2008/4/29 WJhonson@aol.com:
Saying that things in BLPs "hurts people" only furthers the idea that that is what we're avoiding. It's a simplistic approach to a complex issue.
Things that we re-report, summarize, etc in BLP's is sometimes going to hurt people. We've been over this ground before. Not only people who do stupid things (like murder, rape, etc.), but people who are mentioned nationally doing embarrassing things as well.
Our mission is not to protect people from themselves. That is *their* mission. Our mission is to rely on reliable, verifiable sources to tell the public what *is* going on.
Hiding half the world, from the world, does not help our project. It makes us look like censors.
We're censors. That is a necessary part of writing an encyclopedia. Yes, we've been over this ground before, and every single time we come down to this: we are not here to make things worse. We are not here to push out trash. We are not here to rub our own stupidity into the wounds caused by somebody else's.