[WikiEN-l] Is Slate an attack site?

[Daniel R. Tobias]

On 11 Oct 2007 at 02:53:08 -0400, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> 
wrote:

> The point *is* that the steaming piles of crap are out there
> and that they don't go away if we ignore them.  The point is
> that protecting our editors from harm is impossible (or is
> self-defeating if we insist on trying) if we hold that editors
> are harmed by mere mentions of steaming piles of crap that (a)
> are out there and (b) everybody else knows about.  The point is
> that the knee-jerk "attack sites bad, bans on attack sites good"
> argument is not nearly so clear-cut as its proponents would like
> to make it.

The fact is that our taboo on "linking to attack sites" is not one 
that's widely shared out in the real world.  This Slate case is just 
one of many examples.  The New York Times linked to Antisocialmedia 
when writing about the conflict that site is involved in.  The well-
respected and notable blog Language Log regularly links to 
Encyclopedia Dramatica to give examples regarding Internet memes.  
Bloggers and commentators talking about how horribly evil some of the 
attack sites are often link to them in order to give examples to 
support their points.  The "Never link to those sites... that's 
EVIL!" viewpoint is not what comes naturally to many people.


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