Talk:1982 Flinders by-election

Problem with inadequate source and confusing edit

Today, at 20:25, I removed a paragraph that included questionable information because I could not locate the source cited. I spent hours trying to find the source, to no avail. I also tried to find any proper source that contained the same information so I could simply drop the source that could not be located and add the source that could. Unfortunately, I could find no source that contained the information. The information in that paragraph, as with any Wikipedia content, depends entirely upon the source. I was certain that due diligence had been done so I removed the paragraph and the source, and provided this text in my edit summary: "Removed paragraph because information could not be verified. While an author and title were provided, there was no URL or ISBN number or any other way to locate the publication, if the information provided is, in fact, some type of publication." I realize that was a long explanation, but my edit summaries are usually a bit long, as I try to explain fully to avoid the chance of a misunderstanding. As I continued to edit the article, I noticed something strange. That paragraph remained. Confused, I went to the History page and saw that on 20:26 - within one minute of my edit - another editor had already reverted my edit and gave an even more confusing edit summary that stated, simply, "unexplained content removal." Then, I got a notice that a message had been left, so I went to my Talk page to find the editor had left a message telling me "you removed content without adequately explaining why. In the future, it would be helpful to others if you described your changes to Wikipedia with an edit summary." I am stunned by that comment, but I want to do the right thing, so, as advised by Wikipedia, I am creating a post here for further discussion. I am a happy collaborator and want only for this article to meet proper Wikipedia standards, so I am going to remove that paragraph again and provide basically the same edit summary, which was already thorough and lengthy. I assume that the other editor desires only for this article to meet standards, as well, and hope we can work together to achieve that. I have reached out to him and feel certain we can come to an agreement. If anyone has further questions about why I removed the paragraph, then I have more information I can provide. Thank you. 69.180.218.186 (talk) 21:20, 26 March 2022 (UTC)

I have restored the material. Per WP:SOURCEACCESS, "Do not reject reliable sources just because they are difficult ... to access. Some reliable sources are not easily accessible." The fact that you cannot locate the source does not mean that it does not (or did not) exist. We can reasonably accept that there was a Socialist Worker magazine in Australia. Mitch Ames (talk) 00:45, 27 March 2022 (UTC)

I feel like this is more a case of a better source being useful. This is a pretty well-known thing about this particular by-election, and is also referenced here, here, here and here, amongst other places. Here's a contemporary mention in Hansard. Any of these would be sufficient sourcing. Frickeg (talk) 00:49, 27 March 2022 (UTC)