Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of assassinated people


 * 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   keep.  Sandstein  20:04, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

List of assassinated people

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A pointless and COMPLETELY UNSOURCED list. Adoniscik(t, c) 02:20, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete Unsourced, trivial. Ten Pound Hammer  and his otters • (Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP) 02:24, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * TPH perhaps you could explain how a list of assassinated individuals is "trivial"? RMHED (talk) 03:14, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Okay, not the best word. Seriously, millions of people have been assassinated, sadly. These people have nothing else in common. Ten Pound Hammer  and his otters • (Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP) 18:20, 22 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Keep Encyclopedic and appropriate use of a list, very useful to have a list of this sort rather than just a category. Unsourced isn't the problem,obviously no BLP issues and the sources would be on the assassinated persons article. All the red links though should be removed as unsourced. RMHED (talk) 03:10, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep and improve. Lists and categories (in this case Category:Assassinated people complement each other. I assume most of the bluelinks state the person was assassinated. Sourcing is a matter for cleanup. --Pixelface (talk) 03:51, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Do you for one minute believe some person is going to come and source those items one by one? --Adoniscik(t, c) 04:05, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * You seem to be trying to imply that it is obvious that each entry in this list should have a reference, here, in this list, that backs up that the named individual was reported to be a victim of assassination. Is this what you really mean?  If so, could you please spell out why the references, in the individual articles, are not sufficient sourcing for the entries?  Geo Swan (talk) 20:26, 22 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Comment Just from looking at the entry for Poland I see that this list is as random as it gets - an entry from the 11th century followed by four persons from different periods of the 20th century? I'm leaning towards deletion, although a list like this is in itself a useful thing, about that there can be no doubt - but it seems utterly unmaintainable due to the effort one'd have to make to source it and choose the content - how notable does one have to be to be included? Cheers, Ouro (blah blah) 09:30, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep. Sourcing is not an issue, as the majority of the people listed here are blue-links, therefore sourcing is expected in the linked articles. If there's a concern that someone made up the redlinks, then remove them. That's a content issue, not an issue of article viability. 23skidoo (talk) 12:28, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * WP articles are not valid sources. Is the rule for lists different? --Adoniscik(t, c) 15:52, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Why can't readers who want to know the source of the claim that an individual listed here was assassinated go to the article on that individual? Geo Swan (talk) 20:32, 22 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Keep but cleanup, and work on the qualifications for getting on the list. In each case, the sourcing for list membership should be in the article about the person. Is it desirable to copy numerous references from each of hundreds of articles in to the article where a list is maintained? Obviously very incomplete, but that is a reason to edit rather than delete. Assassinations have altered world history by leading to regime change or by silencing importannt voices. The intro says it is "important" people, so there is room for quibbling there, as murdered persons may become "important " posthumously when used as political symbols. There are numerous redlinked people from developing nations who are of questionable notability. Then the intro excludes those who were "executed," but when soldiers or revolutionaries in a coup shoot the preceding leader, it looks mightily like an assassination, and in fact William R. Tolbert, Jr. is included even though he was "executed" by such a military kangaroo court. The list amazingly shows only 3 people assassinated in Germany while Hitler ruled, but includes Fred Hampton, shot by the Chicago Police in the 1960's allegedly for political reasons. The whole "Deaths under suspicious circumstances" section seems unencyclopedic and a breeding ground for conspiracy theories.Edison (talk) 15:11, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep - Concur with the Keeps and Clean-ups. Very nicely organized list that is exactly the kind of navigational artcle WP needs more of.--Mike Cline (talk) 15:42, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Weak Delete It would be an Augean cleanup job. This is the type of mess you can get into when you choose not to rely on sources.  Yes, assassinations are an encyclopedic topic.  Anyone who has looked at a World Almanac has eventually reached the section of "Historic Assassinations Since 1865", and this one is arranged by nation.  It isn't limited to the heads of state or government, and that's part of where we get into a problem.  What's an "assassination"?  According to the article, this is a list of "important people who were murdered, usually for ideological or political reasons"; what's the definition of "important"?  