On 2/23/08, Itaqallah <itq.wiki(a)googlemail.com> wrote:
The role WP:UNDUE plays here is important.
From a general historical perspective, depictions of Muhammad have been
quite rare (User:Grenavitar/mimages). There are only few periods in which
they were actually of any significance, such as under the Ilkhanids (later
Safawids) or some periods of Ottoman rule. Undue focus upon a minority
tradition in the manner the article currently does isn't particularly
balanced. There's been a tendancy to compare this article with others like
[[Buddha]], [[Jesus]], [[Krishna]] etc. who all have had substantial and
diverse traditions of depiction throughout most of history. Such comparison
is not sensible, however, for that very reason.
Unfortunately everyone here seems more interested in arguing past you
here, Itaqallah. Part of the problem is:
On 23/02/2008, geni <geniice(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Islam is a
minority thus it's POV that you should not have or show images of
historic people is a minority so lets see what other POVs there are.
Geni, you could start by appreciating that there is no single "Islam"
POV just as there is no single "Christianity" POV or "Republican" POV
or any other tradition that you care to mention.
Take a look at the gallery for Muhammad on Commons:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Muhammad
One example of calligraphy and the rest of the images are medieval
Persian and Ottoman depictions of Muhammad. This doesn't strike me as
a representative selection. Indeed, it seems as if people have simply
uploaded as many of these sorts of images as they could find. We're
representing that this artistic tradition is the primary tradition,
when it is in reality a minority tradition.
For some reason people seem to be forgetting our core content
policies, such as NPOV, the minute images come into play rather than
text.
--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain(a)gmail.com