Thomas Dalton schrieb: If there is an internet petition with 200.000 signatures against an image, I'd say, that it is a good candidate, don't you think? -- Raphael

Thomas Dalton schrieb: Shouldn't we start with the first step? We can always stop, when we think it's enough. -- Raphael

On 21/02/2008, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote: No, no we don't. We can decide on a case-by-case basis, by discussion and consensus among the editors of a given article, the same way we do for *every other editorial decision*... -- - Andrew Gray andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk

On 22/02/2008, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote: But we don't have a policy for everything. We can't have a policy for everything - we simply cannot reduce every editorial decision to a flowchart and a statute book. We make our own case-specific decisions all the time, on a thousand different issues of content and layout and presentation, and there is nothing that will kill the encyclopedia if our editors start making a thousand and one sometimes. I cannot think of a single time I've consulted a policy to decide how best to incorporate an image into an article, or whether I should; if it's then disputed, I talk to other editors and we work something out. All show/hide would become is another tool for incorporating an image to the best extent, another factor in the subtle editorial decision on how to construct the page. It becomes a lot less threatening if we stop thinking of it as a once-off concession and consider it as an unusual special case, like - oh, I don't know, having text in columns. It'd look silly most of the time, but sometimes we find that functionality improves the article. Let them, I say. Our editorial quality will not be ruined if articles are structured in such a way that you have to click a button to see a photograph of a clitoris on [[Clitoris]] - nor will it be ruined if you have to click a button to see a photograph of a jackdaw on [[Corvus monedula]], not that I can see anyone caring about that. (Made to look a little sillier, mind you, but then we do plenty of that already!) Common sense will stop it being applied grossly inappropriately; I can trust our community on that. Our fundamental guiding principle is that people can reach consensus on everything, can work together and produce a result, if we give them the encouragement to do so and a framework in which that's expected. Saying we don't trust people to reach consensus on applying a tool if we let them start using it... well, if we used that logic every time we allowed people to do things, we'd never have had a wiki. And if it all goes horribly wrong, well, we can get together and decide not to use it in future. But say we do have such a tag on [[Clitoris]]. Why would this be inherently a bad thing? There are no shortage of perfectly legitimate reasons a sizable subset of readers (& editors) would not want an immediately visible image on the article, which have nothing to do with prurience or a desire for censorship! Indeed, the reasons are a lot more justifiable to the general population than the Muhammad ones. The phrases "public computer rooms" and "embarrassment" should explain a lot of them... -- - Andrew Gray andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk

In 22/02/2008, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote: Yes, but we get edit wars over *everything*. There'll be an edit war, we'll reach a compromise, it's over and done with. To quote myself (because I haven't thought of a better way of putting it yet): "Common sense will stop it being applied grossly inappropriately; I can trust our community on that. Our fundamental guiding principle is that people can reach consensus on everything [...] Saying we don't trust people to reach consensus on applying a tool if we let them start using it... well, if we used that logic every time we allowed people to do things, we'd never have had a wiki." Edit wars are undesirable, but they are also a normal cost of doing business with our model. Something causing edit wars is... well, to be expected if discouraged. -- - Andrew Gray andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk

On 22/02/2008, Andrew Gray <andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk> wrote: Could you name a few legitimate reasons why we shouldn't have an immediately viewable image of a clitoris in our [[Clitoris]] article? Surely those who don't wish to be embarrassed by what they are looking at on a public computer and would feel embarrassed by looking at an image of a clitoris, wouldn't start reading an article entitled "Clitoris" on a public computer? In the article [[hand]] there is a picture of a hand. In the article [[face]] there is a picture of a face. In fact, in every article we have relating to a body part, there is a picture of that body part. Images confer information that text cannot and are very useful to explaining a subject. So, since we are showing an image of a body part in the context of education and information, what legitimate reason is there to break this policy? We are not showing the image to be gratuitous or to shock or to entertain or to titillate. The only reason to object to images of sexual organs in our context is prudishness and a desire for censorship. -- Oldak Quill (oldakquill(a)gmail.com)

Why are we so eager to bend over backwards for people who either cannot operate their web browers or refuse to do so?

