[WikiEN-l] Human dignity

[Ray Saintonge]

Jimmy Wales wrote:

>I am curious to know whether very many people agree with me that "human
>dignity" is a valid reason for a "delete" vote in a case like this.
>
>Here is another example, and I will probably regret mentioning it:
>http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060714/ap_on_fe_st/911_love
>
>This woman (please do not name her in the email archives, eh?) had a
>policeman come to her home for a noise complaint.  She thought he was
>very attractive.  So, a few weeks later, she called 911 to inquire about
>him, to ask for his name.  She indicated in the phone call that she did
>not know how else to contact him, and gave her phone number and ask them
>to have the officer call her or drop by.
>
>Now, if she had stopped for a moment to think about why calling 911
>about this was a bad idea, I am sure she could have called the
>non-emergency phone number.  (For non-US readers: '911' is what you call
>everywhere in the US in case you have an emergency, and they will send
>the police, fire department, or ambulance as necessary.)
>
>Instead, she was arrested for abuse of the 911 system.  As far as I can
>tell from the story, she did not have malicious intent, it was not even
>a prank, it was just a mistaken call to the wrong number, and a "cute"
>story.
>
>The AP, in what I must say I personally find to be a lack of
>journalistic ethics, chose to publish her full name and distribute the
>story to millions of people worldwide.  Our understanding of the story
>is not enhanced by knowing her full name.  It is just a funny little
>story about someone being stupid.
>
>Fortunately, most AP stories vanish from the net pretty quickly.  This
>one will.  The Yahoo link will die in a few months.  But imagine if
>someone were to write a Wikipedia article using precisely the (daft, if
>you ask me) arguments that Anthony DiPierro has been using.  It is a
>confirmable story, we do know a number of fairly trivial facts about
>her, and... we might imagine... this *could* become an idiotic short
>lived meme among the immature segment of the under-17 crowd on the
>Internet, as did Brian Peppers.
>
>Should we therefore have an article?  Let's assume that we can verify
>the story easily enough.  (Maybe one newspaper keeps its archives online
>for free... maybe a dozen blogs pick up the story.)
>
>I would vote "delete, nn - human dignity".  A full explanation would be:
>For goodness sake, leave the poor woman alone.
>
This has already appeared on two separate TV news shows here.  There is 
an abiding interest in the general public for this kind of story, but 
admittedly the name of the person is not important.  I can accept the 
premise that her name should not be mentioned by us, though there are 
whole books about the stupidest things ever done, and The Guiness Book 
of Records lists strange things without end.  They do name names.

Perhaps an article like [[Stupid things which people have done]] would 
satisfy the cravings of those readers.  Few of these incidents would 
merit more than a paragraph, but anything there would need to be 
verifiable.  If anyone really wants to know the name they could always 
track down the reference.

Ec