Or rather, for their parents... while sex information etc seems to have a home in the wikipedia, parents might not be thrilled at the idea of Junior reading up on anal penetration, cock rings, and other 'adult' concepts. I know I wouldn't if it was my kids... some things are just not for juvenile eyes, if only because too much information leads to very awkward questions.
The front page should have a note on it in the introduction, saying something like 'While the wikipedia does not condone obscenity, articles may contain adult concepts and language unsuitable for children. Please supervise your children's access.' or whatever...
Or rather, for their parents... while sex information etc seems to have a home in the wikipedia, parents might not be thrilled at the idea of Junior reading up on anal penetration, cock rings, and other 'adult' concepts. I know I wouldn't if it was my kids... some things are just not for juvenile eyes, if only because too much information leads to very awkward questions.
The front page should have a note on it in the introduction, saying something like 'While the wikipedia does not condone obscenity, articles may contain adult concepts and language unsuitable for children. Please supervise your children's access.' or whatever...
I strongly object against this. This implies that the concept of obscenity is generally shared, which it isn't. If you get your obscenity warning label, I want my "religious content" warning label. And someone else may want a warning label that Wikipedia may be offensive to people having suffered from certain traumas. And maybe the creationists and anti-abortionists want one, too.
Wikipedia is an *encyclopedia*. That implies certain things. If you don't want your children to learn, don't allow them to read -- that is your right as a parent. But not everyone wants children to be kept ignorant of sexual matters (or the ideas that lead to such indoctrination to be perpetuated uncritically).
Regards,
Erik
On Thu, Nov 14, 2002 at 10:27:32AM +0100, Erik Moeller wrote:
I strongly object against this. This implies that the concept of obscenity is generally shared, which it isn't. If you get your obscenity warning label, I want my "religious content" warning label. And someone else may want a warning label that Wikipedia may be offensive to people having suffered from certain traumas. And maybe the creationists and anti-abortionists want one, too.
Would you support a more generalised warning, though? Perhaps a "WARNING TO PARENTS: wikipedia contains material that some consider unsuitable for children. We would like to encourage everybody to use information responsibly".
Would you support a more generalised warning, though? Perhaps a "WARNING TO PARENTS: wikipedia contains material that some consider unsuitable for children. We would like to encourage everybody to use information responsibly".
The first sentence implies that people who want to protect children from information somehow are especially relevant. What about people who want to protect adults from information? Do we also want a WARNING TO CHINESE VISITORS: Wikipedia contains material that some consider unsuitable for upstanding citizens? There are certainly more concerned Chinese than concerned Americans.
The second sentence isn't NPOV at all, and has little meaning, because the "responsible use" is not defined -- if it is subjective, then we don't need to encourage people to do it.
What I could live with is: "Disclaimer: Wikipedia is an encyclopedia covering a wide range of subjects and as such contains material that some people may consider offensive to themselves, their offspring, their relatives, their friends, their acquaintances and, in some cases, their pets. We do not take any responsibility for alleged emotional, physical or metaphysical harm resulting from use or abuse of this great tome of human knowledge." But I think the short version of this disclaimer is to put a link on the word "encyclopedia". Which, incidentally, is already there.
Regards,
Erik
Erik Moeller wrote:
What I could live with is: "Disclaimer: Wikipedia is an encyclopedia covering a wide range of subjects and as such contains material that some people may consider offensive to themselves, their offspring, their relatives, their friends, their acquaintances and, in some cases, their pets. We do not take any responsibility for alleged emotional, physical or metaphysical harm resulting from use or abuse of this great tome of human knowledge."
"Pets?!" Would making explicit material available for cattle to watch alter the level of bullshit?"
"Taking responsibility for alleged harm." That's not what this is about.
Ec
Erik Moeller wrote:
The front page should have a note on it in the introduction, saying something like 'While the wikipedia does not condone obscenity, articles may contain adult concepts and language unsuitable for children. Please supervise your children's access.' or whatever...
I strongly object against this. This implies that the concept of obscenity is generally shared, which it isn't. If you get your obscenity warning label, I want my "religious content" warning label. And someone else may want a warning label that Wikipedia may be offensive to people having suffered from certain traumas. And maybe the creationists and anti-abortionists want one, too.
Wikipedia is an *encyclopedia*. That implies certain things. If you don't want your children to learn, don't allow them to read -- that is your right as a parent. But not everyone wants children to be kept ignorant of sexual matters (or the ideas that lead to such indoctrination to be perpetuated uncritically).
So you don't like that wording? Leave off the first sentence then. It's just my blathering. In lieu of some means of 'grading' articles for suitability (which I don't think we need) a parental warning is the LEAST we can do. MOST of the articles in the wikipedia are noncontrovertial, but not all of them, and the odds are high that it wouldn't occur to a lot of parents that this is the case. Articles in the wikipedia come up in Google all the time and while it's great for Junior to be able to find information on Golden Retriever dogs or the History of Great Britain or the Lesser Spotted Warbler, the kid can go from there to anything else in the wikipedia...
