Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Don Black

This page is an archive of the proposed deletion of the article below. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page, if it exists; or after the end of this archived section. The result of the debate was ambiguous.

There are several interlinked decisions in this thread. It is made more complicated by a very chaotic pagemove history. After carefully reviewing all the comments and the evidence presented (and ignoring the "vote count" because it's not helpful in this case):

1. The article currently at Don Black (non-notable person) describes a physics student, webmaster and IEEE chapter chairman. The article does not present evidence that this person meets the recommended criteria for inclusion of biographies. Nor did the discussion below raise strong evidence of this person's inclusion in a general-purpose encyclopedia. I am going to call this as a "delete" decision.
2. The article currently at Don Black (nationalist) describes a white supremacist and former leader of the Ku Klux Klan. Reviewing that article and doing some research of my own, I find only marginal evidence that this person meets the recommended criteria for inclusion of biographies either. There are lots of racists and even lots of people holding offices in the KKK. I find it relevant that he is not mentioned in the KKK article itself nor is there any attempt to chronical every leader. His primary claim to fame seems to be his role as webmaster of Stormfront. If that is the case, he would be better discussed in context. (You could also make an argument that Operation Red Dog is notable but again, that argues for discussion within the article, not a separate biography.) However, this article was never nominated for deletion. I am going to call this a no-decision.
3. Don Black is currently a disambiguation page with four entries. Two of the four have no article today. There was some evidence presented that the pilot might deserve an article but scanning for similar articles, I find few EVPs with biographies. With all due respect to his WWII career and his charity work, these are not unique contributions to society.
4. The musician is more problematic. There was no evidence presented in this discussion that the musician meets any of the recommended criteria. My own research turns up a lyricist who once worked with Andrew Lloyd Weber. I can't personally find enough to meet the WP:MUSIC guidelines. However, there is a redlink at Don Black (musician) with quite a few inbound links. Deferring to the collective judgment of those other editors, I am going to consider that a requested article.
5. That leaves us with a disambiguation page with only one article linking to it and one link that might someday get an article. Of the two (or four) Don Blacks, the white supremacist seems to be the one with the most press though the musician has the most inbound links. Short disambiguation pages are strongly discouraged. Disambiguation pages should be created only when needed to disambiguate between actual articles. I am going to exercise my discretion and create a stub about the musician, cross-link the two articles and pare this page down to just those two lines. I am also going to make this an orphan (as good disambig pages should be). If/when verifiable non-stub articles are created about the other Don Blacks, they can be added later.
6. I consider the term "nationalist" to be ambiguous to anyone not deeply familiar with the current US white supremacy movement. I recommend a further name change to the article (and an update of all the inbound links). "Activist" is equally ambiguous. Personally, I recommend "white supremacist" or "white nationalist" but that is not a decision for VfD. Further discussions about the final article title should be held on the appropriate Talk pages.

Rossami (talk) 4 July 2005 07:53 (UTC)

[edit] Don Black and Don Black (non-notable person)

Article fails to establish notability. The User has moved Don Black (nationalist) to [[Don Black (racist}]] and then added this non-notable person and tried to create a disambiguation page. RickK 06:41, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)

"Don Black, a self-described racialist and former leader of the Ku Klux Klan." - Stormfront —Preceding unsigned comment added by Softcafe (talk • contribs) 06:49, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

He has now moved the article under Vfd to Don Black (non-notable person) and the other article to Don Black (racialist). RickK 07:07, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)

"Don Black, a self-described racialist and former leader of the Ku Klux Klan." - Stormfront. The individual uses the term to describe himself. The term "nationalist" is an obfuscation of "white nationalist". The proper term is "racist", and is the appropriate disambiguation discriminator for the topic heading. Without proper disambiguation, the entire "Don Black" entry and sub-entries should be deleted. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.15.75.108 (talk • contribs) 07:13, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps the fact that this person is non-notable is his most notable aspect, and representative of a segment of society unrepresented on Wikipedia. I vote keep it online. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.200.240.250 (talk • contribs) 07:32, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• Thanks to user:RickK and user:CesarB for trying to fix this mess. The editor, Softcafe, did all the wrong things for perhaps a somewhat right reason. I think that "Don Black" is a sufficiently common name, and the one Black has sufficiently high notoriety, that having a disambiguation page, even with only a few instances, may help inform our readers and prevent confusion. Lastly, I notice that there may be a (barely) notable profesor (Don V. Black) with verifiable information.[1] Maybe the article "Don Black (non-notable person)" could be moved to Don Black (physicist) and I'll see if I can dig together enough of Dr. Black's discoveries and facts to make a decent stub. I am familiar with the milieu of the more famous Don Black, though I've barely edited that article. "Racist" would be a POV description, but I believe the "Racialist" may be appropriate. It is on a par with "Nationalist", though slightly different, and is sometimes used by [racists] to describe themselves. However "activist" seems to be an NPOV term for similar subjects (e.g. Bill White (activist)) so I suggest moving Don Black (racialist) to Don Black (activist). -Willmcw 07:40, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)

