Tony Sidaway wrote:
On 6/1/06, Peter Ansell ansell.peter@gmail.com wrote:
So we can promote things only if they are not divisive and inflammatory in American English Christian culture?
No, this is an encyclopedia. We do not promote ANYTHING.
However, if we're going to have to debate this issue thousands of times (roughly once per five userboxes removed, I suspect) then at least we can weed out the obviously absurd reviews. Such as those that should be rejected on other grounds, even if people are prepared to pack polls and vote against "What Wikipedia is NOT".
I certainly agree as far as the encyclopedia goes, but user pages aren't part of the encyclopedia proper. I say on my user page that I live in Atlanta, which isn't particularly encyclopedic, nor even very helpful for writing an encyclopedia, but I don't see any harm in it either.
I think you're using the wrong set of criteria here. The primary purpose is indeed to write an encyclopedia, but that doesn't mean that userpages must themselves meet the criteria for inclusion in an encyclopedia. I do agree that Wikipedia isn't a general social-networking site, so if they actively harm the task of writing an encyclopedia then they should go. That's a different criterion than saying they should go because they "promote" something.
I can't say I myself see much problem with people saying on their userpages what their religious beliefs are. Some (like "I'm a Satanist") will offend people, but then so do a lot of things ("I'm gay", for one), and I'm not sure proscribing them all helps the project of writing an encyclopedia more than it harms it.
-Mark