Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Brown priest


 * 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   delete. Davewild (talk) 12:33, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Brown priest

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A non-notable term heading a list of mostly non-notable people... and calling them Nazis. As far as I can tell, the term was invented (or at least popularized) by historian Kevin Spicer in his 2008 book that is the source of this list, and it has not come into general use (check Google yourself). The article consists mostly of a long list of German priests who were associated with the Nazis, the vast majority of whom are redlinks. Talk page has comments indicating some of the names may be incorrect or include priests who later spoke out against the Nazis. I'm not sure that we should be vilifying dozens of otherwise unknown people without any of the context which Spicer probably includes in his book. Brianyoumans (talk) 03:32, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Delete This is a WP:NEOLOGISM coined by Kevin Spicer. It hasn't received significant coverage in reliable, independent sources. A long list of accusatory red links sourced to a single book is very problematic.  Cullen 328  Let's discuss it  04:23, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Keep - the fact that most of the list members are currently redlinked says nothing about their notability and even less about the notability of the term. [Specifically, it looks like there are six brown priests who already have Wikipedia articles, which is more than when I started this in 2009.] A neologism coined in a book by a professor and published in an academic press stands on quite a different footing from the neologisms the cited policy deals with. Google Scholar and Google Books indicate that the term has been used by others as well. That some of these people are argued (on the talk page, usually without sources) to have positive traits as well does not dispute that all of these individuals are "brown priests"&mdash;as Spicer defines the term. If a few of the links need to be piped to disambugate, that also does not suggest the remedy of deletion. Finally, as for the notability of the individual priests, the fact that they are currently redlinks is not dispositive. Many of the receive extended discussion in Spicer's book and elsewhere. Savidan 04:32, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * The only other secondary sources that I see using the term are other works by Spicer and 2 print-on-demand books that probably contain reprints of the Wikipedia article. Oh, wait, actually, I found one article, a 2008 article in "Holocaust Studies". Could you provide any other titles or links? Brianyoumans (talk) 04:56, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I suppose we live in the age of declining attention spans, so here are a few to get you started. These are reviews of Spicer:   . The fact that the term gets picked up on in book reviews published in scholarly journals counts for a great bit.  These, as far as I can tell, are totally independent (or at least do not cite Spicer nearby):   . If you do not have access to any of these links, snippets can be found in the original links I posted. For what it's worth, it appears Spicer uses the term in both his 2007 and 2008 books, although only the latter is currently cited in the article. Savidan 05:38, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Another book review using the term: . This one does not show up on Google Scholar or Books. Savidan 05:42, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, the term is used in reviews or summaries of Spicer's book. That accounts for sources 1-4, 6, and 8 above, at a brief look. #5 is the one independent example of usage I cited above. #7 is a reference to a "Brown Priest" in a Sean O'Casey play, not related at all. Honestly, the term seems like a neologism, and not a very successful one at that.Brianyoumans (talk) 12:27, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't know where you are getting this idea that book reviews published in scholarly journals don't count for anything. Savidan 17:07, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * As a source for an article, they are fine. But when you are trying to figure out whether a word or phrase has come into common usage, having it appear in reviews of the original source that coined it is pretty useless - it just means that the term was used prominently in the book.Brianyoumans (talk) 21:13, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Comment I hate to add more verbiage to this, but... The more I look at this list, the more I think it is a bad idea. A few of these people might even still be alive, which would make this a WP:BLP issue. We are taking one scholar's list of names and calling them all "Nazis", essentially. Without the biographical info from Spicer's book, there is room for confusion - one link was going to Joseph Muller (priest), who was executed by the Nazis, and a few minutes research convinced me that a different Joseph Muller was probably intended by Spicer. We are also accepting Spicer's judgements on people - some of the existing links go to people I would agree are "brown priests" by Spicer's definition, but some are priests who had more complex relationships with the Nazi regime. Who do you call a "brown priest"? Joseph Lortz, for instance, apparently left the party by 1938 and removed material favorable to the Nazis from his works. Placing his name next to that of more committed Nazis is problematic.Brianyoumans (talk) 15:02, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Even if some are still alive (very, very unlikely, and entirely speculative), WP:BLP was