And does "usually" mean that it doesn't necessarily have to be ideological or political?   If this list were confined to persons whose murders were described in publications as "assassinations", it would be a much smaller list.  Since it appears that this will be a default to keep, I hope that folks will take the time to add those inconvenient things called "citations".  If it's unchanged after four months, nominate it again.  Mandsford (talk) 16:25, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * It was nominated in 2007 and not one source has been added since then. Let's get real; it ain't gonna happen. --Adoniscik(t, c) 16:39, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Help us out. If it was previously nominated for deletion, why in the name of heck, in the interest of informed decision-making, hasn't the most recent nominator made a link to the previous discussion available for the rest of us to read?  Current nominator, um, that would be you, wouldn't it, Adoniscik?  Geo Swan (talk) 20:41, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Did you mean Articles for deletion/Lists of people by cause of death?
 * If so your complaint that a year has passed, and no one has moved or copied any of our existing references here falsely implies that the consensus at the afd a year ago was for the references to be moved here. That is plainly untrue.  In fact, only two correspondents mentioned sourcing at all.  And the closing admin didn't mention it.
 * Further, I suggest, our nominator has over-looked a couple of practical factors: (1) If the references were to be duplicated, both here, and in the individual articles, they would rapidly go out of sync. (2) the list entries are currently about 40 bytes long.  Most fully populate references are about 200 bytes.  If we moved just one reference per entry here we would quintuple the size of this article, and it would probably take thirty seconds or more to render on some of our readers' computers -- if it didn't cause their browsers to hang.
 * Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 21:19, 22 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Comment*What about all the mob bosses assassinated in the US, such as Albert Anastasia, Joseph Colombo , and Sam Giancana? All were "assassinated," and all were "important." How about John Dillinger , Baby Face Nelson and Pretty Boy Floyd, criminals many sources ,  say were assassinated by the police, with at least as much justification as for the claim Hampton was. Edison (talk) 21:20, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, if they merit an article on the wikipedia, then why wouldn't they merit an entry on this list? Geo Swan (talk) 21:24, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep for the reasons I offered in my comments above. Geo Swan (talk) 21:22, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment I propose that the verifiability policy requires that redlink (no article) names may not remain on this list without a reliable source, so this is not used to place propaganda in a top website for political purposes. Also, the policy for biographies of living persons and/or WP:V require the removal of unreferenced statements that "so and so is suspected of the killing." The "deaths under suspicious circumstances" section should be pruned of those who officially died of disease (Arafat), suicide (Iris Chang), or accident (Paul Wellstone) where "someone suspects" there was foul play. Only documented assassinations of demonstrably notable people should be in the article. I could live without references for the listed names which already have articles documenting the assassination. Edison (talk) 21:33, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep So far from a category making a list irrelevant, i would say that most categories here of people could probably be usefully done also as lists if anyone wants to do the work of adding additional helpful information, such as dates. . They give additional information very useful for browsing, a principal function of an encyclopedia. The red links are almost all of them people who would certainly be notable, and where the missing article is an example of cultural bias--eg supreme court justices in Columbia and Sri Lank MPs--it should rather serve just as a reminder to write the articles. That the people have been assassinated is obvious from the Wikipedia articles & if its though helpful to have  source copied over, that's easy enough. -. The "suspicious circumstances" part should be treated as Edison suggests. DGG (talk) 00:39, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions.   -- raven1977 (talk) 01:16, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep per WP:NOEFFORT - just needs work. Colonel Warden (talk) 22:55, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep as per Edison, etc. Edward321 (talk) 23:48, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment Since it looks like this will default to a keep, I've added the first citations and dates for those assassinations that have been listed as such in a common reference book. I hope that others will trim this 98 kilobyte article of its fat.  Since the list has gone so far by the idea that sources aren't necessary, a new name got thrown on every time someone is murdered.  Journalists, entertainers, guys running for sheriff, Mafia godfathers, persons who have been killed for criticizing the government, etc. can all be described, I suppose, as "assassinations".   However, if the article had simply followed the principle of citing to a source, it wouldn't have become such a mess.  I think that the standard should always have been whether a shocking murder is described in a news publication as an assassination, and being able to prove it.  Mandsford (talk) 18:37, 24 October 2008 (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.