Talk:Stephen G. Roszel

Neutral point of view? And why have references been deleted?

Since this article was accepted at AfC, almost every bit of it has been changed from a neutral summary of what's in the references (most of which have also been removed) into a tribute full of cherry-picked quotes, mostly written by a friend of his, some in a letter to the editor of a publication, which is not a reliable source. I'd like to know how this can be justified. —Anne Delong (talk) 03:06, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

It's a work in progress, as should be clear from the edit summaries. And whether Nathan Bangs was a friend or not, he was one of the most important Methodist thinkers of the era and thus someone whose view is relevant. --ThaddeusB (talk) 04:17, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

I also take issue with the description of the changes. There are a total of two quotes by Bangs. The first is a physical description of the man - hardly controversial or "tribute" material - a primary source is perfectly acceptable. The second is an attributed quote, offered upon his death. It is quite common to have quotes from famous (and relevant) figures in the death section of an article. (A third quote, not by Bangs, was already in the article before I edited it.) Meanwhile, I have expanded the article from 600 bytes to 3700. Of the added 3100 bytes, 360 comes from the two quotes - hardly "filling" the article.

And as long as we are discussing neutrality, I will note that the original text did not mention Roszel's anti-abolitionist efforts. To say adding such (potentially embarrassing) material makes the article "a tribute" to the man is rather silly.

Finally, on the "deleted" references, I will say the original references were all passing mentions that did not establish notability. I have replaced the sources where information was gleaned from a single sentence mentioning the man in a 300 page book to actual summaries of his life that contain the same facts (and establish notability by being significant coverage.) No actual material has been removed, and a few high quality sources is a much better way to build an article than dozens of trivial mentions. --ThaddeusB (talk) 16:48, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

I agree that "high quality" sources are a good thing, but only if they are independent and by different authors. While the sources that were in the article were not all extensive, they supported specific facts and were accessible on line for verifiability. All articles are "works in progress", but this isn't a draft any more; it's an actual article, so sources shouldn't be removed unless replaced first with better ones. When I saw it, it had three sources: One was pre-existing in the draft, not linked on line and not cited. The second was not linked on line, but I was able to find a link, and saw that most of the citations were to a letter to the editor from a friend (N. Bangs) - such letters are included unedited and for this reason are weak sources. The third source linked on line, and about half of the section about the subject is another quote from the same Mr. Bangs. I hope that you can see my concerns, and will consider not removing a "variety" of sources in favour of a "few" unless there is danger of WP:CITEKILL or if some of the sources are unsuitable.

Since my original post you have added to the sources and the article is more balanced, for which I thank you. About the anti-abolitionist activity: Perhaps you would have been justified in using this example to call my concerns "silly" if that material had actually been in the draft at the time. —Anne Delong (talk) 02:55, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

No worries, just a minor misunderstanding. (It seems the article was updated about the same time as your comment and I mistakenly believe you'd seen this version.) ... I always intended to add back the other sources that were relevant (as I said in the edit summary). It was just easier to do it in steps since each source only supported a tiny bit of text... Anyway, thanks for getting this ready to submit for AfC. I would have never seen it otherwise, but I took interest in it when I saw it had been G13 delayed 2+ years. At first it looked non-notable, but then I figured out his name was usually spelled with one "l" and bam a bunch of more extensive sources popped up. --ThaddeusB (talk) 04:50, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

BTW, when I say "work in progress" I mean something I am actively working on, not just something that might be improved someday. :) --ThaddeusB (talk) 05:13, 16 January 2015 (UTC)