Talk:Caroline Overington

Events of the 2007 Federal Election
I re-added a previous section outlining Overington's actions around the 2007 election. These were widely discussed in the media, particularly by Media Watch, who saw them as representing an abuse of media power. This section had been removed from the article without good explanation.128.250.114.203 (talk) 08:07, 24 September 2009 (UTC)
 * And I have removed it (I did not remove it first time) as potentially breaching WP:NPOV, WP:BLP and WP:UNDUE. Perhaps a more succinct and neutral version may be appropriate. -- Mattinbgn\talk 08:22, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Fair enough. However, I'm not clear on how I can alter the text, as it is, to satisfy those three criteria. At present, it discusses the various aspects of the issue in a set of concise sentences. Here is the section as it was:

"In the lead up to the 2007 Federal Election, Overington was accused of improper behaviour with regard to two candidates for the Division of Wentworth. It was reported that she solicited preferences for Malcolm Turnbull from an independent candidate <>. She and other media figures have characterized the email exchange as a joke <>. She was also accused of threatening the ALP candidate George Newhouse with adverse press coverage unless he acceded to her demands to submit to an interview and photograph <>. On election day itself, Overington was involved in an incident with Newhouse. She had gone to a polling station at a Sydney primary school to vote. Newhouse and other witnesses claim that Overington slapped Newhouse across the face.<> Overington said she pushed Newhouse away with an open hand when he approached her; the editor-in-chief of The Australian, Chris Mitchell, mediated the dispute between the two.<>

The Australian Electoral Commission did not launch an investigation and no formal finding against Ms Overington was made <>."

To me, the section feels quite balanced. I think that the NPOV is satisfied, particularly about their physical interaction, because both sides of the incident are reported. That there was an altercation between Overington and Newhouse is undisputed - she published an apology in The Australian on the matter (linked). Both sides of the story (which was reported in a number of Australian broadsheet newspapers) have been given in this paragraph.

Again on NPOV, the original series of emails between the two has been cited, and both explanations are given. The inclusion of her argument that "it was a joke" is somewhat of a bias towards Overington (and therefore, implicitly, against Newhouse), because I think it would be difficult to find an media analysis of their interaction that argued Overington was acting in a journalistically appropriate manner. If anything, I think that this section should be _included_ under WP:UNDUE for that reason. It tries as hard as it can to report the opinions of both sides.

I think that BLP has been satisfied, given that the above arguments of NPOV, and the citations throughout.

If you could identify a little more specifically which parts of the paragraph need work, I'd be glad to do it. Thanks. 61.68.166.103 (talk) 13:31, 24 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Have reverted section about the 2007 election campaign, as explained above. Please let me know specifically where you think the paragraph violates particular policies, and I will try to adapt them. Thanks 128.250.114.216 (talk) 03:14, 24 February 2010 (UTC)


 * It is way too much detail about what is a minor matter in the overall context of her career. The content reeks of an editor with an agenda and it includes uncited information. The whole "controversy" is worth about a sentence, if that. -- Mattinbgn\talk 10:25, 24 February 2010 (UTC)


 * First, if you think the paragraph contains uncited information, indicate which assertions you're referring to. That's why I asked "specifically where you think the paragraph violates particular policies". You see, every statement of fact in the paragraph was referenced _at least_ once, with articles that clearly fit with WP:IRS. Simply asserting that "information" is uncited is not constructive. Second, good faith editors might misconstrue loaded words like "agenda" and "reeks" as accusations of bad faith. Finally, I've trimmed the point down to two heavily referenced sentences. 128.250.114.216 (talk) 00:00, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Some acknowledgement of the incident would be worthwhile. As it stands, the article reads like a biography put out by a PR agent - it may well be.84.133.226.60 (talk) 01:02, 20 April 2014 (UTC)

I agree that it should be acknowledged. I added in on 14 May, but it has since been removed by We stop the abuse. It read as follows:


 * On the day of the 2007 federal election, at a Wentworth polling place, Overington was witnessed in a public dispute with George Newhouse, the Labor candidate for the seat. The Australian published an apology to Newhouse over the encounter in December 2007.

