Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lindsay Mills

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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 redirect to Edward Snowden. Consensus is that the sources presented in the article are not significant enough that the subject should have an article; most if not all coverage is in regard to her relationship with Snowden. Sam Walton (talk) 09:44, 2 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Lindsay Mills

Lindsay Mills (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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"Dating Edward Snowden" is not sufficient notability to justify a standalone Wikipedia article, per WP:INVALIDBIO. Ms. Mills' brief appearance at the Academy Awards to help accept an award for a documentary about Mr. Snowden, is not enough either, in my opinion, though it may merit a mention on Edward Snowden. agr (talk) 13:10, 16 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]

FWIW, there was a discussion in 2013 about mentioning Ms. Mills, saved at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Edward_Snowden/Archive_2 (search for her name).--agr (talk) 13:39, 16 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. North America1000 14:42, 16 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions. North America1000 14:42, 16 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Russia-related deletion discussions. North America1000 14:42, 16 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
WP:GNG and WP:BIO say "If a topic has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject, it is presumed to be suitable for a stand-alone article" At first look, Mills should be presumed to merit a stand alone article. She meets this criteria because of the 27 sources cited here in Wikipedia, at least 15 of them are substantial articles which feature Mills as the subject. Wikipedia only requires 2. Consider these for example -
  • Lewis, Paul (11 June 2013), "Edward Snowden's girlfriend Lindsay Mills: At the moment I feel alone", The Guardian, retrieved 16 September 2016
  • Weiss, Sasha (13 June 2013), "We Are All Pole Dancing on the Internet", The New Yorker, retrieved 16 September 2016
  • Greenwald, Glenn (10 October 2014), "Edward Snowden's Girlfriend, Lindsay Mills, Moved to Moscow to Live with Him", The Intercept, retrieved 16 September 2016
  • Dowd, Kathy Ehrich (6 September 2016), "5 Things to Know About Edward Snowden's Girlfriend Lindsay Mills and Their Life Together Now", People, retrieved 16 September 2016
  • Snowden (film), in which the character of Mills has a starring role
Is there anyone here who will argue any of the following claims?
  1. These works feature Mills as their subject
  2. These are substantial works of original journalism
  3. These works are published by reputable media outlets
  4. This coverage is not temporary and happened regularly over 2013-16
  5. Each of these works has a different journalistic angle
I accept all of the above claims, so I say that Mills passes BIO and GNG. If anyone wishes to argue otherwise then could they please point to the part of those criteria which she is failing or make another deletion argument. I confirm WP:NOTINHERITED and that Wikipedia:Trivial mentions do not establish notability. However, a person who is the subject of articles has established their own notability. Beyond Wikipedia's WP:GNG, Mills meets other notability criteria, including WP:CREATIVE for her blog reviews and WP:PORNBIO for the many commentaries on her shirtless underwear pics and videos. Blue Rasberry (talk) 22:36, 20 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that Mills passes the notability threshold, but I think there may be an overriding BLP concern most closely represented by WP:BLP1E. This is a unique situation in which the subject is only (borderline) notable by way of her relationship to Snowden, and she has tried to keep a low profile. I think she's distinguishable from otherwise non-notable spouses of other famous people, such as Melania Trump. Trump chose to marry a very famous person; Mills hasn't married Snowden, and Snowden was totally unknown when they started dating. She has been thrust into the (dim) limelight unwillingly. Note the quote in this source you cited: "She didn't sign up for the life she had, which is people asking questions, people finding a photo of her and creating a story around it." --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 16:58, 21 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
DrFleischman I can understand why someone might argue WP:BLP1E, because it is taboo to discuss the media coverage of this person. The sources cited discuss these things:
  1. This person's relationship with Snowden (everyone sees this)
  2. Mills participating in subversive activities (making treason jokes at the Academy Awards, dressing as a criminal for Halloween)
  3. Mills re-uniting with Snowden to enjoy life, when almost all media suggests that Snowden should be imprisoned or executed
  4. Mills blogging and being emotionally open in her social media accounts
  5. Mills posting and videos pictures of herself in her underwear
Wikipedia is not supposed to pass judgement on why reliable sources report things, but multiple reliable sources are reporting all of these things. There are degrees of separation about the media coverage, and it does extend from a crime that happened in 2013, but the media coverage has been regular and continual.
