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Note: This closure is under deletion review jheiv (talk) 11:10, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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 Userfied to User:Wikidemon/Climategate scandal to give non-admins access to the page and see how it is a blatant POV fork of Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident: just put the two pages next to each other. Early close to minimise drama resulting from blatant WP:GAMEing. Rd232 talk 10:58, 28 December 2009 (UTC) PS Appropriate followup to issues of titling and article content/focus of Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident would be at... drum roll... Talk:Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident. Possibly using appropriate dispute resolution, most obviously Request for Comments. Rd232 talk 11:19, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Climategate scandal

[edit]
Climategate scandal (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log • AfD statistics)
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Content fork or POV fork (not sure which) of Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident. In reliable sources the "Climategate" moniker is identical to the topic of the latter Wikipedia article and has no independent existence. Further, the term "scandal" is inherently POV until shown otherwise by a strong consensus of reliable sources (such as the Teapot Dome scandal). Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:42, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This article has been moved from Climategate scandal to Climategate controversy.

  • Note - from article creator. "Climategate" is without question a notable topic that deserves encyclopedic treatment. Does ayone dispute that? This is not intended as a fork at all, but routine organization of a large subject matter consisting of a series of related events into multiple sub-topics that cannot readily be shoehorned into a single article. The current article by its title, and much discussion on the talk page, is about the hacking incident that is but one of several aspects of the affair. There has been much debate and edit warring there so it is hard to figure out where consensus will come to rest, but the current status quo for that article is that it has that limited focus. There has been a lot of discussion and widespread approval there that information about the creation and playing out of the scandal does not belong there, and should instead be treated in its own article. Yet that article has become something of a portmanteau, with long sections talking about the "hacking" (i.e. unauthorized access and republication of private electronic files from a university computer), the scandal (as promoted and played out in the blogosphere, popular press, political arena, scientific community), the underlying actions of the scientists themselves, and the progress of climate change theory and research thereon. Budding one article into two siblings when it gets too unruly is not a "fork" at all, it is simply good organization. As for the title, there was some discussion at Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident, and there seemed to be a preference for appending "Scandal". I have no particular preference. Whether we call it a scandal, controversy, incident, or just leave the descriptor off is a question for the editors to decide, but it does not affect the notability of the subject. Keeping things NPOV is an ongoing responsibility of editors, no reason to avoid dealing with a controversial topic. - Wikidemon (talk) 00:55, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Redirect to Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident for now. This is basically a duplicate. --TS 00:59, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - I think Wikidemon is probably correct in that there should be a page for the public controversy (as opposed to a controversy about the science) that has since ensued. This is mostly because there are some strong feelings at the Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident article in favor of focusing the article on the hacking incident as opposed to the ensuing controversy. Separating the two articles would help to clarify each and I think would do a lot of good. Finally, as the name can always and probably should be changed (as I indicated on the talk page prior to the AfD), the debate here should be restricted to the content / direction of the page. jheiv (talk) 01:05, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
One mild disagreement: there's clearly a scientific controversy that grew fron this as well as a public controversy. There is, for example, increasing evidence of collusion manipulating peer-review to favor one theory over another, which is specifically a scientific controversy, as the man on the street has little understanding of what peer review even is. — Charlie (Colorado) (talk) 09:58, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep per GoRight. The existing Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident is a mess, starting with the misleading title. At least this one is starting with what people actually call the affair. Pete Tillman (talk) 01:40, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - disgraceful example of a POV fork with a completely non-neutral title. Legitimacy of "Climategate" terminology is in question, but the use of "scandal" is shocking. Reviewing administrator should be aware that this should not be decided by !votes, because climate skeptics keen to push their non-neutral POV will doubtless be herded by their echo chamber into this AfD in order to add legitimacy to the "scandal" fantasy. -- Scjessey (talk) 