Wikipedia:Notability and its Discontents

The Problem Space

Wikipedia is a nation of laws, not [mostly] men, and the guiding document at play on the project is the general notability guideline (GNG). In theory, notability is not about a person's importance, but only whether significant independent coverage in multiple reliable sources exists about them. Though GNG is the main guideline, there are sub-guidelines for specific areas such as books, professors, and athletes. These subject-specific notability guidelines (SSNGs) help editors determine notability clearly in areas where the general guideline is vague enough to be unhelpful, or because it results in inconsistent or indiscriminate results.

A common refrain is that Wikipedia is not here to right the world's great wrongs – its mandate is only to reflect the version of the world as presented in the best information sources. But what if there was a way to do both? Attempting to right notability's wrongs can make it seem like one wants to over-represent the marginal, but to achieve encyclopedic completeness what we need to do is something totally different: correctly represent the marginalized.

One of the most inconsistently applied areas of the GNG is with "underrepresented" topics. These are topic areas on Wikipedia that have less coverage than the sources available about them could facilitate. This is a natural consequence of editors writing more about what they know, and deleting more of what they do not know about. In a movement with significant demographic imbalances, the result – without intention or malice – is areas that don't receive significant coverage on Wikipedia despite meaningful coverage in other domains. Implicit bias among editors results in increased skepticism and scrutiny of the topics they are less familiar with.

There's a self-fulfilling belief that people who have been forced to live on the margins of society and social power are of marginal notability. Sometimes this is true, if there is simply no information about them available in decent sources. But very often this is a conflation of how Wikipedians see importance when it intersects with a certain foreignness and lack of perceived status. Living on the borderline of society does not equate to being borderline important. Very often it is precisely figures who move from the fringes to impact the mainstream that are shifting the frontier of how humans view themselves and treat others, making an outsized impact on the world.

A New Way Forward

Again, a topic is presumed to merit an article if it meets either the general notability guideline, or the criteria outlined in a subject-specific notability guideline (SSNG). SSNGs are very powerful, because they are "explicitly listed as an alternative to the GNG". That means a subject might not meet the general notability standards, but as it says in the subject-specific notability guideline for academics: "failure to meet either the general notability guideline (or other subject-specific notability guidelines) is irrelevant [if it meets this SSNG]".

So, what does it take for, say, a porn star to warrant inclusion on Wikipedia?

• The person has won a well-known and significant industry award.
• Being a member of an industry hall of fame such as the AVN Hall of Fame, XRCO Hall of Fame or equivalent.
• The person has been featured multiple times in notable mainstream media.
• The person has made unique contributions to a specific pornographic genre, such as beginning a trend in pornography; starring in an iconic, groundbreaking or blockbuster feature

Award-winners, hall of fame members, mainstream coverage. That makes sense. And then... "unique contributions to a genre.. beginning a trend.. starring in a groundbreaking feature."  What a thoughtful guideline! It recognizes that leaders, pioneers, groundbreakers are worthy of notability. This is so simple. If it works for sex stars, can it work for the rest of humanity?

There are lots of ways to ensure that people don't fall through the notability cracks. There's even a catch-all for any biography: it's enough that a person has made a widely recognized contribution that is part of the enduring historical record in his or her specific field. And yet so many people fail to meet that burden within our community; so many articles are deleted; so many people and their contributions rendered invisible.

The usual definition of notability for a candidate article in the Wikipedia context is that multiple independent reliable sources are about this subject. A complementary definition is: A person who had a noticeable impact on a community as recognized in that community's most reputable sources. Let's call that a "community standard" of notability. Communities also differ in the sources that exist about them. Wikipedia's definition for reliability in a source means having a "reputation for fact-checking and accuracy." While sources about marginalized people may be not be traditionally mainstream like trade journals – which are widely accepted as good sources on Wikipedia – they're niche but reliable. They locate notability in the context of the relevant community. That is a community standard.

For a change, let's not focus just on process and policy in theory, but on outcomes. In discrimination law, a practice can be judged unfair not only if there is unequal treatment but also if there is ultimately unequal impact. In the end, if the results of the process are wrong, that is enough to justify change. A policy is simply not rational if it consistently produces inconsistent and flawed results. So let's change the policy and get better results. Let's adjust the subject-specific notability guideline for people or groups who are underrepresented on Wikipedia. And let's apply those communities' most reputable standards of awareness and recognition when determining their notability. We can do better, so we must.