On Wed, 16 Feb 2005 21:22:51 -0000 (GMT), Tony Sidaway minorityreport@bluebottle.com wrote:
Skyring said:
And guess what? If you look at what the general public regards as good encyclopaedias in this day and age, you'll see no Autofellatio, no Goatse, no terrorist beheadings. I suggest that the people who think that such material belongs in a good encyclopaedia are a tiny minority.
Evidently not, else they would be so massively outnumbered on Wikipedia that such articles would be a cinch for VfD.
That is quite an assumption. Perhaps some of us would prefer to forget about Wikipedia's seedy underbelly, have nothing to do with such articles (much less VfD them), avoid controversy and raising vocal objectors.
* For a start, it's only a minority who get involved in VfD in the first place.
* Secondly, it's only a minority who are the most "hard hitting" Wikipedians.
* Third, it's only a minority who are the most active Wikipedians.
* Fourth, editors are a minority on Wikipedia, and don't necessarily reflect the general public anyway (they reflect that section with Internet access, some free time (quite a lot for very active editors, or else less time spent doing other things), some decent level of education (certainly for many active editors))
I really think far too many people here are not in touch with reality, and ignoring the fact that their views (standing up for the freedom to have such images) are probably not shared by the majority of people - and furthermore, many (probably the majority of) people would be seriously put off Wikipedia by such images.
In all fairness, it is likely that in the world as a whole, the majority leans towards conservatism. Western liberalism/pro-anarchism is probably most definitely in the minority.
Who are we putting together an encyclopaedia for? Us or them? Are we just adding content to Wikipedia for our own gratification, and as such we wish content to be written as we desire it to be? But by and large people adhere to policy/guidelines (e.g. NPOV). That is why I would like to see some self-regulation on this issue. I do not think Wikipedians can be left to their own devices (as I've pointed out, we aren't left to our own devices. There are policies and guidelines for a reason. Without them, Wikipedia would be anarchy)
Zoney