The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. John254 03:11, 25 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Tova Hartman[edit]

Tova Hartman (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

It is with great reluctance that I nominate this article, but by now, anyone familiar with User:Shirahadasha and her contributions [1] can see that this has been part of a pattern to foist only one view relating to Jewish feminism, mainly an extreme Modern Orthodox POV of these issues. All the indicators seem to lead to the conclusion that User:Shirahadasha is promoting Tova Hartman (and a few select others that are on the ((Jewish feminism)) for very good reasons), as Tova Hartman is the founder of the Shira Hadasha Modern Orthodox feminist congregation, see ‘Taking To The Streets’ For Agunot. This is a violation of WP:NOT#SOAPBOX and probably Wikipedia:Conflict of interest (formerly known as WP:VANITY) and as this topic grows and expands the dearth of other voices becomes more and more evident as these articles, all neatly packaged under the ((Jewish feminism)) template erode any semblance of Wikipedia:Neutral point of view with regards to what all Jewish denominations think of this subject. IZAK 08:50, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• NOTE: See related votes at: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mendel Shapiro and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Daniel Sperber.
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Judaism-related deletions. IZAK 08:59, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete per above. IZAK 08:50, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Speedy Keep Nominator has failed to state an actual criterion for nomination. Nom has alleged WP:COI, but has not claimed any conflict of interest that's actually found in the WP:COI policy. No relationship to any relevant organization or other similar actual conflict of interest has been alleged, nor could one be as there is none. An editor's subject-matter interests and personal points of view simply are not violations of the COI policy and there is simply no problem with having an article on a topic an editor happens to be interested in as long as the usual inclusion criteria are met. The nominator needs to assert an actual policy basis for deletion to have a legitimate AfD and avoid a speedy keep. --Shirahadasha 04:56, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Although non-notability has not been asserted as a basis for this AfD, as an FYI the following sources are sufficient to meet the central notability criterion of WP:BIO: [2], [3], [4], [5], [6]. In addition, the fact that Professor Hartman's works have been published by the Harvard University Press (e.g. [7]), Duke University's Common Knowledge (e.g. [8]), the APA (e.g. [9]), etc., is also an indication that her academic work has been peer-reviewed and is notable independently of her work as founder of Shira Hadasha and as a popular writer and lecturer, as is the fact that Stanford University uses one of her books as a text. [10]. See also this source. Best, --Shirahadasha 09:26, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Shira, we all know how to use Google, but let's try applying our brains also. While Tova Hartman may be a lovely lady, she is just one of millions of professors and tens of thousands of Hebraica and Judaica academics in the world with nice articles about them and with books they may have had published by universities, BUT that would in no way qualify them to become icons or guides for new ways of re-inventing Judaism. What you are saying Shira, is that this lady Tova Hartman, because she is a professor and has had her words printed can now come forth and change Judaism and as you argue in the article that that is her "claim to fame" -- nowhere in Jewish history have academics had ANY standing in the world of Torah study and they have zero significance as innovators of Jewish customs and certainly their opinions mean nothing in Jewish law. So in that regard she is totally not notable. By way of example: The Jews for Jesus can also claim to have WP:RS but that still gives them less than ZERO credibility in the world of Judaism. Wikipedia cannot teach lies it has a responsibilty to facts as well. IZAK 09:39, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete. On this site and in the article there is nothing that shows she is more than a lecturer with degrees and strong opinions. No news articles or books with her as the subject...misses the WP:BIO criteria about multiple non-trivial reliabile independant publications about her. - Peripitus (Talk) 11:47, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep, the fact that there is a group of people going through the pains of getting all references to Jewish Feminism out of Wikipedia in itself makes the notable Alf photoman 13:53, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Hartman is important enough to have refutations on the web by major figures like Elizabeth Fox-Genovese. But the criteria is less Judaism and more feminist academics. It should be debated on a more appropriate project group--Jayrav 15:09, 20 February 2007 (UTC).[reply]
  • Comment Here is a source for Elizabeth Fox-Genovese's commentary on Hartman: [11]. --Shirahadasha 19:09, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Easy Merge to Shira Hadasha - Tragic Baboon (banana receptacle) 15:18, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge. I agree with Tragic Baboon, merge to Shira Hadasha not notable enough for own article but not WP:NN enough for deletion. While IZAK makes some important points about WP:COI and Shrahadasha's username - this is not the place for them. Even in an AfD editors must assume good faith - failure to do so does not help their proposals.--Cailil 19:27, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I have no affiliation with Shira Hadasha. I know of no relationship to Tova Hartman, Mendel Shapiro, or Daniel Sperber, or any of the people or related subjects I have edited an article about. I do not live in Israel. I am merely interested in the subject. I also have numerous edits on many subjects, for general Jewish articles I've started see e.g. Maaser Rishon, Maaser Ani, see also my contributions to Amidah, Yom Kippur, Kashrut, List of Jewish Prayers and Blessings, Bible, Temple in Jerusalem, Kadosh Hakadashim, Mikveh, Mechitza, and many more. I am simply not a one-issue editor. Best, --Shirahadasha 20:23, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak Keep; see my comments on the AfD below regarding this bad faith nomination. RGTraynor 20:48, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletions. -- Pete.Hurd 05:09, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep meets WP:BIO with three articles that feature her in sites covered by google news, this month. John Vandenberg 08:31, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep. 15 articles in Google News archive, three in current news. Clearly notable. Bad faith nom. —David Eppstein 17:05, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep on basis of material above. --MacRusgail 00:56, 22 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Reviewing the current state of the references I still feel that my delete commentary was correct; although I feel the same way about the nom as per RGTraynor's comments. None of the references or news articles are about her, just mentioning her work as part of a larger article. It does seem that if she was a Professor of Education involved in feminist issues in say England with the same level of news commentary there would be a lot more deletion feeling. - Peripitus (Talk) 01:26, 22 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If she was in England, and there was more feeling for deletion, someone would need to justify deletion using WP:IAR to override the fact that the person meets WP:BIO. In short: WP:Afd is about evidence, not feeling. John Vandenberg 01:53, 22 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Strong Keep but expand. From this discussion its clear that she is notable in several ways that are not properly brought out by the article. But even if she werent, full professors at major universities are notable, and Hebrew Univ is the principal national univ. There's a major book by Harvard UP,and media mentions--and I gather there are more to be added. (It would help to add them now)

It was argued in the discussion that Jewish women have never been traditionally Torah scholars, and therefore she, as a woman scholar, could not be notable-- that comment is of course the most extraordinary POV pushing. It was also argued that she represents only one possible group of Jewish feminist scholars is equally POV, for it can be remedied in the obvious way, by including the others. I urge those who did not say keep to go a few paragraphs back and re-read those 2 arguments. I hadn't known her work before, but now I want to see what accounts for these extraordinary feelings. DGG 01:50, 22 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep and expand. Kolindigo 07:42, 22 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Israel or Palestine-related deletions. -- John Vandenberg 22:45, 23 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.