01:58, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • As I wrote earlier, please try to avoid discussing the article title, which I think everyone agrees could be chosen differently, but rather the content / direction of the article. Other than the title, could you enumerate your disagreements with the content / direction of the article? jheiv (talk) 02:02, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Thanks for pointing that out Dimawik. So there is a separate article about the email leaks/hacking. I was confused because at first a climategate search took me to an article entitled Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident which didn't even cover the climategate topic. As this article covers that topic and the other one doesn't then there is no valid reason to delete it. It isn't biased to call it a scandal because it was widely reported and led to the resignation of Phil Jones, rocked the Australian parliament, was mentioned at the UN by the chairman of the IPCC and the Saudi government (who called for an investigation)and is now being investigated by the USA's congress.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.222.59.18 (talk • contribs)
  • For the time being I've moved the article to Climategate POV fork for reasons that must be obvious. The use of the term "scandal" in the title of an article about this event contravenes our most fundamental policy, Neutral point of view. --TS 02:45, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
It was just quickly moved back to Climategate scandal -- maybe there could be a quick resolution on the talk page? jheiv (talk)
Well, restoring this POV fork as a redirect to the parent article would be the most obvious resolution. --TS 02:54, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I think that Climategate is a parent article WRT hacking incident. Dimawik (talk) 03:02, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
There is no article called "Climategate", and unless Wikipedia changes its rules on the neutral point of view there probably never will be. -- Scjessey (talk) 03:07, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Blanking the article is pretty aggressive given that there's an active discussion here with a (very early tentative) majority of good faith "keep" opinions that specifically address the "POV fork" issue. That is more or less an early snow close, and really ought not to be done in arguable cases. I chose Climategate scandal rather than simply Climategate, because of opinions expressed on the talk page of the hacking article that "scandal" is the proper way to title "-gate" controversies. I was trying to be less controversial, not more. Other titles are just fine to, such as just plain "Climategate". Adding "POV fork" to an article title does not seem very serious. Surely you must know that using an article title to disparage the merits of the article is more than a bit soap-boxy and unencyclopedic. Might as well move it to "Somebody's dumb idea for an article about Climategate". - Wikidemon (talk) 03:06, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Even if there were a majority of !votes for "keep", that should have little bearing on the result of this discussion. There is no way an article entitled "Climategate scandal" could possibly survive scrutiny with anyone remotely familiar with WP:NPOV. Clearly the closing admin will have no choice but to insist on deletion. There is nothing to salvage, since anything neutral has apparently been lifted more or less wholesale from the neutral article. -- Scjessey (talk) 03:11, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Well, Watergate scandal and Lewinsky scandal thrive in Wikipedia. There is no POV in calling a widely publicized allegation a scandal. This is actually a dictionary definition. Dimawik (talk) 03:17, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Er... those are actual scandals. There is NO evidence that there is anything scandalous about the data stolen from the CRU, unless you are including the scandalous behavior of climate change deniers, conservative bloggers and energy industry lobbyists trying to make more of the matter than it really is. -- Scjessey (talk) 03:34, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
With respect, Scjessey, you do seem a trifle dogmatic on this subject. Give it a break? These are your personal (and debatable) opinions, y'know.... Best, Pete Tillman (talk) 03:43, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, but I disagree. The skeptics are outnumbered in the real world by several thousands to one, and it is only by manipulation of the press and agenda-driven editing on Wikipedia that this sort of garbage makes headlines in the first place. You're backing the wrong horse in this race, quite frankly. -- Scjessey (talk) 05:13, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Scjessey, you seem to be confused a bit. In order to say that the event should be called Climategate and the hacking is actualy a small and unimportant part of it, one does not need necessarily to be a skeptic. Similarly, an allegation does not need to be true in order to be called a scandal, it just needs to be widely known. Majority of population that can read does not have an agenda, but IMO resent a spade being called by some other name. Dimawik (talk) 06:41, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
(outdent) Allegations of a scandal are just that: allegations. They are not scandals.  Cs32en  06:52, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
WP disagrees: A scandal is a widely publicized allegation or set of allegations that damages the reputation of an institution, individual or creed. A scandal may be based on true or false allegations or a mixture of both. Dimawik (talk) 07:51, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
