-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1
Steve Bennett stated for the record:
Hi all, Just a thought in the wake of the pedophile thing. Could we agree not to ever again block people for what they are? No matter how disgusting, unpleasant, immoral etc. Such things always being at least somewhat objective, we should stick instead to only blocking people for actions.
In other words: If someone says, "I'm a pedophile", then by policy this should not be a reason to block them. If, on the other hand, they are trolling, and it works, then that becomes a blockable action - trolling.
I worry that there is a genuine slippery slope where "I am a pedophile" gets confused with "I am a terrorist", then "I am a member of Hamas" then "I support Eta" and so on and so forth. Is it not better to simply say "We do not block people for statements of who they are or what they believe"?
Steve
Don't forget, Steve, to consider all aspects of a policy, including the public relations concerns. As a top-ten Web site with some minor oopsies already on our record, we need to be careful about how eagerly we hand the media any sort of "haven for pedophiles"-shaped club to beat us with.
With that caveat, you will see a related statement come from our ArbComm ruling.
- -- Sean Barrett | She had lost the art of conversation, sean@epoptic.org | but not, unfortunately, the power | of speech. --George Bernard Shaw