Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Perth Group


 * 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The result was Nominator withdrawn,. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules: simple/complex 10:54, 20 April 2012 (UTC) Non-admin close

The Perth Group

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Reliable sources are lacking to establish the notability of this pseudoscience group, which has only one or two members with possible but marginal notability: Eleni Papadopulos-Eleopulos, a hospital technician, and Valendar Turner, an emergency physician. These may be the only members of the group for all one can gather from reliable sources. Because Papadopulos-Eleopulos' article provides more information anyway, this article should be deleted or redirected to Eleni Papadopulos-Eleopulos. SpectraValor (talk) 17:24, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Redirect Article initially made as a redirect to AIDS Denialism. Should be restored as a redirect. People might legitimately want to look them up, and the main AIDS Denialism article covers them nicely --Harizotoh9 (talk) 17:29, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I agree. SpectraValor (talk) 17:44, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Health and fitness-related deletion discussions.  —Tom Morris (talk) 20:08, 10 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep. Nominator stripped article of information about other key participants prior to nomination.. All names are sourced to website cited in article. The attempt to use their evidence in the Andre Chad Parenzee case was widely covered in news and books. 291 books mention Perth Group in relation to AIDS.  Group is widely cited as influential in positions held by South African President Thabo Mbeki. About 2 dozen Perth Group publications listed in PubMed.  The Perth Group is considered a driving force in a movement that has led to an estimated half million people dead or infected in South Africa alone. That seems notable. We cover Flat Earth Society and its key figures, and they are far less influential than this group and its key figures. Jokestress (talk) 21:30, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Please don't confuse Google searches with reliable sources. I stripped the article of potential [WP:BLP|BLP] violations in which individuals were named in association with this group because there were no reliable sources to establish the existence or the notability of these connections. SpectraValor (talk) 19:01, 11 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Independent sources for other involved people added. Plenty more reliable sources (in the Wikipedia sense) where those came from. Their influence in South African policy is well-documented. Jokestress (talk) 21:59, 11 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Surmising from the authorship list of a paper published in 1995 that the authors are or even were part of the Perth Group is original research. SpectraValor (talk) 13:09, 12 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Their own website is an acceptable source in an article about themselves. Per WP:SPS: "Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, usually in articles about themselves or their activities." Your ongoing removal of citations and information during a deletion discussion you initiated is problematic. Jokestress (talk) 16:28, 12 April 2012 (UTC)
 * My overriding concern is BLP. A marginal pseudoscience group with few or no notable members and that few reliable sources even recognize as a group has a website that is cited by few if any reliable sources. On this website, they (whoever "they" are) state that various individuals are associated with them. Without confirmation of this association by reliable, independent sources, it is perilous to make this association on Wikipedia. In short, when someone claims that viruses do not exist, it might be wise to hesitate before granting credence to everything they say on an unknown website. SpectraValor (talk) 16:47, 12 April 2012 (UTC)
 * The Perth Group has never claimed that "viruses do not exist". It's reasonably clear from their published material that they think that some viruses do indeed exist. They haven't even claimed that HIV definitively does not exist, only that, to date, it has not been properly isolated. Luwat (talk) 00:05, 13 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Medicine-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 22:57, 11 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Organizations-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 22:58, 11 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Delete I don't find enough coverage from Reliable Sources to establish this group as notable. Their participation in a trial in Australia got them an article in the Sydney Morning Herald and a passing mention at the Skeptical Enquirer; not enough to qualify as Substantial Coverage. I was going to agree with a redirect to Eleni Papadopulos-Eleopulos, who appears to be one of the two founders of the group, but after looking at her article I don't think she is notable either, and I would support a nomination to delete that article as well. I could also support a redirect/merge of this article to AIDS denialism as suggested by Harizotoh9, but someone would need to keep an eye on the page to make sure it isn't promptly recreated. --MelanieN (talk) 23:36, 11 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Keep. Jokestress is right - this is an article on an important and notable subject. It should not be deleted. Luwat (talk) 05:13, 12 April 2012 (UTC)
