Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sean Hughes (Irish republican)

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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 no consensus to delete, default to keep. At the current level of sourcing, it does not appear to be impossible to have a BLP-compliant article about this person, so policy does not mandate outright deletion. Sandstein 22:56, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sean Hughes (Irish republican)

Sean Hughes (Irish republican) (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Article with major, major problems so please read carefully. Toby Harnden wrote a book called Bandit Country which was published in 1999. The book was a detailed account of the Provisional IRA's South Armagh Brigade, and certain people were not named for legal reasons. One of them was called "The Surgeon", who at the time had not been convicted of any offence. Two years later British tabloid newspaper the Daily Mirror claimed that Sean Hughes was "The Surgeon" in this article, thereby naming someone the original author of the book making the claims didn't. Since then the Mirror's stance seems to have changed slightly. I haven't seen the full article as I've not got a Highbeam subscription but it can be seen here. It states "The identity of The Surgeon is controversial". A man was recently killed in Northern Ireland, and "The Surgeon" has been named as being involved in this story. It was added to the article with this edit, even though the identity of "The Surgeon" hasn't necessarily been confirmed for our purposes, as I'm not convinced the Mirror is a reliable source for a claim of that nature. The article isn't particularly neutral either, simply focussing on his alleged criminal activities and nothing about his background to balance it out. Policies the article may fail - original research, verifiability, biographies of living people and neutral point of view. In my opinion it's impossible to have a policy compliant article on Sean Hughes, so delete. One Night In Hackney303 17:23, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

  • Delete. Notable only for being the subject of an unsubstantiated tabloid allegation, he has not "received significant coverage in reliable sources". If there is to be an article about this, it should be under the title of The Surgeon (IRA member) (who appears to have had significant coverage), The Mirror's allegations could be given due (i.e not very much) weight in this article . Rockpocket 17:45, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep. On further consideration I'm changing my !vote. This article in The Times notes, "GHQ staff has been without an operations officer since 2002 when Hughes, who held the post, was appointed to the army council". The appears to place him as an Army Council member directly, rather than as a proxy of an unconfirmed pseudonym. Its also provides a second independent (and somewhat more reliable) source for notability. I think we should be careful giving too much weight to the allegations about The Surgeon on a single tabloid source, but see no reason we shouldn't have an article for Hughes as a member of the IRA Army Council. Rockpocket 20:47, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment Unless I'm missing something here, the sources available would allow something like a four sentence stub. There is no information about him in the usual books (and believe me I've looked), it's impossible to create an encyclopedic article. One Night In Hackney303 05:04, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment Lack of currently available information to create a full biography doesn't necessarily preclude the creation of a stub article now, if the information that is available establishes notability. If there was reason to believe that there was no possibility of further information becoming available I might concur, but I seen no reason to believe that. Rockpocket 21:48, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment I don't see the benefit in keeping a stub saying someone is a former member of the IRA Army Council, in the hope that more information becomes available at a later date. Surely the best thing to do is delete and if more information becomes available recreate the article? One Night In Hackney303 03:52, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment Maybe it would be better, in general, but i'm not aware that is current policy. The wider principle is interesting: should we keep stubs on people who are notable but who we are currently unable to reliably expand on, beyond saying why they are notable? I would prefer to have that discussion rather than create precedence in deleting this stub on that basis. Rockpocket 04:54, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment There's not sufficient reliable source material to establish notability for WP:BIO, and even if he did "meeting one or more does not guarantee that a subject should be included". Given that by stating he's an IRA Army Council member we're saying he's committed a criminal offence punishable by up to ten years imprisonment, it's a WP:BLP problem in terms of WP:NPOV as that's all the article says. That is current policy, and it's a more valid deletion reason than WP:N is to keep. If it was a neutral stub (say about a notable sportsman) that would be a different matter, but as the article stands all it does it accuse the subject of criminal activity. One Night In Hackney303 05:07, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment For the record, I agree that we would have a BLP problem by stating he he's an IRA Army Council member. We are not stating that though. We are stating he has been named as an IRA Army Council member by reliable sources. Crucial difference. Rockpocket 22:56, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
