Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ed O'Loughlin

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, even taking into account the comments on the subpage.--Kubigula (talk) 04:51, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Ed O'Loughlin

Ed O'Loughlin (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Mr. O'Loughlin is the Jerusalem correspondent for Fairfax Holdings, which owns the Australian newspapers The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. As an individual, his notability is borderline — one could argue the case either way. However, this article is not about him as an individual; it is the result of a slightly obsessive anti-O'Loughlin campaigner who edits from a dynamic IP address in Canberra. In his own words, "The very reason for an O'Loughlin entry is due to his controversial journalistic malpractice!" and "Only Ed O'Loughlin - The Mideast correspondent (Jerusalem) has a biography in Wikipedia. And why might that be? He has not won any prizes for his Journalism, nor written any books. Could it be because he is controversial? Could it be because he is regarded by many pundits as being rather an advocate than a journalist?"

This would be all well and good if Mr. O'Loughlin's alleged malpractice constituted a scandal of some note, covered in reputable and reasonably non-partisan sources. However, the sources documenting the "controversy" are all obscure Internet sites and a slew of "pro-Israel" lobby groups, such as Honest Reporting (affiliated with Hasbara Fellowships, which recruits people to advocate for Israel on Wikipedia.) Furthermore, the criticisms have been exaggerated. At one point a source saying:

Ed O'Loughlin frequently puts Palestinian interpretations of events as the leads to his stories, with a paragraph much further down including a statement from an Israeli spokesperson. He also often uses language or interprets the news in ways critical of Israeli policies.

Was rendered as:

O'Loughlin deliberately structured his stories and chose his words so as to favour the Palestinian side in any dispute.

In accordance with WP:Biographies of living people policy, especially the first principle "do no harm," I do not see the need for an article which exists, by the admission of its own main editor, solely to disparage an individual based on chinese whispers from the Israel lobby. <eleland/talkedits> 18:28, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

• Delete as an obvious coat rack. If someone in the future wants to make a neutral, well-sourced, and verifiable article, they can do so without this mess. *** Crotalus *** 19:05, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
• Weak keep, pending the removal of the second and third sections and the addition of sources to the intro. It appears that the subject is plenty notable by himself, and so there's no good reason to delete the article. The coatrack issues can be handled by pruning (i.e. removing) the second and third sections of the article while leaving the intro intact. --lifebaka (Talk - Contribs) 20:35, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
• Delete per Croatulus horridus. Shiva_eVolved 22:38, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
• Delete per Crotalus. Durova^Charge! 03:32, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
• C1818 (talk) 11:19, 25 December 2007 (UTC) I have been following the discussion about this article for some time. Unfortunately I believe that the editor Eleland is introducing his own bias. His strategy in this and his other editorial endeavours is simultaneously both sophisticated and simple. Unable to objectively refute particular statements that he personally disagrees with, he simply says that the source material itself is not reputable and thus so is anything derived from that source and anybody who uses it. Whilst it is certainly necessary to question all sources, he does not question the sources that he agrees with and seems not to like any form of minority opinion, no matter what its merits may be. In this case, Mr O'Loughlin has a public and demonstrable record of editorial bias in his writing and this represents an essential style of his work that needs to be noted in his biography. This article should NOT be deleted and those that disagree with objective and verifiable evidence indicating Mr O'Loughlin's work is biased toward one side should present their case.— C1818 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
• NOTE: An extensive (and largely off-topic) digression by an anonymous user has been refactored to a subpage. *** Crotalus *** 11:53, 25 December 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.