Template:Did you know nominations/Ian Stephens (editor)

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Cwmhiraeth (talk) 05:18, 7 April 2018 (UTC)

Ian Stephens (editor) edit

  • ... that British newspaper editor Ian Stephens may have saved "hundreds of thousands" of lives during the Bengal famine of 1943 by publishing photographs of the victims? Source: Sen, Amartya (27 April 1984). "Mr Ian Stephens". The Times: "In the subcontinent in which Ian Stephens spent a substantial part of his life, he is remembered not only as a great editor (with amiable, if somewhat eccentric, manners), but also as someone whose hard-fought campaign possible [sic] saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of people."

Created by SlimVirgin (talk). Self-nominated at 03:57, 17 February 2018 (UTC).

General: Article is new enough and long enough
Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Hook: Hook has been verified by provided inline citation
QPQ: Done.

Overall: Excellently written article about responsible and independent journalism. Article may have a minor neutrality issue, for example it does not describe any negative responses from the British, focusing instead on the praise Stephens received. Secondly, next time please add the source above yourself. Thirdly, don't forget to do a review (QPQ). Farang Rak Tham (Talk) 12:25, 18 February 2018 (UTC)

Farang, there's a problem here. First you rejected the nomination on the grounds that it had previously been nominated for FA status, [1] then after I explained that you'd confused it for the other article linked in the entry, [2] you removed your post rather than striking it, [3] leaving my reply as a reply to nothing. Now you say that the article isn't neutral because it doesn't contain negative reaction to Stephens' publication, even though there wasn't any that I'm aware of. And you added the wrong source above. SarahSV (talk) 17:19, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
Sorry about yesterday. With regard to the wiki article, are you sure there were no negative responses? Stephens was more or less going against British policy. Above I had added one of the two sources you cited in the article, but today have removed. I cannot access the Times article, because I have no newspaper clippings subscription. I understand the Times article contains the original quote, so please write a note above in the hook to that effect. There must be a source mentioned in the hook (and preferably a quote from the source).--Farang Rak Tham (Talk) 18:21, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
Okay, I'll add something above from The Times, but the lead contains the quote, so I didn't think it was necessary. Re: neutrality, I'm not aware of anything negative in secondary sources. He was widely hailed as a hero, and the British were finally forced to act. Whether they grumbled about him in private, I don't know. He has written a book with a couple of chapters about what happened, but it's hard to access. I do intend to develop the article eventually, but I thought this would be enough for a start article at DYK. SarahSV (talk) 18:27, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
I tried to search for some information about Stephens, but could not find much detail. Anyway, I understand that there is not much of an issue of neutrality, just a matter of an article which is still in process. Above I have included the source, which i take on good faith. I cannot access it, but have seen it quoted in The Telegraph. So once you have done the QPQ i can pass the hook on good faith.--Farang Rak Tham (Talk) 19:09, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
SlimVirgin, don't forget the QPQ thingie.--Farang Rak Tham (Talk) 20:36, 5 March 2018 (UTC)
  • I'm here to comment that it is unreasonable and a creeping-rule form of POV to say that an article is "not neutral" because it doesn't feature a response that the editor feels should exist. If there was any negative response, the burden of showing it falls on whoever claims there was -- provide that primary source saying "we hate Mr Stephens", or that secondary source saying "the response to Mr Stephens was not all positive", don't just assume there must've been one and expect others to follow your command. And BTW, the assumption that there must have been one, or that Churchill intended to starve the Indians, strikes me as part of the revisionistic third-worldist legendarium that gets published in The Guardian and appears in rants by Indian Congress Party officials, in contradiction to even the most basic facts documented by historians in the 60-odd years before that. Dahn (talk) 13:04, 24 March 2018 (UTC)
  • It have nothing against the subject of the article, if you're referring to me. But writing about the criticism the subject of the article has faced, helps to provide context, and in this case, may help us understand how daring Stephens' decisions were during that time. It was not a command, it was an inquiry, as you can read above "Article may have a minor neutrality issue ..." I'm not aware of any "rants by Indian Congress Party Officials", since i don't read Indian news papers--perhaps you can enlighten me sometimes about these matters.--Farang Rak Tham (Talk) 17:38, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

Hi, this article appears to have a {{refimprove}} tag on it - could this be fixed before promoting to queue? Thanks. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 15:45, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

Ritchie333 someone added {{refimprove}} to the Selected works section without explaining why, so I've removed an unpublished paper, in case that's the concern, and the tag. [4] I can't see what else to do. SarahSV (talk) 15:55, 11 April 2018 (UTC)
It is a mysterious tag. It was the section Selected Works that was tagged. Perhaps The Rambling Man wanted links to the works of Ian Stephens. Regardless, the article has only reliable sources.--Farang Rak Tham (Talk) 17:14, 11 April 2018 (UTC)