Ken Arromdee wrote:
On Mon, 4 Jun 2007, Sheldon Rampton wrote:
(2) A presumption against publishing articles on
people who have been
victims of stalking, in cases where publication of an article on
Wikipedia might subject them to additional harassment.
For a while I've thought something like "Wikipedia is not the
creator of
news" should apply. (Probably badly worded; reword as you wish). If
creating a Wikipedia article itself helps to spread or advance
something
described in the article, we shouldn't have it. (This only applies
when
that article specifically, not just Wikipedia in general, advances
a cause.
We wouldn't delete the article for Internet or the one for
Wikipedia itself.)
What Ken is describing sounds more like a reiteration of Wikipedia's
existing "no original research policy" than something specifically
addressing stalking or cyberstalking. I think stalking happens
frequently enough that it deserves to be treated seriously in its own
right rather than subsumed under some other concept. In the case of
Allison Stokke, the young woman whose experience was the spark of
this thread, Wikipedia's article about her didn't *create* any news.
Her situation has been reported in the Washington Post and elsewhere.
Ken's policy therefore would not be particularly helpful in this case.
It's not 100% certain to me, by the way, that the Wikipedia article
on Stokke would need to be deleted even under an anti-stalking
policy. The versions of the Wikipedia article that I've seen have
have not sensationalized or dwelt on the blogosphere's sexualized
treatment of Stokke that is the cause of her distress. In fact, it's
possible that Stokke herself might be fine with Wikipedia having an
article about her, even if (and perhaps especially if) it mentions
the harassment and her objections to it. She doesn't seem to object
to ALL mentions of her. She just wants the heavy-breathing stuff to
stop. The Washington Post article on her situation states that she
has sought media consultant advice to help "get this all under
control," and it's clear from reading the article that Stokke and her
father were both interviewed by the Post's reporter. It seems likely
that they cooperated with the reporter because they hoped that the
Post's story would help put out the word that she objects to the way
bloggers are using her image. An appropriately-written Wikipedia
article might serve the same purpose and therefore might be something
that she would welcome.
To determine whether this is the case, of course, someone would need
to contact Stokke or her family on behalf of Wikipedia and inquire
directly about their wishes, and this sort of inquiry cannot be done
by the entire collective. (The last thing she needs is a mob of
Wikipedians calling.) Someone would therefore have to serve as a
designated agent of Wikipedia in making the inquiry, and I don't
think Wikipedia has a structure in place to accomplish this.
The question of how Wikipedia should handle this particular situation
is less interesting to me than the question of what policies and
procedures would help address this CLASS of situations. A number of
other cases come to mind such as Richard Jewell or the Star Wars Kid
where people have become objects of unwanted and unwarranted public
attention. Existing policies such as NOR, Notability or NPOV may not
be the right policies with which Wikipedia should address these cases
when they arise.
--------------------------------
| Sheldon Rampton
| Research director, Center for Media & Democracy (
www.prwatch.org)
| Author of books including:
| Friends In Deed: The Story of US-Nicaragua Sister Cities
| Toxic Sludge Is Good For You
| Mad Cow USA
| Trust Us, We're Experts
| Weapons of Mass Deception
| Banana Republicans
| The Best War Ever
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