In some ways Mills meets WP:LOWPROFILE but she also passes all of the highprofile criteria listed there. She did agree to have herself portrayed in a Hollywood movie. She is obviously attention seeking for appearing at the Academy Awards. The Halloween costume stunt is as attention-seeking as a person in her circumstances can be. Also girls who present their public image with underwear photography are hardly avoiding media attention. I confirm that she is avoiding some media attention, but there are lots of other kinds that she is seeking and getting. It would be an unusual argument to make that media coverage on all these points by all these publications over 3+ years is BLP1E of a shy person who fails GNG. I expect that animosity toward Snowden and prejudice to dismiss the value of the reviews of her art is leading people strangely say that all these media sources somehow combine to fail notability. (I wished for more explanation but saying this did not advance the discussion. Blue Rasberry (talk) 11:57, 30 September 2016 (UTC)) This person seems to have not had media attention before the leaks, but after the leaks, she has gotten both the media attention pushed on her and forced the media to give her attention that only she could have demanded. Blue Rasberry (talk) 22:03, 23 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
You're not suggesting that editors who disagree with you are driven by anti-Snowden animus, are you? --01:46, 24 September 2016 (UTC)
I am not aware of anyone disagreeing with me yet, but I do think the discussion here has been odd. I see multiple citations that feature the subject of this article as their own subject, and typically when that kind of source material is present people say that the Wikipedia article passes GNG and vote to keep it. Somehow, for whatever reason, the delete votes have come without addressing GNG, and I am sure that is strange. One possible cause of this discussion not following the usual practice could be animus, and I listed several of biases that are known to float around Mills - animus against people accused of treason, fugitive actions, weird art, and erotic art. I hope that no one disagrees with me that it would be odd to delete this article for failing GNG, and I think the lowprofile and BLP1E arguments are not obvious fits to this case either. Still, intuition is a powerful thing, and I expect that many commenters here voting to delete are having a shared experience of having an insight about deletion that is obvious to them but not obvious to me. I have my own biases that might prevent me from having that insight.
I would agree with anyone who said that journalism about Mills originated in her relationships with Snowden, and that her art and views and public image would not have attracted media attention otherwise, but there comes a point when someone gets enough media coverage that Wikipedia considers them their own person. If Mills has not passed that point, then can anyone articulate what is lacking? Blue Rasberry (talk) 03:10, 26 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
You have some valid points, but please try to avoid the ad hominem attacks, which do not advance the discussion. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 17:31, 27 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I should have chosen to communicate in a less confrontational way. I am sure that everyone here has something productive to contribute to the conversation and there are better ways to attract good comments than casting doubt on anyone's motives. A better way to communicate would have been to just ask for a little more explanation. Blue Rasberry (talk) 11:57, 30 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment -- I'm not convinced by the above sources:
  • The Guardian -- largely being snippets of Ms Mills' blog as it relates to her relationship with Snowden
  • The New Yorker -- same, but within a topic of "our lives on the internet" topic rather than Mills as a person
  • The Intercept -- a passing mention.