 * But that's the question before us: how is it "important and notable?" Based on what sources and which Wikipedia guidelines? SpectraValor (talk) 13:10, 12 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Jokestress made it perfectly clear how it's important: the Perth Group has been covered in the media, influenced government policy in South Africa, and been involved in legal cases. The sources Jokestress provided show that the Perth Group, whatever one thinks of their views, are notable, under WP:NOTE. Luwat (talk) 00:02, 13 April 2012 (UTC)
 * The notability policy states that "significant coverage," meaning "more than a trivial mention," is needed for notability. There are probably several book- or article-length reliable sources that mention the Eleni/Valendar team, but they do so in a sentence or less, and they usually place "Perth group" in quotes, as I have just done. This is not a strong endorsement of notability. SpectraValor (talk) 16:06, 13 April 2012 (UTC)
 * That these sources don't provide "more than a trivial mention" seems to be just your assertion. Luwat (talk) 23:47, 13 April 2012 (UTC)
 * A single sentence in book or an article is a trivial mention by any definition. SpectraValor (talk) 19:20, 16 April 2012 (UTC)
 * No, that would depend entirely on what the sentence actually says. If, for instance, it says something like, "This thing or event is the most earth-shatteringly important thing in the entire history of the human race", then that would be a non-trivial mention. Anyway, what's your evidence that the sources given by Jokestress do provide only single-sentence mentions? Luwat (talk) 04:16, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
 * The sources. SpectraValor (talk) 16:40, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
 * According to Jokestress, 291 books mention the Perth Group in connection to AIDS. Did you check each one to see that it provides only a single-sentence mention, or are you making this up as you go along? Luwat (talk) 06:30, 18 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Did I check each one? To the extent that I could, yes. There are not, in fact, 291 books that mention the Perth Group in connection to AIDS or in connection to anything, there are 291 Google returns for the search "Perth Group" and "AIDS". There are 1400 returns in Google Books for "Perth Group;" most mentions are not about this "Perth Group." When you examine the returns for "Perth Group" and "AIDS" or "HIV," you find that there are only a handful of real books that mention the Perth Group. Much of what the Google search returns are magazines, newsletters, and self-published books by individual AIDS denialists, but mostly books that do not appear to mention the Perth Group at all. I don't know why the Google search returns these things, but this example shows why it's not very useful to use Google searches in discussions like this. Of the about 15 legitimately published, actual books that I could find that verifiably mention the Perth Group under discussion, including several denialist books, about half use quotes around Perth Group or the phrase "so-called". Two thirds mention Perth only once in the body of the text if at all. In some, "Perth Group" appears only in the references or in a footnote or endnote. Some only mention the putative group as an example of AIDS denialists without any further description. The most comprehensive treatment of the Perth Group in any book is in "Denying AIDS" by Seth Kalichman, where there are 14 pages, including the appendices and references, that contain some reference to the Perth Group, and the book "AIDS, South Africa, and the Politics of Knowledge," which devotes one paragraph out of 153 pages to describing the group. SpectraValor (talk) 19:30, 18 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, ‑Scottywong | yak _ 20:11, 18 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep, passes WP:N quite easily; note extensive discussion in Seth Kalichman's Denying AIDS, probably one of the best books on AIDS denialism; there are two multi-page discussions of the PG and their beliefs, , and there are more discussions in google books alone , , , then we've got google news , , , , , and my fancy-shmancy HighBeam account turns up more , and google scholar has some more . It's obvious nonsense, but it's notable nonsense that needs to be expanded and debunked.  WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules: simple/complex 13:59, 19 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Note that the page has been substantially rewritten today . WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules: simple/complex 17:42, 19 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep, I'm convinced by WLU's reasons and the rewrite, and I withdraw my request for deletion. (Is that possible, Wikipedians?!) SpectraValor (talk) 19:59, 19 April 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.