Talk:Normal Bob Smith

Votes

Please note that any votes or arguments on this page won't affect the Deletion-Decision in any way. If you have arguments for keeping the article, please post them in here. Also note that your arguments won't be considered as much as those of "full-time"-accounts if you have created your account for the single purpose of commenting on this deletion process. Sceptic Watcher 11:13, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Arguments for keeping the article

Normal Bob Smith is a freelance artist who invented Jesus Dressup. He is an outspoken atheist who's been a speaker at the American Atheist's Convention, and featured in the Neil Abramson documentary "Bob Smith USA." Ref: http://www.bobsmithmovie.com/

In 2004 he was the center of controversy when protesters of his Jesus Dressup magnet toy stood outside Urban Outfitters and succeeded in getting his product dropped from their shelves. Ref: http://www.tfp.org/what_we_do/index/blasphemy_dress_up_jesus.htm

Normal Bob also made news when he attended Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" film dressed as Satan. Ref: http://www.washtimes.com/business/20040322-092410-2758r.htm

Normal Bob Smith is a lightning rod for social issues, especially in an increasingly censored environment.alienlovesong 19:08, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I am new to this, so I probably am missing something. I have been unable to find any given reason for the proposed deletion of this article. It is clearly a factual description of a man much in the public eye both nationally and internationally, and I can find no grounds for its deletion in the Wikipedia deletion policy. I would very much appreciate any information on the purported reasons for this proposed deletion. (x.hismarck@charter.net)

agreed

KEEP - Normal Bob is quite the controversial character on the internet. He runs one of the major atheist websites on the internet and continuously makes major news headlines with his artistic work. He first came onto the scene with the Jesus Dress-Up controversy: (http://washingtontimes.com/business/20040331-085944-8277r.htm) and Urban Outfitters. More recently, he put out a popular flash game to dress up Mel Gibson, as reported on FOX News (http://www.myheavy.com/video.php?video_id=2747&type=user). He's also recently launched Muhammed Dressup (http://www.muhammaddressup.com/), which not only cuts to the recent controversy of the Muhammed cartoons incident, but characterizes the argument for free-speech rights. Much like other "shock-jocks", Bob uses his web skills instead of a radio voice. If this isn't suitable as a Wikipedia entry, I dunno what is. Audiolight 20:48, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

KEEP. There's no reason to delete. mikeirani

KEEP - I've made several edits to philosophy/religion articles. I do not see the reason why this article is being considered "irrelevant". No reason to delete.

KEEP - He's been in a movie, he has acting credits, he deserves a wiki page for that purpose to.

When I first came across the site which started a controversy, I told myself that in any way, truths will re-surface regardless of whatever barriers that might try to impede them. Freethinkers are harmless since the assertion that christianity is about faith,hope, love...understanding, I don't see any valid reason as to why Normal Bob Smith be subject to deletion. It is like an actual hell for him. His works reveal that his fears stemmed from what religion have inspired. Deleting him then is not a relevant measure to antagonize him. And what of humanity? Is this what God is created for? So that revenge and counter attacks be fostered? What have we learned from our histories? Lessons learned from the ruins of the past and the things made possible by civilization? If the only recourse is to exterminate, then what use are all the books of human thought and the creativity that sparked? Bob did a tremendous demonstration of how thoughts evolve. What is irrelevant? According to the premises discussed by the writers above, it simply means "an opposite" of what they define as relevant. But nature is very relevant and a god of significance hence, the science that taught humanity their importance is nature. And nature freely flowed out and have given birth to our dear atheists like all the non-atheists! And if they are asked to contribute and do things, do they not give what is asked of them? Why then should their works be looked down upon merely because it speaks in an anti-religion language? I don't favor the deletion!------ Elvira B.203.160.183.131 06:50, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

No. Bob's an important and vocal member of a large and growing (12-16% of the US by many surveys) community -- atheists. He offers a view of the world that many, many of us share, but he is open and funny and trenchant as many of us aren't willing or able to replicate. Keep his article up and let it grow!

The changes to the article were superb. There can be no reason to delete it now. But I still cannot find any reference to the original reason given for deletion. One of the above writers mentioned "irrelevant" as a reason, but who said it was an irrelevant article? Exactly what was it said to be irrelevant to? Where can I read that reason in context? As I said before, I am brand new to this, and I suspect that I just don't understand how to navigate the Byzantine labyrinth that is Wikipedia. As best I can tell, the instructions for nominating an article for deletion require that the nominator "Give a reason for the deletion and a category for the debate" at the start of the discussion page (step II, "How to list pages for deletion", "Wikipedia: Articles for deletion"), but I see no reason or category given at the top of this page. If there is someplace else I am supposed to look for the reason, I beg that somebody will enlighten me. It seems to me that that would be the most important part of the debate. Yours truly, a humble novice, X. Hismarck

P.S. I wrote the last paragraph and somebody else wrote the one before. I'm sorry, but Wikipedia can be very confusing at times. Shouldn't there be some automatic separation between individual responses so readers do not confound them? - X. Hismarck

Proposals concerning the content of the article

If this side isn't deleted, it will need a lot of work. For one, there are far too many links, common policy is to only have five links. We should go through the mentioned articles and look what can be integrated in the text, and what is too long to be integrated and thus must stay linked. I think it would be nice to have a photo of him, too - if there are public domain photos of him available. Sceptic Watcher 13:34, 21 November 2006 (UTC) Photo available for public use: http://www.normalbobsmith.com/hatemail225_me.jpg

I have worked on this side. If it isn't deleted, it should be more suitable now. Sceptic Watcher 13:50, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

I've made some changes to make it less arbitrary and more factual... what do you think?

Thank you, this is a lot better than my version - it's obvious that you are a native speaker, which I'm unfortunately not. Sceptic Watcher 11:54, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Could the person who gave the link to the photo please add the relevant information? As it is now, it will be deleted on the 29th because I didn't provide the source etc. This is neccessary if the photo is to be used. Sceptic Watcher 11:59, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Using the word "clad" is silly for a wikipedia entry, in my opinion. Also, starting a sentence with because?! Wrong, wrong, wrong.--128.232.247.173 22:44, 27 November 2006 (UTC) I went and fixed those grammar issues myself. nobs 03:35, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Ref. 7,000 hate mails: http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.ListAll&friendID=16732980&MyToken=98b28bd0-0e78-44d1-91ae-6158e80ec68aML (Vacation's end, 2nd paragraph) --Djudge 22:33, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

You are correct, Djudge. It was a loose estimate but you may insert it back if you think it's worth mentioning. It seemed trivial to me. nobs 04:53, 18 December 2006 (UTC)