Wiki143:Articles for deletion/Simon Fraser University 1997 harassment controversy

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. - Mailer Diablo 12:24, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Simon Fraser University 1997 harassment controversy

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This page has been speedy deleted with an eye to an ArbComm case that wasn't closed, overturned at Deletion Review, and kept at AFD. While the AFD was open, the ArbComm case closed, placing this article under a remedy encouraging but not requiring speedy deletion. It has since been speedy deleted again, and gone to deletion review again. With no consensus to endorse the speedy deletion, it is overturned and brought back to AFD per the undeletion policy. So here we are, unfortunately. As part of the deletion review close, the article has been both retitled and cut down about 50%. So while you are encouraged to read the most recent deletion review, and any other desired discussion, many of the concerns are at least partly addressed and the article should be read as it is now before opining again. I don't want any admin to wheel war over this, and I don't want to see it on deletion review a third time, so please come to a clear consensus. Ideas from the deletion review include 1) deleting it, 2) keeping it 3) merging it to History of Simon Fraser University, 4) merging it elsehere, and I'm sure you all will have more. Count my listing as a technical nomination. GRBerry 07:28, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
Note to closing admin This article has attracted sock-puppets to prior discussions, including the deletion review just closed. GRBerry 07:28, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

• Additional note to closing admin Take a look at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration#Request for clarification on undeleted Marsden-Donnelly harassment case. At this time, no clarification has issued, but that may change by the time you close this. GRBerry 19:58, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
• Additional comment by relister: Personally, I think that merging to History of Simon Fraser University won't work, as that is a one edit stub that will be overwhelmed by this content, and is unlikely to be watched closely enough to prevent the content from violating WP:BLP at some point in the future. I encourage opiners who believe that prior opinions should be endorsed to make it crystal clear which prior opinons they are endorsing; the possible merge solution was unavailable as a close in deletion review because it was unclear whether some "per above" opinions were in favor of or opposed to that solution. GRBerry 07:34, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep A significant event, and one for which many sources are available. CJCurrie 07:37, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
• Reluctant keep as the outcome involved the resignation of the president of a top university. In other words, a significant outcome outside the case itself. Normally I would suggest a merge back into Rachel Marsden but the ArbCom situation suggests that would not be helpful. --Dhartung | Talk 07:49, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep There is overwhelming evidence of sustained nationwide coverage of the controversy, including a set of articles from more than halfway across the country two and a half years after the story broke (Ottawa Citizen). Articles whose primary subject is this case include multiple full-length articles in each of the Globe and Mail and Macleans, and at least two Google Scholar results. Kla'quot 08:02, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep Reasons listed:
  1. If we apply WP:N, the case shatters the required threshold of multiple reliable sources. I find upward of 30,000 words in Lexis-Nexis and Newsbank alone, over multiple months from almost all major Canadian news outlets (very few international though). The case reverberates in the Canadian press until today. Notability is also given by the institutional impact. Resignation of a president of a major university is no small thing. I cannot see how 30,000 words should be summarized in two lines in History of SFU. The case, while probably not a first-tier academic scandal, is clearly far from obscure.
  2. WP:BLP requires tight sourcing of all claims and balanced writing. It does not mean sourced comments must be removed because they put individuals in a bad light, and many other academic scandals on which we have articles have an element of wrongdoing by at least one participant. All are or should be held to WP:BLP, none should be (or have been, to my knowledge) completely removed. After reading most of the articles I find that the article does not deviate in tone from the majority of articles from the major news outlets. It is not "grossly unbalanced". If the article appears biased, then it's because the facts are biased. If individual sources are found to be unreliable, this should not be a problem as most factual claims can be sourced in triplicate. (Addendum: I support GRBerry's removal of the lurid details. The article should focus on the institutional process and impact in the style of Rick Coe's analysis for the Canadian Association of University Teachers).
  3. This article revolves around three individuals and one institution. The institution, SFU, and one individual, President S., are notable ex officio; one individual, LD, is seemingly non-notable outside this case; and one individual, RM, is of contested notability. This argument has been made that because of the contested notability of this last individual covering the case in the detail allowed by the richness of the sources constitutes undue weight. I cannot find a precedent for this. We cover scandals in the bio of individuals if the scandal revolves around one person and biographical information is available (see e.g. Mary McCarthy (CIA)) or in a stand-alone article on the case (see e.g. Duke lacrosse case), or as in the Ward Churchill case, spread over multiple articles. If RM is non-notable outside this case and biographical information is hard to come by, there should be no bio entry on her for risk of providing false information. But this should not affect this article which meets all of our standards per WP:N and no arguments other that "there should not be two articles on RM" have been made in support of the claim that it fails our policies. ~ trialsanderrors 08:18, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep. Easily passes the notability threshold (and I'm reluctant to grant that to "news" events.) If WP:BLP is an ongoing concern, apply an appropriate level of protection to the article, but do not delete it. BLP applies to unsourced or false information, not true and well-sourced information which makes someone look bad. This information is already a significant part of public record and consciousness, and our failure to include it will do little or nothing to "protect" those involved. Seraphimblade 09:35, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep at this title (great idea, BTW), do not merge. I coudl rehash it all again, but I think T&E put it as well as anyone could. