Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bruce Rind


 * 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. ST47 (talk) 01:16, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

Bruce Rind

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )

This is the lead author of the study in the Rind et al. controversy. Having a separate article on Bruce Rind fails WP:BIO and WP:PROF.

Any 'keep' argument would likely refer to point 1 of WP:PROF: "The person's research has made significant impact in their scholarly discipline, broadly construed, as demonstrated by independent reliable sources." However, I point to the "Specific Criteria Notes" - none of these criteria are satisfied. Two of these notes which are subject to some interpretation state (emphasis mine) they must be "an author of highly cited academic work – either several extremely highly cited scholarly publications or a substantial number of scholarly publications with significant citation rates." Or, they must have "pioneered or developed a significant new concept, technique or idea, made a significant discovery or solved a major problem in their academic discipline. In this case it is necessary to explicitly demonstrate, by a substantial number of references to academic publications of researchers other than the person in question, that this contribution is indeed widely considered to be significant and is widely attributed to the person in question." Neither of these seem to be met. It is not clear what exact citation rates are being looked for, but his (in)famous paper is at 1,311 cites, a very similar paper is at 318 cites, and everything else is substantially fewer cites. Nor has he developed a significant new concept or discovery. I looked at the top 5 cites of his most cited paper, and none of them attribute significant new findings to him. The 1st was critical, the 2nd cites it to show gender difference, the 3rd is about the controversy, the 4th cites it to show prevalence, and the 5th cites it to support gender differences in effect as well as being one of several meta-analyses. Other than references to the controversy, these are all cites as of any other paper.

Of interest may be the fact that the user who created the article and wrote most of it is presently topic banned from human sexuality articles, including biographical articles. (Sexology arbitration case) The article does indeed have elements consistent with it being a POV push. It says unnecessary things to make its subject look good (he's a great chess player! Some nonscientist named Oellerich in a nonscience journal said his science was good!) while ignoring the subject's association with pedophile advocacy and age-of-consent reform groups, as documented in the Rind et al. controversy article.

I suggest we replace this article with a redirect to Rind et al. controversy. Crossroads1 (talk) 21:07, 21 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions. Crossroads1 (talk) 21:18, 21 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Psychology-related deletion discussions. Crossroads1 (talk) 21:21, 21 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Delete I was there when this article was created by the now subject-banned user.  Based on evidence the came to light during that event, concur with the theory that it was intended as POV fork/push.  It ignores mentioning the subject's various, shall we call them "suspect" behaviors, which while I understand the BLP policy means a high level of scrutiny towards libel, is nevertheless well documented.  The article subject is otherwise not terribly notable and could be argued, has not really contributed to science in a meaningful way.  His work mostly came to light due to media hysteria.  I did not take action to AfD this article prior to this due to my minor involvement in the arbitration case, combined with article creator's history incivility, harassment, and petty acts of retribution against anyone who dares disagree.Legitimus (talk) 00:36, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Comment The article should be evaluated independent of the motivation of the article creator. It seems at least that the subject could be noteable due to the Rind et al. controversy and the subject has produced independent academic research that has been cited often. This is not the place to establish whether he developed a significant new concept or discovery but this should rather be evaluated in the context of scientific citations (e.g. by peers / scientists and not by us). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hannes Röst (talk • contribs)
 * Delete This is a very much POV-pushing article. It is largely an unjustified POV fork from the much better article on the subject matter.John Pack Lambert (talk) 15:25, 26 June 2019 (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.