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Koto Okubo

• Articles for deletion/Koto Okubo
• Articles for deletion/Koto Okubo (2nd nomination)

Koto Okubo (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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This was listed before for deletion in September 2012 with a consensus to merge. It was ignored repeatedly then protected and restarted, restarted, restarted, restarted and restarted. The issue at the prior discussion was not solely that she wasn't even the world's oldest woman (she was then the oldest woman in Asia, it was that there was nothing about her other than her name and birth date. Now that she has been determined to have been the world's oldest woman, that's still a WP:BLP1E issue and the contents should again be merged to the Japanese supercentarian article and hopefully not just deleted outright. I don't think there's a consensus that having being the oldest women ever at any given time is sufficient notability for an article so I want to see where we should go with Template:Oldest people. Ricky81682 (talk) 22:24, 19 August 2015 (UTC)

• Keep. She was the world's oldest woman for a month, and this is part of the history of longevity. Georgia guy (talk) 23:00, 19 August 2015 (UTC)
• Keep no-brainer, almost all of the top 40 names in List of the verified oldest people have articles and I doubt many of them are notable for anything other than their longevity. @Ricky81682: please consider withdrawing this AFD so it can be speedy-closed as keep. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 02:24, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

The prior discussion was merely that she was the oldest living woman in all of Asia and that wasn't sufficient. The fact that people stubbornly ignored it doesn't mean it isn't a fair discussion. Also, it's entirely possible for all forty of those articles to be merged together (I consider this akin to the former articles we had on every fiction character which became merged into individual characters of show pages). -- Ricky81682 (talk) 04:30, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. — JJMC89 (T·E·C) 02:26, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Japan-related deletion discussions. — JJMC89 (T·E·C) 02:26, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• Keep and ban OP from further disruption. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 166.170.48.75 (talk) 02:55, 20 August 2015 (UTC) — 166.176.58.18 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Merge to List of Japanese supercentenarians. Sources tell us almost nothing of interest that isn't already available there. Remove the unsourced statements and you're pretty much just left with a name, age and country and a statement that she was the oldest woman for a month. What little bio information that can be salvaged can go in the people section unless more information comes up. CommanderLinx (talk) 03:27, 20 August 2015 (UTC) This template must be substituted.

Editor is not a WOP and only exists to disrupt WOP work." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 166.176.58.18 (talk) 03:51, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

What, only Italians can get involved? EEng (talk) 03:58, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• Delete or Merge to List of Japanese supercentenarians. Nothing to justify a stand-alone article. Citations are obituaries and membership of a list. Might justify an article with appropriate citations, but there are, so for, none. DerbyCountyinNZ 04:06, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
• Comments to the closing admin Topics related to super-centenarians have been contentious in the past. Longevity-related articles were subject to ARBCOM standard discretionary sanctions until 2014. It is not unlikely that editors who have strong feelings on this issue have or will participate in this discussion. This may be one of those situations where policy and precedent should clearly trump the "!vote count," particularly if it is close or participation is low. Getting a second admin's advice may be helpful if the result isn't clear. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 04:08, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
• Merge to List of Japanese supercentenarians and redirect there. To quote the previous AfD, The result was merge to List of Japanese supercentenarians. A good decision then, a good decision now. The article doesn't even say anything about this woman's longevity, other than its span. And it has no other hint of notability. (To those who complain that articles are awarded indiscriminately to other ancients, see Misplaced Pages:Other stuff exists.) After this stub was previously turned into a redirect, there were vigorous efforts to ignore this and re-create the article, wasting others' time. This second time, protect the redirect. -- Hoary (talk) 04:18, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• The previous AFD closed before she became the world's oldest person. The huge amount of press coverage she received in early 2013 (and late 2012?) when she became the world's oldest person and when she died makes the results of that AFD obsolete. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 04:38, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

