From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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 delete. So Why 07:16, 5 July 2017 (UTC) reply

Richard Thomas (politician) (  | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – ( View log · Stats)
(Find sources:  Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs· FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

Minimally sourced biography of a person notable as a smalltown mayor and non-winning candidate for higher office. Neither of these are claims that satisfy WP:NPOL in and of themselves -- he could still get an article as a mayor if he could actually be sourced over the "who have received significant press coverage" part of our criteria for local officeholders, but the sourcing shown here isn't doing that: apart from one obituary in a major newspaper immediately upon his death, the only other sources quoted here are deadlinked content in the town's local community weekly newspaper. There simply isn't enough sourcing here to give him an NPOL pass, and there's nothing here that would hand him a presumption of notability in the absence of adequate sourcing. Bearcat ( talk) 17:40, 11 June 2017 (UTC) reply

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Ontario-related deletion discussions. Bearcat ( talk) 17:40, 11 June 2017 (UTC) reply
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions. Bearcat ( talk) 17:40, 11 June 2017 (UTC) reply
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Ad Orientem ( talk) 00:37, 19 June 2017 (UTC) reply
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, — MRD 20 14 02:42, 27 June 2017 (UTC) reply

Delete There is a lack of adequate sourcing for the article and fails WP:Politician. Most of the existing content comes from an obituary from the Toronto Star. No reliable sources are coming up about his work as a voice actor. -- Enos733 ( talk) 01:16, 29 June 2017 (UTC) reply

  • Keep - I believe the sum of the parts of the biography of this individual are sufficient to meet GNG, even though they came out a loser in a race for parliament by six votes. This is a deceased individual, a historical figure, not the self-congratulatory Wikipedia campaign ad of a politician on the make. Therefore, the SNG high bar that we put up to hinder manipulation of WP by the campaign staffs of political types should not impede a normal consideration of GNG. Carrite ( talk) 16:22, 1 July 2017 (UTC) reply
Comment - I would add that if many politicians decided to kill themselves to take maximum advantage of this relaxed approach to passing WP notability muster, I would have no objection. Carrite ( talk) 16:29, 1 July 2017 (UTC) reply
Exactly zero of the parts in question confer an automatic presumption of notability on anybody in the absence of sufficient reliable source coverage to support them, regardless of whether the subject is alive or dead. And no, you can't take things that don't pass Wikipedia notability criteria in and of themselves and add them up to say that they add up to something like notability when taken in toto, if the sourcing still isn't actually there to support a WP:GNG pass. If he could be shown to pass NPOL #2 ("local political figures who have received significant press coverage") on the basis of having significantly more coverage than just one obituary, then that would be one thing — but the sourcing here simply isn't adequate to get him there. Bearcat ( talk) 16:59, 3 July 2017 (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.