[WikiEN-l] Wikipedia as moral tool?

[Delirium]

Fred Bauder wrote:

>>It is impossible to know which bits of information cause damage it is
>>impossible to quantify the damage and again impossible to quantify the
>>good.
>>    
>>
>
>It's not at all impossible. Detailed information about private people is harmful. Even excessively detailed information about public figures. publishing private phone numbers of celebrities is an obvious pain in the ass. We don't need to know if George Bush has Herpes. People have a right to live without a spotlight turned on them. Likewise detailed information about how to kill people is rather obviously harmful. None of the statements you made are true. Rough approximations may be arrived at with respect to all 3.
>  
>
The rough approximations vary widely according to cultural norms, 
though, which poses quite a problem for Wikipedia since we're an 
international enyclopedia, rather than situated in any one culture.  We 
don't need to know if George Bush has Herpes, perhaps; do we need to 
know that FDR had polio?  The consensus for many years was that this was 
private information that would be inappropriate to publicize against his 
wishes.  However, more recently, it's been mentioned more widely, and we 
mention it in our own article.  There are probably still people who find 
that distasteful, but what are we supposed to do about that?

I think that we can probably all agree on the extremes (e.g. home phone 
numbers), but it gets murky quickly past that.  For example, some 
countries prohibit publishing the names of various categories of alleged 
criminals, or various categories of alleged victims, whereas other 
countries' press does so routinely; which standard do we follow?

-Mark