"Don Black (activist)" will require another level of disambiguation, since the "Don Black (non-notable person)" may consider himself an activist, and lead to more activity. The "Don Black (racialist)" is most appropriate, as noted above. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.200.240.250 (talk • contribs) 07:48, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Yes, or "Don Black (non-notable person)" may also come to consider himself a racialist. We can worry about those when they happen. (I'm not worried about Don Black (racialist) ever wanting to be known as "Don Black (non-notable person)") PS - please sign and date your posts. -Willmcw 08:22, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)

Gentlemen -

While I am affiliated with UCI, I am not a professor.

However, there is another Don Black who is notable. He is the classic "Right Stuff" individual. He is a former Executive Vice President and General Manager of the McDonnell-Douglas Corporation. He was a pilot in indonesia during WW-II (flew the hump). He is still saving lives by donating his time to managing an organization that finds shelter for the homeless in Southern California. He also contributes his time to other charitable works such as ensuring open-space will exist in Southern California for our children.

The original generic "Don Black (non-notable)" should be allowed to stand on its own merits as representative of the other Don Blacks.

          - Don V Black, Chairman, 
            IEEE Computer Society of Orange County
             6/17/05 11:00AM PDT

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.200.241.74 (talk • contribs) 18:21, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• I truly sympathize with your plight, but I'm trying to see how we can help you. Can you write an article for the encyclopedia about that "Don Black" using verifiable resources? That's what we need. Our efforts have to uphold our principles of "neutral point of view", "no original research", and "consensus editing". Please allow the consensus to decide what name to use for the articles. "Don Black (activist)" appears to be a clear distinction from "Don Black (pilot)" and "Don Black (physicist)". At one time, we had a note at the top of "Don Black" which made clear mention of "Don Black (musician)", even though there is no article about him. We can perhaps do the same for these other Don Blacks. That would save us the disambiguation page. -Willmcw 05:06, Jun 18, 2005 (UTC)
• I really have a problem with an article about Don Black (non-notable person) since it screams non-encylopedic. Or, am I missing something? If I have this right, then I see this page as a Delete but keeping the DAB page. Vegaswikian 07:14, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Of course there's no way we can keep have an article called "Don Black (non-notable person)" for long. Getting back to the general question, there are probably lots of Charles Mansons, et al. - people who share their name with a notorious person. But really, unless the other persons of the same name are notable there's not much that we can do. I don't see any brilliant solutions, but here's my suggestion of the night. I propose that we delete Don Black (non-notable person), keep the Don Black as a disambiguation page with a sentence about each of the other "Don Black"s who deserve minor acknowledgement, and move Don Black (racialist) to Don Black (activist). I've edited the Don Black dab page to cover other Don Blacks. Is this acceptable to Softcafe and others? Cheers, -Willmcw 06:11, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
  • That sounds good to me, provided that the disambiguation page retains all the significant information from the article on the physicist. If that turns out to be beyond the scope of a disambiguation page, then he warrants a separate article. Factitious 10:57, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)
• I am sure that we are all bright enough to realize that the real question before us is not "Don Black (non-notable person)", it is whether Wikimedia will allow "Don Black (racist)" and his supporters to use Wikipedia to promote the Ku Klux Klan, and their particular brand of hate and racism. As for POV, by linking to these websites, we are promoting them.
  • Hatred and racism are notable and encyclopedic, even though they're bad things. Linking to a website is not the same thing as promoting it. Factitious 10:54, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)
• There is really nothing notable about any of the Don Black's listed, except that their names appear on the internet. My recommendation is that this "VFD" be promoted to include all the "Don Black" entries, especially the one promoting racism, since none of these people are notable. In which case I would vote that they all be DELETED, or all remain with the DAB. In the latter case, I fear that Wikipedia will become irrelevant and eventually join the ranks of National Enquirer. -Softcafe 03:32, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Don Black (non-notable person) definitely has to be renamed, since the article mentions notable things about him. Don Black (nationalist) seems to be even more notable, and I think we would all welcome an article on Don Black (pilot). Since the main issue here is the rather confusing naming situation, I'm not sure why this is being discussed on VfD. Factitious 10:54, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be placed on a related article talk page, if one exists; in an undeletion request, if it does not; or below this section.