On 22/02/2008, Ben Yates <ben.louis.yates(a)gmail.com> wrote: We always knew there were risks with alexandria. Argumentum ad baculum? -- geni

On 22/02/2008, Ben Yates <ben.louis.yates(a)gmail.com> wrote: Didn't somebody once make a big song and dance of burning that place to the ground? Nowhere is safe.

On 21/02/2008, Tony Sidaway <tonysidaway(a)gmail.com> wrote: We are not but you don't appear to be attempting to write the code required to get the web browsers to do what they want them to do. -- geni

On 22/02/2008, Tony Sidaway <tonysidaway(a)gmail.com> wrote: Which is why you build a firefox extension to do just that. Set it up with a simple way to download and add list of images to block could be quite popular. If the various ad blocking extensions can work so can this. -- geni

On 22/02/2008, Tony Sidaway <tonysidaway(a)gmail.com> wrote: Really? How would I block all images with the images with the text string "Catherine Eddowes" while not blocking "Wells next the sea". How would be able set things up so that firefox blocks images that authority X considers to be ah somewhat disturbing without blocking anything else? -- geni

I do not think that the utter removal of the images is something anyone in this discussion (as opposed to discussions elsewhere) thinks is tenable. The only open issue is whether we can come up with a compromise solution that makes the images less provocative without damaging the truth of the articles. But to address your specific comment, I don't feel compelled to privilege your taking offense at hiding the images any more than I feel compelled to privilege their taking offense at the presence of the images in any form. As I've said a couple of times along the way, the insistence on including the images in the main article and making sure they are visible isn't neutral; it's anti-Islamic, or at least against some very typical forms thereof. It's not that far off from insisting that it is appropriate to prefer blasphemous depictions of Jesus in his article. On Fri, Feb 22, 2008 at 9:14 AM, cohesion <cohesion(a)sleepyhead.org> wrote:

On Fri, Feb 22, 2008 at 7:03 PM, James Farrar <james.farrar(a)gmail.com> wrote: to do something that will cause disagreement among the petitioners whether this already was enough submission to the general concept of islamic law or not. Or something that will encourate them to push the line even further. I am "waiting" for a petition demanding to remove any remark that Aischa was far off any kind of age of consent at the time she lost her virginity. Mathias

On 22/02/2008, The Mangoe <the.mangoe(a)gmail.com> wrote: The refusal to compromise our policy for a particular belief is not anti-[that belief]. Any other biography article would contain an image if one were freely available. To suggest that those who wish to maintain this pattern is anti-Islamic is manipulative and provocative. -- Oldak Quill (oldakquill(a)gmail.com)

On 22/02/2008, Andrew Gray <shimgray(a)gmail.com> wrote: A compromise is when each side gets some, but not all, of what it wants. A situation where neither side gets any of what it wants cannot accurately be described as a compromise.

On 22/02/2008, Andrew Gray <andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk> wrote: That does not fulfil the demand for removal of the images from Wikipedia. And we have thrown away our principles to appease religious zealots - who still won't be satisfied. Lose-Lose. I perceive that attempting to appease the fundamentalists by a so-called compromise solution will be the thin end of the wedge, and there will be no chance of our resisting their further demands. Appeasement is weakness - I would hope the project is strong enough to stand up for the things in which it believes.

