[Foundation-l] Concern for the safety of Wikimedians at Wikimania in Alexandria.

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
What is there to be offended at. When I go to the USA I can expect behaviour
that is completely accepted in my home country to land me in jail. When I
came into the Taipei airport the first message was that smugglers of drugs
can expect the death penalty.

As I stated earlier, your freedom is limited by the freedom of others. When
you feel offended by this, you can only stay home.
Thanks,
    GerardM

NB I do not use drugs so crazy ineffectual measures against drugs do not
threaten me.

On Tue, Mar 4, 2008 at 4:48 AM, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:

> Yes, and I think Gerard's "When you insist on behaving in a manner
> that is offensive to others your safety can not be guaranteed." is
> perhaps putting it the wrong way. That statement certainly offended
> me.
>
> On 03/03/2008, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester at gmail.com> wrote:
> > When the Wikimedia Foundation puts us in a situation that our mere
> > existence is offensive to others, and our mere existence in a country
> > endangers our safety, it's a good sign we should not be holding
> > conferences there. Being openly jewish, gay, or a westernized woman is
> > offensive to some in Egypt, and unless one is forced to subject
> > themselves to coercive rules and limitations that, I should mention,
> > fundamentally violate standard human rights, then their safety cannot
> > be guaranteed.
> >
> > I don't know how this isn't clear to you Gerard. When we have a
> > situation where our conference attendee's sexual preferences, gender,
> > religion, and birth country must hidden or denied, in order to assure
> > their safety, we simply should NOT be hosting conferences there. It is
> > an implicit statement that Wikimedia does not support human rights --
> > the right to freedom of religion, freedom of nationality, freedom of
> > sexual preference, and freedom from gender discrimination. It's
> > absolutely unacceptable to say "Instead of admitting that we picked a
> > stupid place to host a conference, we're going to stand by it and
> > force our conference goers to choose between their safety, and their
> > human rights." That's a fundamentally wrong thing for the Wikimedia
> > Foundation to do, but it's precisely what they've been doing.
> >
> > -Dan
> >
> > On Mar 3, 2008, at 6:09 PM, Gerard Meijssen wrote:
> >
> > > In the end it is about freedom. The freedom that is available to you
> > > is limited by the freedom available to others. When you insist on
> > > behaving
> > > in a manner that is offensive to others your safety can not be
> > > guaranteed. The rights and the treatment that you take for granted
> > > in your
> > > normal environment is not necessarily what will be available in other
> > > environments. This is rather elementary I would say.
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > foundation-l mailing list
> > foundation-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
> >
>
>
> --
> Refije dirije lanmè yo paske nou posede pwòp bato.
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>