit to articles just an hour old and that are still breaking stories? Ever heard of STUBS? Apparently not!

And this at "at the moment" stuff by the nominator totally gives away his/her shortsightedness and rush to judgment here!

Let's see: from WP:BIO, the subject must be "unusual enough to deserve attention or to be recorded." Er, the first white valedictorian at a historically black college? Gimme a freakin' break -- yea, that's unusual, DUH!

When all sources say the person "made history", that's not "routine news coverage" as discussed at Wikipedia is not Wikinews - again, a big and well-deserved DUH! goes to the nominator here.

Sheesh! "Kinu" needs community censure, not support for this AfD.

Now go find something productive to do instead of tearing down the good faith work of others!

Daimerej (talk) 08:01, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Comment: Please discuss/debate on contents, not attacking other editor. Everybody has a right to nominate an article for deletion. Let us discuss whether this article stays or not based on Wikipedia policies and guidelines, okay? Being in AfD does not mean that this article is already going to be deleted. An administrator will decide later based on the consensus of this debate. Dekisugi (talk) 08:45, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Comment - Thanks for supporting me when my good faith efforts at contributing to Wikipedia were so very, very obviously and misguidedly attacked by User:Kinu. It is heartening to realize that people do not view all editor actions as on equal footing and warranted and rational, which -- of course, this is very obvious, and goes without saying -- by extension means something about the editors who take such actions. On the other hand, what you are saying reminds me of a numbbot who might say that anyone who brings false charges before a "court" is blameless, while assuring the person who is charged that there will be a just outcome from a nameless and faceless "judge". But a just court immediately throws out and does not even listen to drummed up false charges, and a failure to do this right away gives no assurance to the person falsely charged. Quite the opposite, in fact. Daimerej (talk) 09:09, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I'll let the community speak for the legitimacy of my actions. Seeing has no one has jumped on the bandwagon to censure me, it looks like my nomination was made in good faith after all. I have no vested interest in the article itself, per se, so I will defer to consensus from this discussion, as is the case with every AfD. From the looks of things, it looks like there is plenty of discussion to be had. As for your personal attacks, I see no reason to humor them... sticks and stones. --Kinu ^t/_c 23:14, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

• Keep. First, a note to Daimerej: please remember WP:CIVIL. There is no need to resort to bad language. Second, the nomination is very misguided. The person is clearly notable per WP:BIO. In-depth biographical coverage exists by multiple independent reliable sources. Apart from those listed in the article, there are lots more. GoogleNews gives 206 hits[1]. The core requirement of WP:BIO is: "A person is presumed to be notable if he or she has been the subject of published secondary source material which is reliable, intellectually independent, and independent of the subject". There is no doubt that this requirement is met here. Also, the nomination is misapplying WP:NOT#NEWS. This is not a WP:BLP1E case either (although there one could perhaps make a stronger argument). Both are talking about the situations where the only reason the individual is mentioned is where a particular event is covered. Here, the newscoverage is primarily of the individual, not the event. If not for him, there certainly would not be such massive newscoverage of the commemcement at Morehouse College in the first place. Plus, of course, in this case the coverage of the individual was specific, in-depth and detailed, not what WP:NOT#NEWS is talking about. Nsk92 (talk) 09:40, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Changing to Neutral for the time being. See my more detailed comments below. Nsk92 (talk) 08:42, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

• Delete per WP:BLP1E. In addition, this person doesn't have inherent notability. His achievements have not been article-noteworthy, there's plenty of students with 4.0's. He happened to be to the person utilized to achieve a semi-notable event that is amply covered in Morehouse College#Modern history.--brewcrewer (yada, yada) 16:07, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I disagree. His notability comes not that from the fact that he is a valedictorian, but from the fact that he is the first white valedictorian at Morehouse, a top historically black college. E.g. this CNN story makes this very clear[2].You may think that this is not a good reason for notability but extensive press coverage says otherwise. BLP1E says: "Where a person is mentioned by name in a Wikipedia article about a larger subject, but remains of essentially low profile themselves, we should generally avoid having an article on them. ...In such cases, a redirect or merge are usually the better options. Cover the event, not the person." Do we really want to have a WP article called The first white valedictorian at Moreohouse, a top historically black college? Because that is the event here. Nsk92 (talk) 16:31, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

