User:Geo Swan/Guantanamo/other articles that aren't ready yet/Dysepsion reply

I already gave a long answer to this in User:Geo Swan/Guantanamo/Guantanamo captives aren't felons and aren't POWs. In it I answered someone who compared the Guantamao captives to the felons in the Louisiana State Prison system. He said there were even some innocent men in the Louisiana State Prison system. I asked him:

"You pointed out that some of the Louisiana prisoners are also considered to be innocent. Before I address your comparison, are you suggesting that Louisiana prisoners, who might be innocent, or who might otherwise be held in detention in breach of the law, do not merit coverage in the wikipedia, even if articles could be written about them from a neutral point of view, which cite authoritative, reliable sources? I am asking because I want to make sure there isn't any confusion on this point. It seems to me that if authoritative sources documented the improper incarceration of a single Louisiana prisoner, he, or she, would merit coverage in the wikipedia..."

Let me ask you a similar question before I address your question: Do you really think that if there is a political prisoners, about whom there are authoritative, reliable sources, he or she doesn't merit coverage in the wikipedia? Here in Canada, over the last couple of decades, we have had a couple of dozen well known cases of men who were wrongfully accused of murder. There are plenty of verifiable, authoritative sources to support creating valid wikipedia articles, that conform to WP:NPOV, WP:NOR and WP:VER. I haven't checked. But I expect that the most well known of them have articles. I would support a wikipedia article about every one of them. I would support a wikipedia article for every one for whom there are verifiable, authoritative source that would support a an article that conforms to WP:NPOV, WP:NOR and WP:VER.

I believe the article about Said Zaid fully conforms to WP:NPOV, WP:NOR and WP:VER.

Yes, in answer to your question, I would support an article about thousands, or tens of thousands, of political prisoners, if there were verifiable, authoritative sources that would support an article that fully conforms to WP:NPOV, WP:NOR and WP:VER.

Why not?

Where to stop? Why not stop when we run out of wikipedians with the energy to write those articles, that fully conform to policy, or when we run out of authoritative, verifiable sources?

What about "notability"? Isn't the Said Zaid article out of compliance with the WP:BIO policy?

1. WP:BIO is not a policy. If you don't believe me, go and check. I am serious. Go check.
2. WP:BIO is a guideline. It is a guideline that derives whatever authority it has from WP:NPOV, WP:NOR and WP:VER.
3. My experience with notability on articles about individuals who are associated with topics tinged with controversy is that notability is far, far too subjective a yardstick to be fair or reliable to decide whether an article merits coverage on the wikipedia.

You compared the Guantanamo captives to thousands of political prisoners. Other correspondents have compared them to millions of common convicted felons, or millions of POWs or former POWs.

My experience is that some of those who argued that the Guantanamo captives weren't really any different from common convicted felons aren't aware that this is not a neutral stand. It is a stand based on a POV -- the POV that the statements of the Bush adminstration that the Guantanamo captives really were terrorists, but they were terrorists who were being dealt with through normal, standardized, business-as-usual procedures. The opposite stand, that the captives are the definitely the victims of war crimes, that it is an established fact that they are the victims of war crimes, is also a POV stand.

The way I see it it is the existence of a brisk controversy justifies covering the material in the article. Inserting our own conclusions, or rather, inserting my own conclusion would be a violation of policy, several policies.

Providing the information readers need to draw their own conclusions, if there is a brisk controversy, is, I believe, a good idea.