[WikiEN-l] Criticism sections on bios of living people

[Jimmy Wales]

Erik Moeller wrote:
> My main point is that living persons are just as deserving of
> criticism as dead ones. Unlike the dead ones, they have feelings we
> can hurt, so it makes sense to be extra careful about what we say and
> how we say it. The case of Tron on  de.wikipedia.org, however, showed
> that even dead people may have lawyers.

But I think we have many cases where the issue does not even rise close
to the level of involving lawyers but we still have a problem.

In this case, we have what I think can only be described as a
stalker/hate site being elevated by Wikipedia into a status of
"criticism" when the criticism in question does not appear to be about
substantive matters for the most part, but rather primarily about
getting attention through lurid and false innuendo.

And I think we have a culture of trying to include all information, from
whatever source.  What this means is that if you find someone in
Wikipedia about whom we have no "criticism" section, you can probably
launch a hatefilled, incoherent blog of rants ... including personal
criticism of physical appearance, sexuality, family history, etc., and
it could end up the center of a wikipedia "criticism" section... despite
having no objective merit.



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