You are misinterpreting that sentence. A scandal is either (1) actual scandalous behaviour (2) allegations about alleged scandalous behavior. If it refers to (2), the term "scandal" refers to the allegations, not to the (alleged) behaviour. Now, we might write an article about the (scandalous) allegations, but then the focus of the article would not be the CRU scientist at all, which is probably not what you would want. I've alerted the editors at Scandal about the possible misinterpretation of the article.  Cs32en  08:48, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I think it is you who is mistaken: the majority of the definitions you quote in the talk page do not require the allegations to be truthful. Scandals definoitely can (and did) involve mis-information. Therefore, the use of the word "scandal" is neutral, IMO. Dimawik (talk) 09:36, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
You need to distiguish between the allegations and the content of the allegations. The article is supposed to cover the content of the allegations. The allegations themselves, whether true or not, may constitute a section of the article.  Cs32en  09:43, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The media reports it as a scandal. We rely on reliable sources here, not opinion. Jong-C (talk) 06:23, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Reliable sources using the word "scandal"? Let's see some then. They would need to be used by a preponderance of reliable sources, of course. -- Scjessey (talk) 06:28, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I would just note that "Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident" is not used by any sources outside of the Wikipedia, but you have argued that it is a good name for another article. You cannot defend both of these positions simultaneously. Dimawik (talk) 06:50, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
No I have not. I hate that title and have argued against it consistently. I prefer "Climatic Research Unit data theft controversy" because I'm actually one of the editors who wants to include more of the post-theft controversy into the article. -- Scjessey (talk) 06:59, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I doubt that "Climatic Research Unit data theft controversy" fares any better in the preponderance of the reliable sources. Other than in WP, Climategate is the word. Some editors tried to limit the scope of the article, now this (parent) article fills the void :-) Dimawik (talk) 07:48, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Note sources using term "scandal" here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Climategate_scandal Jong-C (talk) 06:55, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The "sources" are opinions from climate skeptics, not reliable sources. -- Scjessey (talk) 06:59, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
You know, given your vehemence and your apparent argument that "climate skeptics" are, ipso facto, not reliable sources, one might wonder if you're primarily advocating a POV here. In any case, it's certainly a fact that there's a scientific controversy and dispute here with rather more scientific basis than, say [Intelligent Design] — which does have an article. — Charlie (Colorado) (talk) 09:58, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment This editorial, published by the Washington Times, a reliable source reporting on how the majority of reliable sources are covering the issue, is quite instructive. Of course, the Washington Times is arguing the truth here, which is not what we are supposed to do.  Cs32en  06:44, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    This is an opinion piece, of course, and no author's name is given. It is also coming from a conservatively-biased organ of Sun Myung Moon. This is certainly not the gold standard of sources. -- Scjessey (talk) 06:54, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    "no author's name is given" - Which, of course, makes it the official editorial position of the newspaper itself. --GoRight (talk) 07:13, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    ...which is generally conservative-leaning, who are in turn generally skeptical of AGW (or prefer to ignore the evidence). -- Scjessey (talk) 07:16, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    You claim to know the positions of the members of the editorial board of the newspaper on AGW. Do you have some evidence to support your claim? (No, you hand waving above is NOT evidence.) Regardless, what is the point? It is still the editorial position of a widely respected media source. --GoRight (talk) 07:38, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    (ec) I'm aware of the general political orientation of the Washington Times. So, from my personal point of view, it is not arguing the truth, but it's arguing falsehood ;-) Yet, an account of the way reliable sources are reporting on the issue is helpful, and if we have a climate sceptic acknowledging that the media generally does not follow his preferred way of seeing the issue, that can contribute to our overall assessment on the preponderance of media reports on the subject. There is no author's name given because it's an editorial that expresses, or is supposed to express, the viewpoint of the editorial board or the publisher.  