Sarah wrote:
On 7/13/06, David Boothroyd david@election.demon.co.uk wrote:
In my view the principle is clear: if a person meets notability for a biographical article, then the whole of their life is notable even if on its own it would not qualify them. For example, Bill Clinton is not a notable saxophone player - he would not qualify for an article based on having played the saxophone - but it is reasonable to mention this fact in his article because it is a significant part of how he was perceived.
The difference between Clinton's saxaphone playing and this situation is that the mention of the former is not harmful to Clinton; and the difference between a politician whose career is ruined by a scandal is that it'll have attached itself to his name, whereas in GLF's case, that appears not to be the case.
Wikipedia doesn't benefit from including the information about GLF, but he will be harmed if we do. Therefore, we ought not to. Fairness is as important as accuracy when writing about living people, if not more so.
How does Wikipedia not benefit from including the information? If Wikipedia biographies are to be accurate articles, they should not selectively exclude facts deemed inconvenient. When I buy a biography written by a reputable historian, if it has a section on a politian's life after office, I expect that section to be accurate and reasonably complete. For example, if 10 years from now Clinton gets arrested for drunk driving, I would expect a biography written after that to mention this fact. I would expect no less of Wikipedia articles.
-Mark