Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Popes (gang)

This page is an archive of the discussion about the proposed deletion of the article below. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page rather than here so that this page is preserved as an historic record.
The result of the debate was - kept

[edit] Popes (gang)

This was tagged for a speedy but gangs can be encyclopedic, like the Crips, so I brought it here. Kappa 22:12, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Keep, notable and encyclopedic street gang. --GRider\^talk 22:38, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Delete According to http://www.chitown.com/bigshoulders/gnglist.html there are hundreds of gangs in Chicago alone. I also think that with a few truly famous exceptions like the Crips, street gangs tend to be unencyclopedic because their activities, members, and notability are almost impossible to verify. In other words, delete street gangs as unverifiable unless they get a lot of press. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 23:02, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)
  • What research did you do to determine that this is unverifiable or "impossible to verify"? --GRider\^talk 23:09, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)
    • Even the police often have difficulty determining what gang pulled off what crime, how many members each has, etc. If we say "Chicago has 300 street gangs and 50 deaths believed to be gang-related", how do we sort the big-time killahs from the gangs who prefer to sit around and sip weak tea? Or do we assume, with an average of less than 0.35 deaths per gang, that none of them are notable? It's not like any of them put up scoreboards of their hit count or anything. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 00:02, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, concur with Andrew. Megan1967 06:04, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, concur with Starblind. Radiant! 08:31, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)
• Keep, notable gang, membership roster may be impossible to verify, that does not mean the gang itself is not.  ALKIVAR™ 09:59, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Extreme keep, notable gang which is insanely easy to verify. Next time, justfuckinggoogleit.com. —RaD Man (talk) 10:02, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Perhaps if there was an article on 'Street Gangs of Chicago', their name alone might warrant mention in a paragraph near the bottom as part of a list which could be sourced from news reports; but how can Wikipedia source and verify any of the statements made in this article? The whole topic seems to be one of the things which Wikipedia can't cover, because it's mostly unwritten, unwritten-about folk memory. -Ashley Pomeroy 23:34, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • On the contrary, this is easily verifiable and the gang still exists. Refer to the link provided above. —RaD Man (talk) 02:37, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)
    • The link doesn't work, and who writes it? To which standards is the information in that link held? Does the gang still exist? Did it ever exists? If it persists, in what form? Is it notable? How can we know that the gang still exists? And more importantly, how can Wikipedia, as a collection of reputable references and links, how can Wikipedia know? If you mean that I should use Google, the first page that emerges is for a gang called the 'Insane Popes', and it's laughable; this page [1] has mention of the Popes in passing, amidst a much larger list? How do we know that the gang is not just three people, with a spraycan? How can we reference or source any information in the article, given that they are essentially a 'secret society'? And given that America has amazing lax gun laws, why hasn't anybody gunned the bastards down yet? My position is that (a) the gang's existence is unverifiable, (b) the gang's composition and history is unverifiable and (c) in any case, they aren't notable. -Ashley Pomeroy 09:58, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This page is now preserved as an archive of the debate and, like some other VfD subpages, is no longer 'live'. Subsequent comments on the issue, the deletion, or the decision-making process should be placed on the relevant 'live' pages. Please do not edit this page.