It was decided and closed prior to that fact and then ignored. It's not like anyone waited until she became the oldest woman to re-start, they just ignored the discussion and now create a new justification to again keep this article. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 04:53, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Even if the previous AFD hadn't been ignored - if the article had been merged in September 2012 then un-merged (i.e revert to the pre-redirect version) and possibly expanded the article when she became the world's oldest person, we would be in the same place today as we actually are: Discussing whether this person is notable given the publicity she enjoyed before and after the AFD of September 2013. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 05:10, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• Comment in support of notability: Her death was widely reported in multiple languages (I found English and Spanish right off the bat) and her death and others has been the subject of satire . If that doesn't meet the qualifications of WP:GNG then I'm interpreting WP:GNG incorrectly. To those raising the issue of WP:ONEEVENT and WP:Other stuff exists, the near-uniformity of other top-40-longest-lived people having their own long-standing articles strongly argues in favor of a general discussion on whether "having your death widely-reported due merely to old age" or "being in newspapers around the world merely due to old age" satisfies WP:GNG or whether those individuals fall under WP:ONEEVENT, and it strongly argues against using the "one event" and "other stuff exists" as reasons to delete articles one at a time. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 04:35, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Oh, another round of the typical "we need another round of discussion after discussion after discussion in different places while we ignore what's actually discussed so we can badger everyone else to death and rally the troops in support of it." An article about the oldest woman in Japan at that time (in Asia in fact) was discussed, supposed to be deleted and then edit warred to stay on. No one bothered to actually convince a soul in support; they just ignored everyone and edit warred until everyone else gave up. Now that it's the oldest women and some merge votes come in, now it's the time we need to have new, separate discussions so that we can again argue about someone who lives to XX number of years needs separate biographies. The AFD discussions are discussions about their notability. Otherwise, you're free to propose an adjustment to point 2 of WP:ANYBIO or a million other angles to make 'staying alive for a very long time' worth a separate article. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 04:53, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

There is a huge difference between "oldest woman in Japan" and "oldest person on the planet" (and a not-as-big difference between "oldest in Asia" vs. "oldest on the planet") in terms of how much press they will get (i.e. how likely they meet Misplaced Pages's notability criteria). Like a high school with a football team (and probably even more so than a high school), a person who is recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's oldest person is almost certainly going to have significant and widespread press coverage in reliable sources. In short, it is unwise to automatically assume people will have the same "keep/merge/delete" recommendation for someone who has never been the oldest person in the world as they would for someone who has. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 05:10, 20 August 2015 (UTC) Update I mis-spoke when I implied she was the "oldest person on the planet" - she was the oldest woman on the planet, which is not the same. However, given the large media coverage of her since 2012 and especially during her tenure as the oldest woman on the planet, I see no question that this person meets Misplaced Pages's notability requirements. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 22:18, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• Comment For comparison, this is the content at the list page (and even that, the nursing home and son comment isn't actually sourced) but that's more than was removed in January 2013. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 04:40, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
• Comment If this closes as "merge" I strongly recommend that the closing admin replace the content with {{Afd-merge to}} followed by a soft-redirect and a link to the most recent prior edit, which can later be changed to a regular "redirect" when the merge is complete. This will make sure that the "failure to implement the results of the AFD" that we saw with the previous AFD doesn't happen again. Note - I'm still strongly in favor of keeping, but I am also strongly in favor of following processes except in rare cases that don't apply here. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 05:17, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• Merge Like WP:N says:

A topic is presumed to merit an article if . This is not a guarantee that a topic will necessarily be handled as a separate, stand-alone page. Editors may use their discretion to merge or group two or more related topics into a single article. ... Sometimes, understanding is best achieved by presenting the material on a dedicated standalone page, but it is not required that we do so. There are other times when it is better to cover notable topics, that clearly should be included in Misplaced Pages, as part of a larger page about a broader topic, with more context. A decision to cover a notable topic only as part of a broader page does not in any way disparage the importance of the topic.

This is a classic situation where such discretion should be exercised. The article says essentially threefour things about the subject: when she was born, where she lived, when she died, and what she died of. The rest is GRG fancruft like "The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare did not announce her name officially (only her residence and age were released). Furthermore, at that time, her record was not yet identified and recognized by the Gerontology Research Group." Who gives a shit? She should be an entry in an list article. EEng (talk) 13:35, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Just because an article "could" be merged doesn't mean it should. There is more information in this article than just the details you've mentioned (four of them that you mentioned, by the way, not three). Just because you "don't give a shit" doesn't mean no one else does. -- Ollie231213 (talk) 21:18, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

I didn't say it should be merged because it could be merged; I said it should be merged because it should be merged. And, actually, there's nothing else in the article beyond the four things I mentioned and the usual longevity fancruft (e.g. "she was the second-oldest right-handed person south of the Mason-Dixon Line other than people in Asia with no home telephones"). Here it is in its entirety:

Koto Okubo (大久保 琴 Ōkubo Koto?, 24 December 1897 – 12 January 2013) was a Japanese supercentenarian who, at the time of her death aged 115 years and 19 days, was recognized as the oldest woman in the world and the second oldest living person behind Jiroemon Kimura. At the time of her death, Okubo was one of only 29 people verified to have lived to the age of 115.

Koto Okubo became the oldest woman from Japan and Asia after the death of Chiyono Hasegawa on 2 December 2011. The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare did not announce her name officially (only her residence and age were released). Furthermore, at that time, her record was not yet identified and recognized by the Gerontology Research Group.

