On 09/04/07, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
On 09/04/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
A request for all those advocating a new policy of opt-out for some biographies:
I'm seeing no-one addressing the issue of Neutral Point Of View, previously a core policy of Wikipedia. Could those of you advocating a new policy please detail your understanding of how we can be sure this won't damage neutrality?
NPOV is a matter of article content, surely? By not having an article we simply don't cover that topic, not implicitly cover that topic non-neutrally...
Indeed, to expand on this, there are some people who we pretty much *cannot* cover neutrally - those whose "notability", such as it is, revolves around one small scandal. They are a private figure and only rose to media attention the time they were caught in flagrante with a hamster, so there is nothing else we can write about them, and we end up with
"Joe Blow (b. 1963?) is an American civil servant, living in Kansas and employed as a tax analyst in 1992. In that year, he became prominent for screwing a rodent.<ref>...</ref> {{stub}}"
I mean, how do we make that neutral? How do we avoid "undue weight" on their one and only moment of fame? It's a serious question.