never meant to prevent the citation of a material to a reliable source, in this case a book by a professor published in a university press. "We" are not calling these people Nazis; Spicer is, and the article is only citing him. As for Muller, his WP article is currently entirely unsourced, and thus a rather flimsy basis on which to claim Spicer is in error. Nor is being executed by the Nazis entirely inconsistent with having been a Nazi sympathizer. By this logic, you could demand the removal of all references to Nazism from every victim of the Night of the Long Knives. As for Lortz, the fact that he may have repented and changed his ways is something that should be noted in his article, not something that should be used to erase his prior conduct from history. Savidan 17:02, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Please see my comments re Muller on the article talk page. I haven't referenced his article, but I'm pretty sure it could be referenced, and I found a reference to most likely a different Josef Muller, who is probably Spicer's "brown priest". The point is, without more than just names in a list, mistakes like this are going to happen. And if this article isn't Wikipedia calling these people Nazis (or Nazi sympathizers), why isn't it an article on Spicer's book? And if it was to be an article on Spicer's book, how can we quote so much copyrighted material? I think we have to be responsible for the material, and I don't think we want to be. Even if none of these people are alive, their families certainly are, and these are serious accusations.Brianyoumans (talk) 21:28, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * The answer to first your question is that Wikipedia never takes a view; it only reports what is stated by others. The answer to your second is that Spicer has no copyright in a list of names (see Feist v. Rural), and if he did it would be fair use. Your core concern seems to be that you disagree with Spicer. Instead of out and saying that, you have chosen every possible pretext, no matter how frivolous: notability, BLP, and now copyright. Savidan 21:53, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I haven't read Spicer and I have intended no criticism of him or his work. I don't even remember how I happened across this article - I might have hit "random article", I do that sometimes. My objections are with including his list in Wikipedia, without any accompanying explanatory information, including lots of non-notable people - lists of people in Wikipedia article should be lists of notable people. And including under "brown priest", which is not a notable term. And the fact that these are serious accusations to make about people, and we want to make sure we don't end up linking to the wrong article.Brianyoumans (talk) 23:00, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Delete due to WP:BLP issues and a lack of consistent usage in academic sources (just try a Google Scholar search). --BDD (talk) 15:34, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politics-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 15:46, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Christianity-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 15:46, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 15:47, 21 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Delete per WP:BLP. The list of priests is based on one person's work and as others have pointed out, is problematic at best. Also as pointed out, the term 'brown priest' has had limited use outside of Spicer's work or those reviewing it....William 17:04, 21 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Delete per WP:NEO, the fact that the article is based on a single source, the vagueness of the term, and uncertainties about which person some of the entries in Spicer's book refer to. Committed Nazis are being mixed together with people who joined briefly but left in the 1930s. I would support a list of "Catholic priests who were members of the Nazi party," if it gave sourced membership dates. Red links should definitely not be included. WP:BLP does not seem to apply to entries in the list with articles. -- 202.124.74.88 (talk) 00:56, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Delete - per WP:RS. Monterey Bay (talk) 00:58, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Delete - per WP:RS. A term being used in a book review isn't an indication of its acceptance or wide use within the academic community. It just indicates that the term is used in the book. Intothatdarkness (talk) 16:13, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Delete Almost entirely written from a primary source.  We already have List of Nazis (A–E) where each line entry is referenced.  I checked, and we do not have an article on Kevin P. Spicer.  A look at the first three pages of the Google Scholar, I only see "brown priest" being used in the context of "Kevin P. Spicer".  Unscintillating (talk) 18:14, 23 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Delete This article is in many respects the wrong way to do it. The concept of Nazi priests is a suitable subject for an article, and Spicer's book would be one of the main sources to be used for it. Any list of individuals included there would indicate the actual nature of the involvement, and use more than a single source. . This article, on the other hand, uses a non-standard title,based primarily on a single book, gives no content or references outside of that book, & lists people with varied degrees of guilt as if they were equal, thus removing all the informative value from the list and violating NPOV. I urge that Savidan or whoever is interested write that  better article  DGG ( talk ) 03:51, 28 June 2012 (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.