  • People -- tabloidy coverage
They are not married so I don't think that a redirect is appropriate; so I'm keeping my delete !vote. K.e.coffman (talk) 03:22, 26 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
K.e.coffman This is great criticism. There are other sources, but I would agree that this is a representative sample. I am not ready to agree that the sources do not meet WP:RS but I would agree that they present Mills as their subject as a way of raising other topics which they discuss with more substance. Blue Rasberry (talk) 12:16, 30 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I don't really have a strong opinion on whether this should be a standalone entry or even a redirect, but I just took an admittedly WP:BOLD cut at removing trivia, redundancy and tone problems. So that might help. Or it might not be enough. I note we do not have a standalone entry Glenn Greenwald's partner David Miranda despite Miranda having taken a much more public role, between the highly publicized airport detention, his testifying before Brazilian legislature, and so forth. Mills appearing at one awards show is not that; she's basically a low-profile person except for who she's dating, and I'm somewhat inclined to say that for BLPs we should err on the side of, Wikipedia should not make someone into a public figure if they are not clearly one. In which case, a bit about their relationship on Snowden's page is clearly appropriate, but only insofar as it actually bears on an encyclopedic account of him and isn't pure tabloid fodder. I'm not sure what we have on her alone is encyclopedic rather than WP:NOT or WP:PSEUDOBIOGRAPHY (especially to the latter, the fact that it was filled out with so much trivia and even arguable BLP violations is to me a tell-tale sign we don't really have enough). Innisfree987 (talk) 16:36, 29 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thank you to editor Innisfree987 for their effort; I took out some more trivia: diff. Content removed was:

References

  1. ^ a b c ABC NEWS (30 October 2015), "See Edward Snowden's Halloween Costume", abcnews.go.com, retrieved 16 September 2016
  2. ^ a b c Nguyen, Tina (November 4, 2015), "Edward Snowden's Halloween Costume Is Too Real", Vanity Fair, Condé Nast, retrieved 16 September 2016
The article is still very unconvincing, and is a WP:PSEUDO biography as noted above. K.e.coffman (talk) 18:12, 29 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks K.e.coffman for the further cuts, and I've followed up with some more of my own plus a bit of reorganizing.
As to where it stands now. On the one hand, at least now this is a more encyclopedic account. On the other hand, removing the trivia and other problems reveals how little there is left after that. It's plainly not "a full and balanced biography" (emphasis in the original at WP:PSEUDO) accounting for her as a whole person, and it'd be really easy to merge into, like, four sentences under a new "Personal life" section on Edward Snowden's page. Still as a matter of policy, the combo of reliable source coverage (even if a bit tabloidy) plus Oliver Stone making a movie out of your life maybe gets a person over the wikinotability hurdle even if the resulting entry is pretty thin. I maybe mildly prefer the former outcome; but I don't think the latter's so terrible in this instance, I don't think the entry as it now stands harms the encyclopedia. Innisfree987 (talk) 20:02, 29 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Innisfree987 Thanks for the article cuts. This version is a solid edit of the narrative. It is not my wish to escalate the stakes of the decision, but I think this information is WP:UNDUE for the Snowden article. Either the topic passes notability and the content can stay here, or almost all of this would be deleted for not having a place to exist. There are 14 cited sources here after your cut, and if this were in the Snowden article, I doubt that more than 2 could be presented as relevant enough to merit space. Still, I would prefer a merge and redirect over deletion.
If there could be a compromise to merge this to a new Public image of Edward Snowden article, including this content, Edward_Snowden#Public_opinion_polls, Edward_Snowden#In_popular_culture. Making such an article would remove tabloid-y content from the Snowden article, which might be an improvement, and help develop the model for doing "public image" articles as started at Category:Public image of politicians. Blue Rasberry (talk) 12:12, 30 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Happy to see if I could help.
The Lindsey Mills AfD really can't address how the Snowden page should be forked, that has to take place on the Snowden talk page. But nevertheless, it's not clear to me what encyclopedic info we have for her would really be lost:
  • The Citizenfour acceptance could definitely go on the movie's page if it's not there already
  • Shailene Woodley portrayal, ditto
  • The search of Mills's home--as a highly publicized aspect of how that all unfolded, I'm surprised it's not already in the chronology at Snowden's page. One cite on that will not be deleted there.
