-----Original Message-----
From: joshua.zelinsky(a)yale.edu [mailto:joshua.zelinsky@yale.edu]
Sent: Sunday, October 21, 2007 05:38 PM
To: wikien-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Harassment sites
Quoting fredbaud(a)waterwiki.info:
-----Original Message-----
From: William Pietri [mailto:william@scissor.com]
Sent: Friday, October 19, 2007 06:08 PM
To: 'English Wikipedia'
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Harassment sites
fredbaud(a)waterwiki.info wrote:
The
problem is the cases in the middle. What overrides NPOV?
I still don't understand what NPOV has to do with this. A link to
edit a Wikipedia user's page is as shameful for MIchael Moore as any
excess of ours. In a way, linking to it puts him in a false light,
displaying petty bullying.
The NPOV violation here is that in the POV of some of us, harassing,
maligning, or exposing Wikipedia editors is a bad thing. More
specifically, it is seen as the one bad thing in all the world that
might merit link removal. Other people do not share this POV.
Perhaps one could make an NPOV-friendly case for removing all links to
all harassment, or maligning, or exposing of anonymous or pseudonymous
people. It would be even more clearly consistent with NPOV to argue for
a removal of all links to all living miscreants everywhere.
Needless to say, I don't think those are a good idea either. I think our
job is to give people the facts as best we can, while leaving the moral
judgments to our readers.
William
_______________________________________________
Yep, your stawmen are indeed straw. You know they are not genuine
alternatives, just debating points.
Fred
Fred, if there are strawmen above please explain what they are. I at
least don't
see any.
_______________________________________________
The statements you say are not good ideas. You are the only one
suggesting them. No one is advancing them as serious proposals. You
advance them as easy targets, straw men. I speak of
Perhaps one could make an NPOV-friendly case for
removing all links to
all harassment, or maligning, or exposing of anonymous or pseudonymous
people. It would be even more clearly consistent with NPOV to argue for
a removal of all links to all living miscreants everywhere.
Fred
That appears to be not a strawman, since he isn't asserting that anyone is
making that argument. If he has said "Fred says one should remove all links
that are harassment etc." that would be a strawman. What he is doing here is
presenting a hypothetical that would be consistent with NPOV. That's an
important distinction.