On Sun, Mar 02, 2003 at 07:24:37PM -0800, Zoe wrote: The article is about the slogan, isn't it? It is false and misleading to name the article "Homophobic hate speech" when it is really about the slogan "AIDS Kills Fags Dead". The real question you should be asking is: is such an article encyclopedic, and does it belong in the Wikipedia at all? I respectfully submit to the jury that such an article is NOT encyclopedic, and does not belong in the Wikipedia. Denis Diderot is rolling in his grave at your descration of his legacy. You Wikipedians would have crucified Samuel Johnson long ago, had he shown up and tried to contribute. Shame. Jonathan -- Geek House Productions, Ltd. Providing Unix & Internet Contracting and Consulting, QA Testing, Technical Documentation, Systems Design & Implementation, General Programming, E-commerce, Web & Mail Services since 1998 Phone: 604-435-1205 Email: djw(a)reactor-core.org Webpage: http://reactor-core.org Address: 2459 E 41st Ave, Vancouver, BC V5R2W2

There are really two issues here: the specific content issue, and then the issue of working courteously with others to achieve consensus. 1. On the specific content issue... "Homophobic hate speech" is a clearly necessary and useful topic, and separate from the specific example of this 'AIDS kills fags dead' example. The title [[Aids kills fags dead]] was poor, and Axel has actually gone so far as to apologize for it, although I think he didn't need to do that, since it was a well-intentioned article all along. Is the topic important enough to deserve it's own article? I think yes, it is, especially in conjunction with a more general article on homophobic hate speech. I would have said 'no, probably not' until I actually read the article and learned a couple of things from it. --------------- SIDEBAR ----------- For example, "everyone knows" that some Christian groups are outspoken against homosexuality. But I generally assume that they are _Christian_ about it, i.e. "love the sinner, hate the sin". And I'm sure that most of them are. (I don't agree with their position, I should say!) If people are referring to *these* groups as practicing "hate speech" I think they're going overboard. But for a Baptist minister to lead a protest at the funeral of Matthew Shepard is really shocking. What's to protest? He was a victim of really horrible and very un-Christ-like violence. And to compound that with a slogan about AIDS! ------------END SIDEBAR---------------- So, I learned something. I had barely heard of Fred Phelps, and I had never heard this slogan before. So, I think that the way things washed out this morning is fine. We have a short, non-political, NPOV article (I guess it could always be improved in this regard, but people aren't fighting much over the specific content, which is a good sign) I SHOULD ADD THIS HERE: I generally don't edit because I don't want to be involved with content issues *and* co-operation issues. My opinions on content are equal to everyone elses, in this sense, it's the wiki way. I only offer my point of view on this as a wikipedian, not as a "ruling" of any kind. 2. On the "working well with others" issue -- I think that a certain minimal amount of edit-warring is inevitable, but here's a couple of tips that will probably be helpful: (a) let the other person win, for awhile, and hash it out on the talk pages and (b) it should generally be uncool for anyone (other than me, ha ha) to simply announce what consensus is, in formulations such as "it has been decided" So: try to relax, everyone. And that's a ruling. :-) --Jimbo