Talk:David Bawden/GA1

GA review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch

Nominator: Darth Stabro (talk · contribs) 17:47, 15 January 2026 (UTC)

Reviewer: Dizzycheekchewer (talk · contribs) 01:15, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

Hello, I will review this article Dizzycheekchewer (talk) 01:15, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

• Well-written
  • Clearly, concisely written without too much unlinked jargon.
  • No issues with Lead, Layout or Words to Watch MOS.
    • There are a couple MOS:SEAOFBLUE instances in the last paragraph of the claimed papacy section
• Verifiable with NOR
  • Spot-check on sources is good, with information matching up. Every paragraph is properly sourced in-line, with most individual sentences properly in-line cited as well.
  • No original research, Earwig is a low 11.5 with matches primarily being proper names or very short phrases, no copyvio
    • Not a huge fan of the cites to the funeral home obituary or the tweets, but I think it provides information that is uncontroversial + is not being reinterpreted here and is therefore acceptable, per WP:PRIMARY
• Broad in its coverage --->
  • While much of the article is broad without any major digressions, I did feel like I was missing something. I think it needs a paragraph or so about how Bawden was received by Catholics. I was surprised for example how the Catholic magazine sources (The Lamp, First Things) treated him pretty even-handedly as someone who's being heretical. I saw one source saying he was more of a schismatic than an apostate, but Idk if that's the standard RS view. Either way, some more clarity on how he's viewed would help.
• Neutral
  • I think the needle is threaded nicely here on NPOV. I would worry about lending too much legitimacy to someone who is a fringe figure, but I don't think it does so in a problematic way here.
• Stable
  • No edit wars or recent upheaval
• Illustrated
  • Photos are good, though I find it a little odd that they are the only uploads for their respective accounts. For the main profile photo, it is definitely the work of the user Phillip DeSlippe at the very least.

Overall, only the one issue pops up to me as far as GA, so it can pass once addressed. Dizzycheekchewer (talk) 02:18, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

Hi Dizzycheekchewer, unfortunately there is a real lack of good secondary meta-coverage on how people reacted to Bawden.

Regarding the photo - To clear all doubt, I personally messaged Mr. Deslippe on X to ask him if he'd consider uploading the photo to Commons, and the uploader of the photo of his funeral is a personal friend of mine who was in attendance at the funeral and I can vouch for its authenticity of license as well. ~Darth Stabro^{Talk • Contribs} 14:45, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

I've reviewed the sourcing and concede the point. I think that you could add something along the lines of, like from the Bulwark source "he was referred to as "the best-known American claimant to the papacy" before Leo." or per the obituary in the Lamp "Antipope Michael’s theological opinions were frequently less extreme than those of many ordinary tradition-minded parish priests." I.e. something to give us a sense of him in the world of Catholic doctrine/antipope milieu. But I won't hold up GA for it as everything else is in order and there are only really the stray sentences here and there in the sourcing, so it's not really unbalanced.

Either way, thank you for confirming the funeral photo and reaching out to Mr. DeSlippe. X being what it is, I also won't wait for them to reply in case they never do/don't see it. If they do reply and say they denied uploading it themselves, please do remove the photo or change it to Fair Use. Otherwise, nice job on this article! Fascinating stuff. Dizzycheekchewer (talk) 15:26, 6 June 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.