Cs32en  07:17, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 06:53, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Obvious POV fork. The Four Deuces (talk) 07:21, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep 216.153.214.89 (talk) 07:22, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete It's a pov fork and I do not doubt an underhanded attempt to bury/hide the information in the other article by biased users who couldn't get the facts they didn't like removed from said article. Even it if wasn't a dishonest attempt at hiding the facts, it's still a pov fork and not allowed. This vote could turn out 1000 to 1 for keep and it would still be necessary to delete per policy.Farsight001 (talk) 07:35, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    "Even it if wasn't a dishonest attempt at hiding the facts" - You actually have that backwards, the AfD is the attempt to hide facts, not the other way around. --GoRight (talk) 07:42, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    If there were any actual facts in the scandal article that aren't already in the hacking incident article and aren't completely pointless, I'd I agree with you. But again, either way, it's a pov fork and should be deleted as such without question.Farsight001 (talk) 08:11, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • The idea is to clarify both articles. If you've been involved in the CRU Hacking incident page you'd realize that there are strong opinions that the page should be restricted to the hacking incident. That seems fine to me, and as a result, the creation of this page also seemed fine, as a place for the fall out. The facts that are in the hacking incident that belong in the fall out page would be here and any ones that aren't directly involved in the hacking incident should be removed from the CRU hacking incident page. 'Know what I mean? jheiv (talk) 08:38, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • I seem to get the idea ;-) You are saying the editors at the other article do not want to cover the substance of the allegations against the climate researchers. At the same time, you actually prefer that they get their (alleged) way, because that would allow the content to be covered in "your" article, preferably with a title that contains the word "scandal" the Climategate scandal article. However, the article Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident article actually covers the substance of the allegations, the content of the e-mails from climate researchers, reactions to those e-mails etc. (The title of that article might not be perfect, and a discussion on the title of that article might be the best way to adress existing concerns.)  Cs32en  09:06, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Close. I actually don't want scandal in the title as I've noted elsewhere on here and more poignantly on Talk:Climategate scandal. Also, I don't take ownership of the article -- I really only have made two or three copy edits when it first debuted on the Wikipedia scene. Lastly, while the Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident page does contain some of the "fallout" or reaction, there have been many more things that have been removed (although the removal has been less frequent as time has passed) that don't violate policies but "aren't what the article is about". I really don't want the Climategate scandal page to turn into propoganda or one huge policy violation, but rather an avenue to clarify the point of both articles. Are we assuming good faith? jheiv (talk) 09:17, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Wait a While i.e. Keep for now. Both articles contain relevant, and probably irrelevant, information. There is a risk that by deleting one, some useful things are lost, that should not be. I feel strongly that the titles should be the starting point. "Climategate" is valid because it has been so widely used; "scandal" most certainly is not. Also, the emails were leaked but no one yet knows whether the system was hacked or whether they were leaked by someone who had legitimate access to them. In the fullness of time, I'm sure there will need to be two (or probably more) articles because of the number of issues raised and the sheer length of the text. A split between the release of the emails themselves and the wider consequences seems reasonable at this stage and I think that is what the two current articles are trying to achieve, if poorly at present. Although "sceptics" may be introducing POV, there are concerns that the other side has appeared to do the same. I think we should err on the side of not removing anything (including the information contained in the fact that there are two articles) so as not to add give credence to the argument that Wikipedia is being manipulated. The important thing seems to me that, if some think there is a need for two articles, their purposes should be clearly stated and bit by bit they should be edited to meet those purposes. If this proves impossible, then merge them. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Philmcgrove (talk • contribs) 08:27, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep while I don't agree with the title I think the idea of the page is what is important. The editors at Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident have repeatedly pronounced that that article is about the hacking incident and have been committed to removing material that falls outside the scope of the hacking incident. As a result, that article has a very strong focus on the hacking incident that really isn't reflective of the weight it is given in WP:RS. Therefore it makes sense that a page should be devoted to covering the public controversy (as opposed to a controversy about the science) / fall out that since ensued. Its clear that this page should be kept. I also am befuddled with editors who, on one hand, wish to restrict the Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident page to the hacking incident yet come here and call this a POV fork. It seems fishy. jheiv (talk) 08:46, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know whether editors at Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident have been "committed to removing material that falls outside the scope of the hacking incident". But if some have been, their attempts have been unsuccessful. The article covers the content of the e-mails, as well as reactions to the content of these e-mails (i.e. not, or not primarily, reactions to the hacking incident). I do not agree with your assertion that this article "has a very strong focus on the hacking incident", and I do not support the conclusions that you draw from that assertion.  