    • Comment. Done. Rockpocket 23:22, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete. Unless we can get more source to prove his elevated position in Óglaigh na hÉireann then it should be deleted.--Vintagekits 19:10, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep Violations of WP:BLP are not reasons to delete an article. The fact that an article in its current state violates any policy is not explicitly a reason to delete it, and I don't believe there's any subject that is "impossible to have a policy compliant article about". The issue for an AFD is mostly whether the subject is notable and citable. This subject appears to be cited by a major publication, whether or not the publication is correct in what they say is not necessarily relevant. Cogswobbletalk 19:32, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Incidentally, I've also removed the uncited controversial statements from the article, as per WP:BLP Cogswobbletalk 19:33, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment I've written about ten articles on IRA members, and I can assure you it's impossible to have a policy compliant article on Sean Hughes that asserts notability. The issue for this AfD is not notability, it's an inability to comply with core policies which is always a more important reason to delete than notability. One Night In Hackney303 19:36, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
I don't understand - why is it impossible to have a compliant article? Just because a subject is controversial, doesn't mean there can't be a compliant article about it. WP:BLP doesn't preclude controversial statements from being made, it only precludes uncited statements from being made. Arguments for deletion should stem from one of the reasons listed here: WP:DEL#REASON. Cogswobbletalk 19:39, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Comment It all boils down to whether the Mirror is a reliable source for the claims that have been made, and given they named him then later said "The identity of The Surgeon is controversial" it's clear that it isn't reliable enough on this occasion. Without the Mirror, we'd be using original research to even add any information about "The Surgeon" to the article. So all you would be left with is an article about an Irish farmer who was convicted of benefit fraud? Sound notable to you? Such an article would in itself be a violation of WP:BLP1E, so it's impossible for a policy compliant article to be written. One Night In Hackney303 19:55, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep It's sourced to major British newspapers. Since when are the Times and the Mirror not acceptable sources? Nick mallory 06:26, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment The Mirror is a tabloid rag, so it's not acceptable when making claims the original author didn't for legal reasons especially when they say the identity of "The Surgeon" is controversial at a later date. Being sourced to major British newspapers does not stop this article failing WP:BLP, WP:NPOV and quite possibly WP:V and WP:OR as well, even ignoring the lack of non-trivial sources. One Night In Hackney303 06:40, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
The Daily Mirror is a tabloid rag? Information which appears in major newspapers isn't good enough for Wikipedia? Are you seriously using this as a deletion rationale? Nick mallory 14:06, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Like I said above, I would consider keeping if the sources were stronger. We must remember "exceptional claims require exceptional sources" - I would not consider the Daily Mirror (at best a rag) to be an exception source but I would consider that claimed an individual was a member of the IRA Army Council was an exceptional claim - the two dont match.--Vintagekits 14:09, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Comment Does The Times (a "newspaper of record") work for you [1]? Rockpocket 21:48, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Comment, no! that good enough for ya?--Vintagekits 23:58, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Comment The Times works for me, however it doesn't have enough information to build an article from. It doesn't contain the same information as the discredited Mirror, or confirm that Hughes is the person Hardnen is referring to. An encyclopedic article cannot be written from that news article. One Night In Hackney303 03:50, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