I found The Australian apology on Proquest and will put in that reference as it seems that a non-primary source is not going to be allowed (as any news source that is not primary will be "a rival publication") Clare. (talk) 10:32, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

Request for comment: inclusion of Wentworth dispute

 * The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Should the Caroline Overington article contain any mention of the dispute with George Newhouse or should this be excluded? Clare. (talk) 07:36, 25 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Support current content as it is written. Neutral, factual and not out of balance with the rest of the article. (Note, I was an objector to an earlier, less balanced version of this content in 2010) -- Mattinbgn (talk) 08:02, 25 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Support inclusion, but comment on current phrasing, it is not clear that it is HER apology, rather than the paper's. Pincrete (talk) 15:01, 26 May 2016 (UTC)
 * The short paragraph appears adequate. What do you mean it is not clear? It states "an apology to Newhouse from Overington ". FoCuS contribs ;  talk to me!  18:30, 28 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Hi Focus, I added that "from Overington" portion of the text after Pincrete's comment :) Clare. (talk) 05:22, 29 May 2016 (UTC)


 * Support the current content. I think it is neutral and factual, as an above user has already said.  Cheers,  Comatmebro  User talk:Comatmebro 13:53, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Include But yes, good idea to stay fully cognizant of the guidelines for WP:BLP -- always stay polite and professional! :) Good luck! Damotclese (talk) 16:08, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Include within bounds set by WP:BLP, WP:V, WP:RS, WP:NOT, etc. There's nothing unusual/special about this case.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  08:06, 13 June 2016 (UTC)


 * The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

BLP edit war
What's with the edit war people. The material's completely and utterly trivial, and demonstrates nothing whatsoever as to the topic's notability. Per WP:ONUS: The responsibility for achieving consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content. WP:BLPPRIVACY: Consensus has indicated that the standard for inclusion of personal information of living persons is higher than mere existence of a reliable source that could be verified. BLPPRIVACY is also pretty implicit that article subjects are allowed a certain leeway in correcting personal information, although of course we have no idea what the case is here. Also note that under WP:3RRNO, removal of contentious material is often exempted from edit warring. So yeah, per ONUS and the fact that one of your sources is WP:PRIMARY, as well as complete trivia—for which "it is referenced" is inapplicable (indeed, it is explicitly exempted from WP:VAN: Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion, per Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons)—means this'll have to be checked in at the BLPN. Cheers,  SN54129  17:45, 4 September 2023 (UTC)


 * I only reverted once, and that was because the content was removed without an explanation. ... disco spinster   talk  18:12, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
 * I've tried to remove the reference because I know it's not true - also her website makes it pretty clear that she lives in sydney with her family and he has a website that says he lives in Melbourne with his family but that's not enough? In my opinion this is bullying her into having to "prove" something which she shouldn't have to do. Madmondrian (talk) 23:01, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Someone can have a partner without living with them so I'm not sure that means much. And we're talking about two people who work in media, people who have the power and knowledge on how to deal with claims which aren't true and a fairly respected Australian newspaper The Age rather than simply some tabloid. Plus this is a fairly critical article so not likely something that was simply never noticed, and while the issue isn't that important it does have some minor relevance to the claims made so again probably not something that the subjects would just choose to ignore. So it seems unlikely to me the claim would have been made and left all this long without correction if it was completely untrue at the time. (Perhaps the subjects may quibble whether they partner was an accurate term for their relationship at the time but it's likely they did have some relationship enough that The Age feels they can defend keeping the claim.) However it is correct that it's nearly 2 years old so it may no longer be true; and it also isn't that important so IMO there's merit to just excluding it. But trying to argue that this is something that's never been true and the source was simply wrong is IMO going to be difficult. I've commented before that it can be problematic when we ask relatively unknown people to require corrections for ancient material and sources which may even be dead, but this is very far from that, IMO it's entirely reasonable in this case we treat the claim as true at the time and do require correction before we don't; although again this doesn't mean we have to include anything in our article. Nil Einne (talk) 09:23, 5 September 2023 (UTC)


 * Per, I also reverted only once, but for a different reason: though probably in good faith, the user was adding external links while having potential conflict of interest. — B. L. I. R. 18:45, 5 September 2023 (UTC)