On Fri, Aug 26, 2011 at 6:45 AM, David Goodman dggenwp@gmail.com wrote:
I want to ask you something else. It's been suggested several times at various places that the present resolution is justified as a compromise to prevent a considerably more repressive form of censorship.
This implies that the proposed image hiding feature is a less repressive form of censorship. I do not see the proposed feature as censorship - all the images remain on the site. Nothing is removed. Nothing is suppressed. Everything remains. [1]
I am however
going to ask whether the fact that such proposals were entertained, shows the validity of the argument that we're on a slippery slope.
Are we truly on a slippery slope with 'informative labelling' with neutral language? Or can this be considered another aspect of curation?
Once you admit censorship, it's hard to limit it; once you admit POV editing, it inevitable develops into arrant promotionalism. Censorship is inherently POV editing.
Are we really admitting censorship via the front or even through the back door through the image hiding feature?
If everything remains on the site, and you and I can continue to see everything that exists just as we do today, how are we 'admitting censorship'? I have read the comments on meta, about the possibility of this opening doors to government requests for removal of content - that, in my view would be censorship. The Board resolution affirms that "Wikimedia projects are not censored." [2]
Cheers Bishakha
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship [2] http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Resolution:Controversial_content