That event is at Morehouse College#Modern history. It can be stretched out there for all its worth. But the event doesn't need its own article, and the validictorian certaintly doen't need his own article. --brewcrewer (yada, yada) 17:00, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

• Keep I say! It does no harm to do so, and it does seem a quite significant event. If Wikipedia sees it fit to keep the names and histories of all the different characters in made-up TV shows and other inane pap, I don't understand why its a problem to list this seemingly trivial, but fairly interesting fact. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 150.204.166.183 (talk • contribs) (see here for post).— 150.204.166.183 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
  • This seems like a WP:NOHARM, WP:OTHERSTUFF, and WP:POKEMON argument to me. --Kinu ^t/_c 23:17, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
• Weak Keep - Meets the basic criteria of notability (see WP:BIO for criteria) and additional sources are available on subject. He’s not as notable as Frank Rossitano, but is probably more notable than Amy Wong.Absolon S. Kent (talk) 22:08, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
• Redirect - no notability apart from this one episode, which it makes more sense to include in the college article. HeartofaDog (talk) 16:54, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
• Delete, the person is only notable for WP:ONEEVENT, as the article reads. Millions of students attain 4.0 grade point averages, big deal. This is a feel good news story, not an encyclopedia article. Coccyx Bloccyx (talk) 17:28, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
• Delete. Coverage at Morehouse College of the notable event is perfectly sufficient. No prejudice to recreation if he goes on to do other notable things besides graduate. - Eldereft ~(s)talk~ 17:30, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
• Delete or possibly merge to Morehouse College. I see no potential for this article to expand with appropriate material. It seems to me that BLP1E is a valid argument here. -Verdatum (talk) 18:08, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
• Redirect as it's a valid search term, but he's only notable for one event and we should cover the event, not the person. _{TravellingCari}^{the Busy Bee} 20:08, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
• speedy keep, clearly notable. Huge amount of media coverage. this is a big deal historically for race relations in the united states. many first black this, first woman that, first gay this have articles about them. we have to be fair in our coverage. this has gotten massive coverage. and he's so damn cute, you can't delete such a nice guy's article. i hope that my personal comments don't invalidate my arguement based on policy. thanks. also please let's wait and see how well this article can get written.Latinlover-sa (talk) 22:10, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
• Delete. Wikipedia is not a newspaper. KleenupKrew (talk) 00:58, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
• Keep Noteworthy, indeed. Trasel (talk) 04:31, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
• Keep for now; see how it develops. This guy received MASSIVE media attention -- as in, made the NBC Nightly News, CNN, etc. and the historical impact of his actions may be seen as a long-lasting sign/milestone for race relations.--SecretAgent (talk) 04:54, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

• I believe that the content in its current form could be condensed down to high-quality factual paragraph (easily, if you cut out all the quotes and soundbytes that make up everything below the second paragraph, which add almost nothing to an encyclopedic coverage of the subject, the event, or the person at this point in history). That paragraph should then be merged and anchor-redirected to the specific section of the educational institution's article, so that readers are taken to where the information is, and are provided with the context to understand the importance of the information.