Comment Yes I am using it as a deletion rationale. Biographies of living people is a non-negotiable policy, and policy is a far more importat deletion rationale than notability guidelines. As I've demonstrated, the Mirror aren't even consistent on the identity of "The Surgeon", so it's hardly an exceptional source is it? It's a sensationalist tabloid newspaper, the very sort of thing an encylopedia is not. You want examples of why the Mirror isn't reliable enough on this occasion? [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7], and there's plenty more. As I say, tabloid rag. You want to use it for mundane information be my guest, but per policy it's unsuitable for sourcing libellous allegations that causes other sources not to use a name use for legal reasons, especially when they aren't even consistent on the identity of "The Surgeon". One Night In Hackney303 14:30, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment Please note that the article has been completely re-written from when nomination and comments above this were made. Two new, independent sources were added and the any claim that he is "The Surgeon" removed. There may still be issues with the article, but the points raised above may, or may not, be relevant to the article as it stands. Its probably worth another look of you have commented previously Rockpocket 08:42, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment It's now a gross violation of WP:NPOV, which cannot happen per WP:BLP. The current article is an absolute disgrace, and I'm appalled that an administrator would think it acceptable. One Night In Hackney303 08:45, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment What it is, is all the verifiable information available about him. That is as detailed as the article can be. Of course, it isn't balanced because we have no information about anything other than the allegations about him. The point of re-writing it was to show the extent of what the article can be (currently). I'm perfectly happy for it to be deleted on the basis that it is unbalanced and hence inherently POV, but that is a very different argument than people are making above (i.e. the Mirror is the only source and the only claim is that he is The Surgeon, these are no longer the case). Rockpocket 08:55, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment "verifiable information available about him"? The issue isn't verifable information about him, it's largely verifiable libellous allegations that have been made about him, there's a big difference. I've never had that much of a problem with The Times, but that alone isn't enough as it's trivial coverage. The rest isn't verifiable information, firstly you've got a Unionist politican making libellous allegations safe under the legal protection of Parliamentary privilege. Then you've got the Mirror who have been repeatedly discredited. In 2005 they again proved their inconsistent stance with this article, where they fall back to "The Surgeon" not the unconfirmed accusation that Sean Hughes is "The Surgeon". Other media do the same, for example - [8] [9] [10] [11]. It seems you're hanging your hat on one article by the Mirror (who've frequently lost libel cases) which they seemingly no longer stand by based on two subsequent articles. One Night In Hackney303 09:13, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • What we have is two articles in the Times naming him as a hardline IRA man who was on the council. We have a MP quoting security sources saying in the same thing (and admittedly, using it to make further allegations that would be libellous but not for pp). Now we have a court ruling that says that Hughes himself claimed his picture was used in a book to represent an hardline IRA member. So we now have how many sources documenting this? One newspaper of record in two different articles, Hansard documenting what was claimed in the commons, a court publication quoting Hughes own claims. Is that "hanging your hat on one article by the Mirror"? There is one sentence in there attributed solely to the Mirror: that he was charged for conspiracy and being a member of the IRA previously, but cleared. I'm guessing those charges were not made against someone called The Surgeon, but probably someone by the name of Sean Hughes. So again, the Mirror naming him as the Surgeon is not in the article, so I don't see the relevance of the citations you provide above. Rockpocket 10:05, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • You would see the relevance, if you'd read the book, as you've just admitted you're guessing. Apart from all the details about the later mostly irrelevant court case, all the information in the Mirror article comes, wait for it, from Bandit Country. And later, they didn't stand by their identification of Hughes as "The Surgeon", and even the court ruling doesn't state it as a matter of fact. One Night In Hackney303 10:13, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Indeed, and neither do we (or even mention "The Surgeon" for that matter). So no problem there. Rockpocket 10:16, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep per Rockpocket. Aatomic1 20:43, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of Military-related deletions. —FayssalF - Wiki me up® 11:44, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
  • I was about to close this myself, but thought better, as there may be an appearance of impropriety. As an alternative, I'll merely comment that this fellow does not meet the standards outlined under WP:BIO. Simply being a former Volunteer does not warrant inclusion in an encyclopedia. I'll hope the closing administrator will realise this. gaillimhConas tá tú? 00:39, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete. The only claims for notability are statements which are matters of dispute. The Sunday Times has often been willing to make sensationalised claims about senior IRA members, and the book is written from an anti-IRA perspective. It is best to follow the approach that the more extreme the claim, the better the sources need to be, and my judgment is that these sources do not make it over the bar. Strict application of WP:BLP would reduce this article to almost nothing and I am not convinced the subject is notable, even if we accepted what has been claimed about him. Sam Blacketer 00:46, 8 November 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.