And then, for BLPs, it's not remotely unusual to have a brief personal life section that says something like, "Snowden now lives in Moscow, where documentary Citizenfour indicated he has been joined by girlfriend Lindsay Mills, a dancer and acrobat. The two have been together since at least 2009, and have previously lived in x,y,z other places. Mills came to media attention after the surveillance disclosures, including examination of her personal blog (NYer quote here). Snowden has criticized media's use of titillating personal photos of her." I think there is vanishingly little chance that would be viewed as giving undue weight to his personal life, especially in light of the length of the article. And then as I say, if that article's getting too long, that's something for the Snowden talk page. Our question here is really just, is it more helpful to readers, constructive for the encyclopedia and fair to Mills to present the information via related entries that are unambiguously wikinotable, or collected together as a "biography", when we have so little on her actual life? Innisfree987 (talk) 15:37, 30 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Innisfree987 Thanks for the thoughtful insights.
I said above that I thought there was more information here on her life than many people are acknowledging. If someone imagines that a biography is defined to be the narrative of birth, family, school, and career recognition, then I agree, the sources do not establish those things. If a biography is whatever parts of a person's life are covered by third party media, then this person's biography includes the points listed above: romance, subversive activities, creating an art blog, and publishing burlesque. Some people see the existing journalism and will say, "no content here", and I am not sure why. I imagine if more circus performers were commenting here, they might have a bias to appreciate coverage of this kind of art and perhaps bias against journalism coverage of the lives people who choose traditional career paths. To me, the protests, blogging, and burlesque are distinct aspects of her biography and the media coverage, and seemingly what she wants covered because that is what she publishes and promotes herself.
You mention, "is it more helpful to readers, constructive for the encyclopedia and fair to Mills to present the information...". AfD is not a process for that. Usually it is a process to discuss only notability. Another odd thing about this article is that it has gotten 42k pageviews in about 2 weeks. The current trend at WP:5000 is that an article that gets 25k in a month was within the top 5000 or 0.1% of Wikipedia articles by popularity. I think that it is fair to say that it is uncommon for topics to become both popular and have notability questioned, but in this case, I think that is happening. This article is not yet reported at WP:5000 but even with only 2 weeks reporting it will rank around #2000. If we considered reader demand, then there is some evidence that right now relatively high Wikipedia reader demand exists for this as compared to most other content. If the article levels at 1000/day, which is not unlikely because that seems to be the interest level outside the news cycle, then it still would be in WP:5000 for a while. This content in this place is something people are finding and using, but I am not aware of that ever having been an AfD consideration. Blue Rasberry (talk) 17:29, 30 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I still feel equivocal about what the outcome should be for this particular entry, but to be clear, when I say we should consider what best serves readers, I categorically do not mean we should make entries on every thing readers want to know about. There are many things readers (myself included) want to know about but for which unfortunately, we don't have enough for an encyclopedic entry. In those cases, we serve readers and the encyclopedia better by not creating an entry that would give a false impression we've adequately represented a topic we don't actually have enough on. And that absolutely is a subject for AfD discussion: it's at the heart of WP:WHYN. And to be clear, WP:HARM additionally makes clear deletion discussions should consider effect on the person in question, if they might be interpreted as low-profile. Innisfree987 (talk) 18:51, 30 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete as one event and that alone, nothing at all actually and we have past consensus of AfD deletions to show for it, there's nothing at all substantial here and claims of being connected to one person for the sheer event, is not at all convincing. SwisterTwister talk 23:43, 29 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Redirect to Edward Snowden; the article has been much improved and is not solely a collection of trivia and random gossip that it used to be. I'm still not convinced of the subject's notability 100%, but the section "Portrayal in the media" is somewhat worthwhile; it could be used elsewhere and would be available from the article history. K.e.coffman (talk) 17:37, 30 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Redirect to Edward Snowden as that is the only reason her name is here to begin with. The BLP1E issue is too strong to ignore here, but this solves the problem in that if someone looks for her name, they will be redirected. What if any should be allowed in the main article will be a matter for the talk page there. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 00:01, 1 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Redirect, there is a lot of coverage but it's all based on the fact that she's Snowden's partner. WP:BLP1E and WP:INHERIT apply. A redirect is appropriate as it is a plausible search term. Lankiveil (speak to me) 01:17, 1 October 2016 (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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