  At the moment, this is a single person, making the news because of a single event in his life. As Daimerej has said, this is still a breaking news story, although I must rebut his use of the term "made history" to describe this event... if the American media is anything like the Australian media, the term "made history" is thrown around far more than it should be. At this very moment in time, Mr Packwood had "made the news". This gentleman and this event may have long-term ramifications, but the case for "making history" will be made when the history books are talking about him. That may well happen. If it turns out that this gentleman gains long-term notability down the track because he has had a more widespread impact (as indicated by multiple, in-depth, reliable sources covering the subject from the holistic point-of-view of the person's life, not the point-of-view of a single event in that person's life), then the article can easily be split back out. -- saberwyn 07:28, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

• Comment. After thinking about it quite a bit, I have re-evaluated my position and will change my vote to Neutral for now. I think the real question here is whether or not the event that there was the first white valedictorian at Moreohouse, while clearly notable in the sense of WP:N in view of the massive coverage it received, deserves a separate WP article at this time. If the answer is "yes", this article needs to be kept (it is not really possible to write an article about this event without it turning essentially into a biographical article about the person; if the event is article-worthy, this would not be a BLP1E case as a careful reading of WP:BLP1E indicates). If the answer is "no", the event, and, correspondingly, the person, may be covered in the Moreohouse College article for the time being and then this could be treated as a BLP1E case for now. Saberwyn gives a good argument for this "no" option above. One could also give a reasonable "yes" argument here on the basis of various historic firsts and lasts being permanently notable and article-worthy once they get enough coverage. Ordinarily, for me at least, notability of the event is the primary consideration in deciding if a separate article is warranted. There is no question that the event passes the actual reading of WP:N and the person passes the actual reading of WP:BIO. However, notability is not the only consideration in deciding if an event warrants an article and Saberwyn makes a good argument along these lines above in this specific case. Nsk92 (talk) 08:40, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

• delete per nom. Trilemma (talk) 16:50, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
• keep BLP1E is not a compelling argument since BLP1E is a concern generally because we don't want to focus on negative events in peoples lives. There is no such concern here. Furthermore, BLP1E has limits (thus, we don't apply it to Charles Manson or John Hinkley). Considering that all sources agree that Packwood's acheivement is "historic" he clearly exceeds the threshold where BLP1E would apply. Nor is there any other BLP concern or indication that he doesn't want an article. Considering that this got international press and is continuing to do so, keeping seems more than reasonable. JoshuaZ (talk) 16:36, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Yes, Joshua Packwood is still making newspapers days after a significant event. However, there is all still in the here-and-now... we don't know what long-term effects (if any) Mr. Packwood and his graduation will have. To use your example of Charles Manson, according to the Worldcat online international library catalogue, there are 234 different published books that have Charles Manson as a subject. The gods alone know how many more sources there are in the form of jorunal articles, news entries, documentaries, or major popular culture references (There was a news article in an Australian newspaper today about the one event he is famous for, 40 years after it happened). When Joshua Packwood has this quantity of publication about him, spread over this amount of time, it would be an undeniable fact that a Wikipeda article would be required. But we are nowhere near there yet. -- saberwyn 05:28, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
    • I agree that if he isn't as notable as Manson but the basic point- that BLP1E has limits stands. The question then becomes which side of the line is Packwood on? JoshuaZ (talk) 16:11, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
• Keep Notability does not appear to be in question. Ecoleetage (talk) 19:50, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
• Keep Notable. Edward Bouchet is Yale's first black phd graduate. He is is notable only for that reason. I find nothing else in that article suggesting he is notable. I see no reason to delete the Bouchet article. This seems the same. LarryQ (talk) 10:52, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually, Bouchet was the first black American to receive a PhD at any U.S. university (not just at Yale). Nsk92 (talk) 12:31, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

The comparison also isn't perfect in that entire books have been written about Bouchet. However, no analogy is perfect and the basic point, that this sort of academic achievement can confer notability, holds water. JoshuaZ (talk) 12:38, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

• Keep If merged to the college, it would constitute WP:UNDUE in that article's current state - it has one line there (of about 3 for "Modern history"). The material is encyclopedic & "cover the event, not the person" does not really work here - what else to call it? Johnbod (talk) 01:46, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
• Keep Meets notability requirments.--Bedford ^Pray 16:44, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

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.