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:04, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
• <sigh> This will be kept here because it meets the notability requirements, only to be deleted because of WP:BLP concerns later and per the ArbCom remedies, brought up at deletion review and brought back here.... My opinion is there should be a cooling-off period with implementation of a Brian Peppers solution, per my reasoning at the DRV and because there is no deadline. The scandal does meet the notability guidelines, but it was relatively minor. And that's the primary continuing interest in this: a scandal involving the obnoxious Rachel Marsden. And that's why people are interested in this, not because of its effect on university administrative procedures. No one is champing at the bit to write University of Michigan speech code controversy, even though that was a big story in its day and we could no doubt find hundreds of sources on it. It could be a good article (and no doubt will be one day); but no one criticizes Wikipedia because it isn't covered here. It is important that we cover Monicagate currently; this is optional and can wait. JChap2007 17:54, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
  • WP:TIND seems to be about breaking news stories. I don't see how this applies here. You seem to be arguing in favor of WP:LETSLEEPINGDOGSLIE.. ~ trialsanderrors 07:16, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
    • "Let sleeping dogs lie" is not policy, just a good idea here. JChap2007 13:53, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep due to notability (nationwide attention from major media outlets), verifiability and impact on the university and beyond. However, it needs some clean-up to make it less POV. EDIT: It has been cleaned up quite a bit since my last visit to the page. In general, it's getting there so clean-up requirements are not as a big an issue now as it was before. -→Buchanan-Hermit™/?! 19:26, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
  • Please go to it now, in the spirit of Template:Tl. The hatchet I wielded last night was primarily aimed at biographical details, and may not have been perfectly aimed even there. Improving an article during an AFD discussion is always a good idea. The article is only semi-protected, not fully protected. GRBerry 20:06, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
    • I agree that "keep and cleanup" should not be a permissible opinion in this discussion. BLP issues should be addressed during this five-day procedural reprieve and not expected to be solved afterwards. And it also shouldn't be addressed in this handwaving "there are problems in the article somewhere" manner, we had enough of that during the DRV. If there are objectionable passages they should be brought up here to make sure they're fixed prior to closure of this AfD. That's not to say that I don't think GRB did an aadmirable job cutting through the clutter (double negative). ~ trialsanderrors 20:48, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
• Ugh. Keep this is notable and verifiable from the news coverage. And such instances are how school policies get reformed. Now we have to go BLP on this article.-- danntm ^T _C 23:50, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep From the history of the article, the version of Nov. 30 seems more explanatory and less confusing and cryptic. The erase button of the redactor may have been plied excessively to avoid including well sourced material about this incident. Edison 01:25, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep -- can't follow the details closely enough, but there is more than enough media attention to this (apparently notable) affair to allow the article to become well-sourced and NPOV. Sdedeo (tips) 20:26, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep per trialsanderrors. I can't believe this is still ongoing. Resolute 02:15, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep, as it's notable, etc. However, let's watch it to make sure it doesn't become a platform for personal attacks against Rachel Marsden (for whom I hold no light) based on her political point of view. --Leifern 02:27, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

  Become? JChap2007 05:33, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

• Keep as a significant event with notability clearly demonstrated by nationwide media coverage. Disagree with any sort of merge option due to ArbCom ruling. bbx 03:56, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep significant event. Trialsanderrors conclusively proves its inclusion-worthiness above.  ALKIVAR™ ☢ 03:57, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep This case has multiple non-trivial published works about it establishing notability, more so than most articles of this type. There's no reason to merge as the sources demonstrate merit as an individual subject. --Oakshade 05:00, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep, the references clearly demonstrate notability. Everyking 06:46, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep per CJCurrie and Everyking. GreenJoe 02:12, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
• Keep as a significant event as per trialsanderrors. Sdalmonte 02:49, 8 February 2007 (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.