On 1/3/06, slimvirgin@gmail.com slimvirgin@gmail.com wrote:
Tony, I agree these are a problem, but I'm not very familiar with them, so I have a question. What is the difference between having a box on your page saying you're e.g. Hindu, and having yourself listed in a Hindu Wikipedians category?
None. It is the categorization that is the problem, facilitated to some extent by the convenience of userboxes (the ease of typing {{user bigendinan}} compared to "[[Category: Bigendian wikipedians]]).
Categorization people by skill or by services provided is a good use of user boxes. But the beliefs and religions userboxes provide a handy telephone book for people interested in pushing a point of view an unscrupulous enough to spam user talk pages or contact likely supporters by email.
The categories must die too.