Andrew Gray schrieb: <snip/> Thank you Andrew for your effort. Unfortunately it doesn't seem like any of those zealots is willing to compromise. Appeasing the no-censorship fundamentalists looks like mission impossible. -- Raphael

I signed the petition too, and not anonymously. We should not offend needlessly. We should maintain high standards with respect to offensive material that conveys little information. Fred Bauder

James Farrar schrieb: I agree. I wrote my reply in order to point to the fact, that those "no censorship at all costs" proponents are actually imitating those "remove all Muhammad images" proponents in their zealousness and fundamentalism. br -- Raphael

On 22/02/2008, Andrew Gray &lt;shimgray(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: As far as I'm aware, we've had an image of Muhammad's face in our article for many years. A desire to maintain the status quo (which is based upon our NPOV and no censorship policy) and to stand by our policy is not "fuck 'em, free speech". If issues had been raised and we had introduced the image just to get under their skin, you may be right. Ultimately, if someone thinks they would be offended by an image of Muhammad's face, why would they take a look at an article about Muhammad on a non-Muslim website without being careful? -- Oldak Quill (oldakquill(a)gmail.com)

On 22/02/2008, Oldak Quill &lt;oldakquill(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: Yet we do have people arguing for the retention of the image on exactly those grounds (well, not in those words) *as well* as the more reasonable ones. Likewise, we have people arguing for the removal on sane editorial grounds, *as well* as the ones yelling blasphemy. On both sides, there are reasonable people and unreasonable people. My point is that if we call one position pandering to the extremists on that side, it's just as logical to call the other position pandering to the opposite set of extremists... ...in other words, *neither* position is "pandering". There are rational reasons to do either. The fact that there are also unreasonable demands to do either doesn't make picking one of them 'giving in'. [As to the status quo being NPOV... I think this is a fallacious assumption to make on a binary issue, but that's another post. What we're seeing here is quite possibly an anomalous case where our normal approach to NPOV, which is basically to smooth things out, can't apply...] -- - Andrew Gray andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk

On 22/02/2008, cohesion &lt;cohesion(a)sleepyhead.org&gt; wrote: Judson, thank you for expressing so eloquently a view that many of us share. I am not a Muslim, a Jew or a Christian. I do not want these religious beliefs--or any other--to determine what I can and cannot see. Religious absolutism has been the norm for thousands of years. We are some of the first generations to have any freedom of religion, freedom of expression and freedom of thought. Why would we voluntarily give this up and allow religion to claim absolute correctness? If this were the other way round, one would be delusional to think that religion would give non-members any leeway. I'm not trying to use "us and them" language and don't want to promote that mentality. What I am trying to say is that those who wish to believe a certain thing may do so, but can't expect the rest of us to follow suit. -- Oldak Quill (oldakquill(a)gmail.com)

Then surely there must be hundred of thousands of objections to the inaccurate (and overwrought) characterization of the "show" as "censorship". It simply is no such thing. And your use of the phrase "collective morality" is telling, in exactly the wrong way. We're supposed to be neutral; we aren't supposed to *have* a morality in that sense. Right now, anyone can see that we aren't neutral about depictions of Muhammad. I've said about what was worth saying in this. Of course, the "show" version is a concession. But what it comes down to at the moment is that making a moral statement about those illustrations is worth fighting over the issue forever. My personal view is that the article shouldn't be caught between the aniconic fundamentalists and the image inclusion fundamentalists. On Thu, Feb 21, 2008 at 5:05 PM, Wily D &lt;wilydoppelganger(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote:

I don't think Wikipedia's "not censored" policy is limited to our project; I think it represents the dominance of those who view Wikipedia as a conduit for disseminating material potentially subject to censorship. By your own words you are setting Wikipedia against the "arrogance" of (some forms of) Islam, so once again I have to say, "I see no neutrality here." I would also point out that the principle isn't really "not censored". It seems to me that we should be seeking a solution which retains the images but isn't so "in your face" about their presence. Actual censorship doesn't seem to be on the table. On Thu, Feb 21, 2008 at 6:29 PM, Oldak Quill &lt;oldakquill(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote:

It's hardly bad faith when I can find people saying it outright. But at any rate, I don't think it's a question of bad faith in that sense, because I don't think that in general they appreciate how that attitude represents a bias. On Fri, Feb 22, 2008 at 7:14 AM, David Gerard &lt;dgerard(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: