Hi,
there's a problem with the article [[Madeline Amy Sweeney]], about a victim
of the Sep 11 attacks. This started out as an anonymous contribution:
"Amy was a wonderful person to wrok with. She inspired me to enjoy my life,
work hard and have fun with my job as an American Airlines Flight Attendant,
because it was the best of the best."
It was expanded, and the quote was removed. Oliver Perreira and Tom
Parmenter have insisted on keeping that quote in the article. The latest variant used
by Oliver is this:
--
The Wikipedia article on Madeline Amy Sweeney was started on November 28,
2001, with the following anonymous sentiment:- "Amy was a wonderful person to
wrok with. She inspired me to enjoy my life, work hard and have fun with my
job as an American Airlines Flight Attendant, because it was the best of the
best."
--
A new contributor named Arno also wants to keep the quote in, with the
remark "SPECIAL NOTE". Because he is encouraged by Tom and Oliver, he is now
ready
to start an "edit war".
My position is that, however touching this may be, there are several reasons
not to have the quote in the article:
* We have a precedent here. On [[Wilson Flagg]] we have kept the comment on
the Talk page and linked to it, with the link name "Tributes and Comments".
* The anonymous quote is unverifiable. I could easily come along and add
another, similar quote to the article under an anonymous IP. Should that then,
too, be included because of its sentimental value? Or does the first quote get
priority because it was "the quote that started this article"? In that case,
can I come along and add new articles about Sep 11 victims with fake
anonymous quotes that are destined to remain in them forever?
* Any self-reference of the type "The Wikipedia article .." is
non-encyclopedic to the extreme and should be avoided whenever possible.
In conclusion, I think it is obvious that we should keep the anonymous
comment on the Talk page, and not in the article. It would set an extremely bad
precedent if we allowed these kind of unverifiable comments in articles. I'd
like to hear more opinions on, preferably on the Talk page of the article
[[Madeline Amy Sweeney]].
Regards,
Erik
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