The name of Okubo was finally reported by the Japanese press on 14 September 2012, and on the same day, Okubo was verified and added to the GRG list and Guinness World Records.

Okubo lived in a nursing home in Kawasaki, Kanagawa with her son. She died of pneumonia on 12 January 2013.

EEng (talk) 16:53, 23 August 2015 (UTC)

• Merge per the above supporters of merging. If there's nothing else to say about her, there's not enough for a separate article. Egsan Bacon (talk) 14:52, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• Keep She was the oldest living woman in the world for almost a month, and the oldest living woman in Japan for over a year, these are surely good enough reasons to justify a seperate article. Bodgey5 (talk) 15:34, 20 August 2015 (UTC) — Bodgey5 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Strong Keep Not everyone can become the oldest person in the world. We need to distinguish those, whose are scientifically verified by recognized authorities, from those, who only claim to be the oldest. Mrs. Koto Okubo's age was verified by both Guinness World Records and Gerontology Research Group. She is definitely notable and her article is an important source of valid information. Sincerely. White Eaglet (talk) 16:58, 20 August 2015 (UTC) — For White Eaglet (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Keep Mrs. Okubo was the world's oldest woman for a period of time and was recognised as such by Guinness World Records, among others. Her name was revealed in September 2012 by the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour, and Welfare and, as a consequence, reports about her, including biographical information, began to emerge/surface immediately - as evidenced by these reports, and , from September 2012 - as such, they prove that more biographical information is readily available and also augment her notability. On top of that, if making it to the status of World's Oldest Woman, backed up by a GOVERNMENT agency as a source, is not notable enough in itself, then this does not bode well for other WOM/WOW/WOP candidates - whereas the notability they have received in worldwide media press coverage has surely deserved them a notable status. My point is: the feat of reaching an old age can, in itself, be considered as deserving of notability, with a Jeanne Calment being the posterchild example, of course. For Koto Okubo, as well, her name will always remain in the record books - and thus will always carry some sense of notability, albeit that biographical information on her might be more difficult to find as Misplaced Pages is a WESTERN-oriented organisation with most of its members not fluent in Japanese. Last of all, it is disappointing to read that members of the WOP group in this encyclopedia are stereotyped as "fancruft" or pinned in a corner with remarks as "who gives a shit?" To me, this comes across as downright condescending as well as serious POV-pushing and is thus in violation with WP:NPOV. As far as I am concerned, the decision in this AfD nomination should be made on the basis of objectivity - "fancruft" and "who gives a shit?" don't point towards that. Fiskje88 (talk) 18:48, 20 August 2015 (UTC) — Fiskje88 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Keep This woman was the oldest woman in the world. Not only that but she is one of the few people to have have reached age 115 of all time and also one of the very few women to have held the title of 'oldest woman' in the world and not also 'oldest person'. I believe this article to be of use and interest. JKSD93 (talk) 19:07, 20 August 2015 (UTC) — JKSD93 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Keep General consensus seems to be that world's oldest women and world's oldest man titleholders are notable enough to warrant their own article. Notability due to a title is not temporary. Even monarchs who reigned for a short time are notable enough for their own article. But this isn't about the first AFD or bringing the article back afterwards...it's about whether the upgrade in status to the Guinness world's oldest woman titleholder brought enough recognition to meet the Misplaced Pages "notability" standard. I would say "yes". It's been "yes" for everyone else since at least the 1980s. Why should this case be different? The article does contain more than just her birth/death dates and her country of residence. The fact that one other user in this discussion "doesn't give a shit" about anything else is irrelevant. -- Ollie231213 (talk) 21:14, 20 August 2015 (UTC) — Ollie231213 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
• Administrative note A few edits before this one, an editor completed a WP:Non-admin closure of this AFD. It was contested. Regardless of the merits of the close (or lack thereof), when an editor in good standing contests a non-admin closure, it means that the non-admin closure is in and of itself contentious and the discussion should remain open until an admin closes it. Unless this discussion qualifies for a "speedy close" now or in the future, it is unlikely that any admin will close it before the normal 7-day discussion period ends. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 23:12, 20 August 2015 (UTC) Correction and mea culpa: I was wrong. The procedure outlined at Misplaced Pages:Deletion process#Non-administrators closing discussions is exactly the opposite of what I said in my stricken remarks. The proper procedure would be for any editor (other than the person who originally closed the discussion) to re-close it, subject to any administrator re-opening it. Given the nature of this particular "early close" and the almost certainty that an administrator would quickly re-open it, WP:Ignore all rules applies - the editor who re-opened the discussion's decision should stand since the end result - the discussion being re-opened - would be the same. Please do not re-close the discussion before the 7 days are up, as it will just be a waste of time as I or another editor will call in an administrator and it will be re-opened. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 01:36, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

