On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 11:52 AM, Fred Bauder fredbaud@fairpoint.net wrote:
We don't exist to fix the real world - we exist to report on it accurately. Many of the things we report on are unfortunate. An IMF candidate who alledgedly raped a hotel maid, a tornado that killed 89 plus people, a terrorist attack in Pakistan and several ongoing and incipient wars, these are other unfortunate things that make the neologism Santorum pale in comparison.
-- -george william herbert
I think you miss the point. Malice can make even publication of true information about a public figure actionable. Participation of a nonprofit corporation in political activity poses problems. I'm not sure what happened here but we need to look at it carefully and evaluate our level of participation in creation and dissemination of this "word".
The word was created in its neologistic sense, propogated, and became popular / infamous without Wikipedia's help. Google was a large part, and blogging, but we really weren't.
I don't discount that Wikipedia is at times used promotionally, sometimes with negative BLP impacts, but in this case it was a real world phenomenon not something driven by WP editors. The article seems balanced to me, particularly presenting Santorum's objections in a responsible and reasonably positive light.