[WikiEN-l] Jimbo on Commons

[Emily Monroe]

> Fwiw, I've long thought the presence of graphic sexual pictures on  
> Commons, and certainly in Wikipedia, does more harm than good,  
> because it means the site "can't be trusted" in the eyes of  
> librarians, teachers, etc etc.

So, in other words, it's a good idea to have rules based on what  
people think of us. Perhaps you have other reasons for thinking that  
we shouldn't have graphic images on Wikipedia, but since this is only  
one that you have expressed, it's the only one I will respond to. I  
respectfully disagree. What John Q. Public thinks should only be a  
minor factor in Wikipedian policy, NOT the deciding factor.

Sometimes a graphic sexual or anatomical image is warranted for  
educational purposes. If anything, that would mean that teachers and  
librarians should trust us more (albeit sometimes secretly due to  
workplace politics or policies), since we aren't afraid to, for  
example, have an article about a famous, explicit painting, and to  
also have that painting in the article. Should the policies  
surrounding such images need to be clarified? Sure. But regardless of  
the chanting of "Think of the children!", we need to not ban such  
images entirely.

Emily

On May 11, 2010, at 4:43 PM, Steve Bennett wrote:

> On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 10:08 AM, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com>  
> wrote:
>> On 11 May 2010 00:12, Carcharoth <carcharothwp at googlemail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Can you explain why Wikipedia and Wikimedia tends to avoid having
>>> explicit guidelines on such matters?
>>
>>
>> It's a gross NPOV violation.
>
> I don't see it, David. An NPOV violation would be something like a
> rule against articles on sexual practices discussing whether or not
> they appear in the bible, or something. I don't really see how the
> absence of graphic images changes the neutrality of the content
> otherwise.
>
> Fwiw, I've long thought the presence of graphic sexual pictures on
> Commons, and certainly in Wikipedia, does more harm than good, because
> it means the site "can't be trusted" in the eyes of librarians,
> teachers, etc etc.
>
> Steve
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l