Cs32en  08:58, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong delete. Here's the background. We already have an article, Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident, which has been the target of a great deal of POV-pushing and abusive sockpuppetry. There have been numerous arguments to move the article to "Climategate" or "Climategate scandal", all of which have been rejected because such titles would be blatantly POV and are expressly disallowed by policy (for the same reason we don't have "Attorneygate" or "Rathergate"). There have also been numerous attempts to wedge in unsourced and poorly sourced speculation, in violation of the biographies of living persons policy. Wikidemon is one of a clique of right-wing editors who objects to the restrictions of BLP and NPOV. Rather than pursuing dispute resolution, and in full knowledge that what he's doing isn't allowed, he's created this POV fork as a sort of BLP and NPOV-free zone. It's one of the most blatant acts of bad faith I've ever seen on Wikipedia. -- ChrisO (talk) 08:52, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep and rename to Climategate. Jaguar's Paw (talk) 08:54, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete this obvious POV/version fork with the title that flies in the face of NPOV and BLP. Neologisms don't make good article titles and calling it a "scandal" pushes one POV. Useful material discussing the "scandal" element can be merged to the article that we already have. Creating a second article just so you can write your own preferred version is not proper. <>Multi‑Xfer<> (talk) 09:16, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. It's possible that the CRU hacking incident page should instead be deleted as not being particularly notable, since the mere hack itself isn't that unusual. If so, some content ought to be merged into this page. (I'd also vote for changing the title of that page to something not using the word "scandal" in order to reduce the POV.) But the topic itself is a good one: the CG files suggest scientific misconduct, and that's independent of how the files were obtained. — Charlie (Colorado) (talk) 09:34, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete: POV fork. Given the ongoing debate on Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident, it is hard for me to escape the conclusion that this page was created in bad faith. Dynablaster (talk) 10:11, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Which makes your !vote rather lame. assumptions of bad faith are not terribly helpful to the discussion. - Wikidemon (talk) 10:14, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep It strikes me as incredibly stupid that climategate is not an article, and if "Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident" is it then it is no wonder the neutrality of wikipedia is being called into question. --mark nutley (talk) 10:23, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong delete as a POV-fork. The content is arranged differently here, but is basically the same as the other article. The title is blatant POV ("scandal"). Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not the news, a blog, news-agregator or a tabloid... We are not here to describe speculation in the media, but to describe facts - which unfortunately at the moment are sparse, since no investigation has yet been concluded. Outside of presenting notable reactions - we will have to await the results of investigations - and we have no deadline (which seems to irk people). --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 10:26, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong delete as POV-fork, especially given that its creator claims "The content and sourcing in the new article are a near-complete overlap with those at Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident‎. I can't see any excuse for this. Dougweller (talk) 10:34, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete These articles should cover the same thing, and the CRU email article should drop the heavy handed tone about "theft" and so on. A theft of emails would not be notable; when allegedly scandalous comments are involved, it is. I run a Google search of "climatic research email," and the first article I get is USA today talking about a "controversial" email "leak."[1] I see George Monbiot calling on Phil Jones to resign. I then get a number of articles about Jones stepping down. Whoever says the CRU email article doesn't cover the issues associated with "climategate" should not be editing the article. That doesn't mean we should create this kind of Bizarro version, even if that article is getting so large that it should be forked (which I don't really see that it is). I'm not sure it's properly termed a scandal either, since I don't think that's how most reliable sources are looking at it. The CRU title is fine; if not, then both of these titles should redirect to Climatic Research Unit e-mail incident. The battle-waging on the original article is immensely counterproductive for all involved. Mackan79 (talk) 10:35, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
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.
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