But I'm not going to sit here and argue about it. I've got MUCH better things to do with my evening.
So you don't like that wording? Leave off the first sentence then.
So it would just be "Please supervise your children's access"? No way, that would imply that we take the POV that supervision of children's learning is necessary to prevent them from looking at "bad information", something I am strongly opposed against. Children should have access to all the information they want, what they should also have is understanding parents who can explain to them what it means. Moral behavior cannot be taught, it can only be lived by example through affectionate parenting.
MOST of the articles in the wikipedia are noncontrovertial, but not all of them, and the odds are high that it wouldn't occur to a lot of parents that this is the case.
Then these parents need better education. An encyclopedia can be expected to cover human knowledge, much of which is certainly controversial.
Articles in the wikipedia come up in Google all the time and while it's great for Junior to be able to find information on Golden Retriever dogs or the History of Great Britain or the Lesser Spotted Warbler, the kid can go from there to anything else in the wikipedia...
Gasp, so they might learn about anal sex? What a horrible thought! What a terrible idea for them to be prepared when they actually have sexual experiences. The history of Great Britain is certainly a story for the whole family, what with all the murder, rape and bloodshed during the colonization.
So let's give parents better "tools" to prevent children from being informed about sexual matters. Is that your logic? If so, I don't share it, and neither do I believe it is NPOV.
But I'm not going to sit here and argue about it. I've got MUCH better things to do with my evening.
Your evening is my morning. It's 11 AM here.
Regards,
Erik
Erik Moeller wrote:
So you don't like that wording? Leave off the first sentence then.
So it would just be "Please supervise your children's access"? No way, that would imply that we take the POV that supervision of children's learning is
Don't be stupid. You know what I meant. I've had enough of this argument. Bye!
--- Karen AKA Kajikit kaji@labyrinth.net.au wrote:
Articles in the wikipedia come up in Google all the time and while it's great for Junior to be able to find information on Golden Retriever dogs or the History of Great Britain or the Lesser Spotted Warbler, the kid can go from there to anything else in the wikipedia...
If junior can go to google and search, there are more hard-core things out there than the Wikipedia. I wouldn't worry about it.
===== Christopher Mahan chris_mahan@yahoo.com http://www.christophermahan.com/
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--- Christopher Mahan chris_mahan@yahoo.com wrote:
--- Karen AKA Kajikit kaji@labyrinth.net.au wrote:
Articles in the wikipedia come up in Google all the time and
while it's great
for Junior to be able to find information on Golden
Retriever dogs or
the History of Great Britain or the Lesser Spotted
Warbler, the kid can
go from there to anything else in the wikipedia...
If junior can go to google and search, there are more hard-core things out there than the Wikipedia. I wouldn't worry about it.
Besides, if he/she lands on wikipedia after a google search, he/she won't go through the main page anyway :-)))
That's what we call "un caut�re sur une jambe de bois" (a poultice on a wooden leg)
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Erik Moeller wrote:
Or rather, for their parents... while sex information etc seems to have a home in the wikipedia, parents might not be thrilled at the idea of Junior reading up on anal penetration, cock rings, and other 'adult' concepts. I know I wouldn't if it was my kids... some things are just not for juvenile eyes, if only because too much information leads to very awkward questions.
I strongly object against this. This implies that the concept of obscenity is generally shared, which it isn't. If you get your obscenity warning label, I want my "religious content" warning label. And someone else may want a warning label that Wikipedia may be offensive to people having suffered from certain traumas. And maybe the creationists and anti-abortionists want one, too.
Wikipedia is an *encyclopedia*. That implies certain things. If you don't want your children to learn, don't allow them to read -- that is your right as a parent. But not everyone wants children to be kept ignorant of sexual matters (or the ideas that lead to such indoctrination to be perpetuated uncritically).
I can agree that if we give the parents the opportunity to block sexually explicit material, they should also have the opportunity to block religiously material, as well as other categories. Some may even want to block mathematically explicit material. In regards to my son I would keep the filters off, but I know from my involvement in educational politics that my view on this represents a minority of parents. To a large measure the issue is about the rights of parents to decide what their own children will be able to see. Parents already feel powerless about the decisions they make for children in the face of the homogenizing tendencies of educational systems. Why should we further erode that right by arrogating to ourselves the decision of what should be accessible for their children?
What I am advocating is a scheme to identify articles that "could" fall into a blockable category. Of course there will be categorization errors over just how bad some paricular article really is, but if we recognize varying degrees of unacceptability the articles will eventually get to the right place..
Eclecticology
I can agree that if we give the parents the opportunity
Please, get away from that non-NPOV "parents who want their children not to see .." assumption. If we build filters, they should be applicable for any purpose whatsoever, be it parents->children or Chinese elite->Chinese citizens.
Propose a scheme that allows this, can be kept reasonably clean and implemented in an easy to use fashion, and I'll look at it. Alternatively, root for my team certification proposal, because it allows just that.
Regards,
Erik
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