Talk:Henrietta Lacks/GA1

GA Reassessment

In order to uphold the quality of Wikipedia:Good articles, all articles listed as Good articles are being reviewed against the GA criteria as part of the GA project quality task force. While all the hard work that has gone into this article is appreciated, unfortunately, as of May 13, 2009, this article fails to satisfy the criteria, as detailed below. For that reason, the article has been delisted from WP:GA. However, if improvements are made bringing the article up to standards, the article may be nominated at WP:GAN. If you feel this decision has been made in error, you may seek remediation at WP:GAR.

Article has a few issues:

• The lead does not adequatly summarize the article.
• The article is missing inline citations, especially the Legacy section.
• The "Early life" section seems more about her family background then her early life.
• She was treated but died on October 4, 1951 at the age of thirty-one.

Needs elaboration.

• Wheras "Legacy" talks about the application of her cancerous tumor, it is never mentioned in the sections describing her life.
• File:Henrietta Lacks (1920-1951).jpg needs a fair-use tag for the article.

ResMar 17:15, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

By all means delist the article if you want, but I do find some of your criticisms unfathomable, particularly "Wher(e)as "Legacy" talks about the application of her cancerous tumor, it is never mentioned in the sections describing her life." Would you care to be specific? Do you want the posthumous uses of her tissue discussed as if they were part of her life? I also think you are wrong in your assessment of the early life section; naming the subject's parents and mentioning the death of the subject's mother when she was four certainly seems to me to fit the heading. - Nunh-huh 17:33, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Defense

You have a point, but my issue stands. The article should breifly (1 to 2 lines) describe the cell line before going on about her legacy connected to that. Yes, I understand this has come under attack before, but you can't just start a section refering to something that was mentioned breifly in the openning. I recommend placing them at the very beggining of the Legacy section.

The Early life section is not actually about her early life. It would be more fittingly retitled "Family background." The section doesn't mention anything about her, just her parents. For example:What school did she go to? What was her childhood like? What kind of an environment did she grow up in? etc. etc. ResMar

In addition, several more, minor issues:

• ...which were cultured by George Otto Gey to create an immortal cell line for medical research.

What do you mean by "immortal?" Resolved my me. ResMar 00:08, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

• The couple had five children: Deborah Lacks (born 1948), who married a Pullum; David Lacks II; Lawrence Lacks; Zakariyya Lacks; and another daughter.

Shouldn't you give the name of "another daughter"?

• On February 1, 1951, just days after a march for a cure for polio in New York City, according to Michael Rogers of the Detroit Free Press and Rolling Stone Magazine, Henrietta Lacks visited Johns Hopkins Hospital because of a vaginal discharge.

"according to Michael Rogers of the Detroit Free Press and Rolling Stone Magazine" should be removed or otherwise modified because it disrupts the flow of the text and is irrelevant to the article. ResMar 18:25, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

• There is information here about how her family didn't even know about the cells until many years later. This is an important aspect of the story that the article misses.ResMar 19:28, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

"Immortal" means "able to divide indefinitely". It's a dictionary definition; insert it if you think it's needed.

Sources and attributions are not irrelevant.

As for the other objections, feel free to delist the article. - Nunh-huh 18:38, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Linked "immortal to Biological immortality. I disagree about the mags. Why are you so eager to close this? Either way, you are not the one who originally sent it to GAN; Richard Arthur Norton is. I will not close this until either he has given his consent, all of the issues are fixed, or the 7-day period expires. ResMar 18:50, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

You miss my point; I don't care what you do; using GA status as a cudgel for getting your desired changes implemented is a distasteful enterprise. And, please: if you're going to present your editorial preferences as ultimata, get the spelling correct: it's "consent", "death", "whereas" , "briefly", and "adequately". Fairly or not, your frequent misspellings do tend to diminish other's opinions of your editorial judgement. - Nunh-huh 18:58, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

First of all, let me say that you're really starting to piss me off. I run IE&, not Firefox. Secondly, have you ever heard of this? You know, the reason I'm here? ResMar 19:21, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I am fully aware of what you're doing here. What does that have to do with Internet Explorer (presumably you meant Internet Explorer 7, not IE&) or Firefox??? Or your "pissed-offness"? Your opinions are your own; if the price of disagreeing with them is "demotion" from GA, such is life. - Nunh-huh 20:08, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

You have a point; so be it. ResMar 20:05, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Failed

User has been active lately, but has yet to respond to the GAR after five days. Sorry, but I'm failing this article. ResMar 22:26, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

About time. The idea that a user who has nominated an article for GA somehow "owns" it in perpetuity goes against the basic principles of Wikipedia. - Nunh-huh 22:52, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Question about bizarre tone of this article

Before I change them, I will at least ask if there is a reason for such terms as "involuntary donor" and "sacrifice". Would it not be more accurate to describe her as the host or victim of a cancerous tumor, which after removal was the source of cells that were cultured and became the first immortal human cell line? The purpose of the surgery was to save her life from the cancer. For centuries, tissue removed during surgery, if not simply incinerated or stored in preservative after pathology exam, has often been used for medical research. In the last couple of decades there has been a cultural shift by doctors toward asking patients for permission to use removed tissue for research, as well as some increasing awareness of the profit potential for products derived from human tissue or genes, but this was not the practice at the time nor a concern. Whoever wrote the lead section makes it sound like she was cheated out of something or that the tumor was removed against her will ("involuntary"). In what way was this use of her cancer cells a "sacrifice" by her and her family? This reads like a fairly naive attempt to anachronistically scold her doctors for not following a custom of 2 generations later, but out of respect for the editors who put the effort into writing the article, I will wait a bit for explanation in case there are angles here I do not understand. alteripse (talk) 17:25, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

I think your analysis is pretty accurate.... the intent seems to be to depict her as exploited. And I think you're right that that is anachronistic and should be corrected. The wording for the Morehouse commendation should be used, if possible to describe what she was commended for, if anyone can obtain the original language: it's possible it used the word "sacrifices" even though it doesn't particularly obtain. - Nunh-huh 19:40, 25 May 2009 (UTC)