[Foundation-l] Boycott in ace at wiki

[Fred Bauder]

> I think I would accept that some language wikis decide, by consensus,
>> that they will not show illustrations of Mohammed under any
>> circumstances.
>>
>> They should not ask for a boycott of another language, though. They
>> could have a protest page with a list of users who want to sign up to
>> it. Sticking a banner on the main page - and worse; as the only
>> content - I disagree with.
>>
>>
> I totally agree with the above. I don't know why the discussion evolved
> into
> the rights of individual wikis to not show the images. I thought that was
> never in question. On the Arabic wp for example, we do not display the
> images by consensus, we try to describe in detail what's in them in
> articles
> pertaining to the subject, this seems to be a compromise accepted by
> most.
>
> What irritated me originally was the call for boycott on the main page
> and
> the fact that the template is worded to be understood as the opinion of
> the
> Acehnese wikipedia not a group of editors/admins.
>
> What bothers me also is the mention by someone above that there was a
> note
> that Acehnese wikipedia follows islamic law and anything that contradicts
> with it is not allowed. If this is true, I think this is recipe for
> disaster. 'Islamic law' is not really a solid law but a large spectrum of
> interpretation of the holy books and precedence and differs by faction, I
> strongly doubt that everyone using that wikipedia will have the same
> views
> of what constitutes a violation even within the same ethnic group thus
> it's
> very hard to call that a 'consensus' that we should respect and not
> impose
> 'western values' on. There is an argument on the discussion going on that
> wiki that all Acehnese are muslim, I can't see how they can verify the
> validity of such claim,  religion is by choice. If someone is an
> Acehnese-born muslim but not a close practitioner or an atheist or
> convert
> to another religion, would his contributions be not welcome if they
> violate
> 'islamic law' (they can be as simple as writing articles about alcoholic
> drinks) ?
>
> --
> Best Regards,
> Muhammad Yahia

Yes, the notion that Sharia controls is troublesome, as is the request
for a fatwa. A fatwa that explicitly addresses images of Muhammad in
Wikipedia either way would be kind of ridiculous and would not meet with
general acceptance. My point is that we don't need to needlessly offend
by posting images we know are not authentic.

Fred Bauder