• Merge & Redirect to List of Japanese supercentenarians. Insufficient independent notability. Also recommend protection of the redirect to prevent future recreation. --DAJF (talk) 23:55, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• Comment EEng, I am curious as to why you added SPA tags to various "Keep" votes on this Afd, my vote included. If you actually took the time to look at my contributions (of which there are over 500) you will see that they are by no means exclusively related to longevity article, in fact, for a long time after joining Misplaced Pages, my edits were almost entirely related to Snooker articles. I note that you have also added the SPA tag to the votes of Ollie231213, Fiskje88, and JKSD93, and yes, it's true that these users do make edits to longevity articles, but they DO NOT exclusively edit longevity pages, something which you have implied when you added the SPA tags. All of these users voted to "Keep" the article, and i'm sure that by adding the SPA tags, you hope to further your cause to get this article on Koto Okubo deleted, but the fact is that you have falsely accused users of having single-purpose accounts. Take JKSD93 for example, they have edited hundreds of articles, many of which have NOTHING to do with longevity, and yet you still added the SPA tag to their vote. If you could elaborate as to why you did this, i'd appreciate hearing your explaination. Bodgey5 (talk) 01:14, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

  SPAs are routinely identified in AfD discussions. That's primarily what the template is for. It doesn't require exclusive editing in a given area, just few edits outside an area. And someone, like yourself, who suddenly reappears after two years to edit almost entirely in one area counts as well. EEng (talk) 02:11, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

  Well, if you looked closer, you may see that whilst a number of my edits are related to longevity articles, I also edit pages on other topics, in fact, just yesterday I created another Snooker tournament article, namely the 1998 Scottish Masters page. So your statement that I only make a few edits outside of longevity articles is a false accusations. But there's also JKSD93, who makes lots of edits outside the topic of longevity, yet you also added an SPA tag to his vote. Bodgey5 (talk) 02:26, 21 August 2015 (UTC) @Bodgey5: I formatted your comment on the assumption you were directly replying to EEng's comment of 02:11, 21 August 2015 (UTC). If I am wrong, please re-format it so it is clear who you are replying to. EEng, I also indented your comment for clarity. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 03:02, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

• Question. Is there anything that can even be said about this person that would not belong in the article on Japanese Centenarians anyway? Looking at the article now, the only important piece of information I see that would not go there is her cause of death. If no sources exist to expand this article beyond a rehash of content that exists elsewhere, I see no need for an article. Someguy1221 (talk) 04:23, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
• Comment I have noticed that many of the contributors here have been pinned down as people solely editing in the field of WOP (thus, stereotyped as "trying to edit-war their GRG-biased POV"). I would like to say that although I can see the point of view of others - I have made few contributions outside the field of WOP - that does not mean that I agree with all of the lists and articles within the WOP field per se - thus, that I have an SPA. I also don't like me being pinned down as a GRG-biased fan. Does it not make sense that someone who follows developments within the field of longevity also edits on that subject within Misplaced Pages? It would make no sense for me to make edits within the subject of football; as a Dutchman, I cannot even name ONE of the players of our national football team. Moreover, I have been a member of Misplaced Pages for a couple of years, yet I don't see why a well-reasoned argument is immediately targeted as being part of an SPA. To get back to the topic of this AfD, I do feel that an article on a WOM is legitimate - solely for the feat that this makes her notable and existent 'in the books' forever. I am disappointed to see that my response has therefore been pinned down as another piece of 'fancruft'. In fact, drawing this parallel wider, you could even argue that if all the people with a POV who have responded here - both the (at times biased?) WOP members and the editors adamantly trimming down on WOP-articles - are left out, the only neutral - thus fair - comment so far given is by davidwr. Perhaps a decision for this AfD should only be based on the truly neutral posts here? Fiskje88 (talk) 07:40, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
• Comment I am shocked to see my account labelled as SPA in this discussion, who made this decision and on what basis? I joined Misplaced Pages originally to create a page for a local sociologist who died and who I believed was notable enough for a page on this site. But don't take my word for it, look at the facts: I have made 153 edits on Misplaced Pages since I joined on 27 January 2011, 41 of which have been related to WOP articles, that's 26.7%... Can anyone in all seriousness claim that my account is a Single-purpose Account when just 26% of all edits I have made are related to the alleged 'single purpose'? I believe this labelling to be an attempt to undermine perfectly good points raised by users who have had ANY past association with anything to do with WOP articles. JKSD93 (talk) 12:39, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

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