[Foundation-l] Minors and sexual explicit stuff

[David Moran]

INTERNET SEX PANIC.  That GQ article doesn't even have anything to do with
Wikipedia, so I'm not sure what your point here is, other than that
teenagers are both interested in and curious about sex, and will use the
tools at their disposal to explore this curiosity, whether they be social
media or reference material.

And the suggestion that removing certain content would make the project more
likely to be used by certain demographics of people is not a persuasive
one.  It is correspondingly true that there are many people who would more
comfortably use, or let their children use, regular brick and mortar
libraries if they could be sure that certain material had been removed from
the building.  But typically libraries do not cater to people who ask that
offensive books be removed, and I don't see any reason why Wikipedia is
different.  These are people who fundamentally do not understand what
libraries (or Wikipedia) are for.

And here's a link for you too, since you were considerate enough to include
one.

http://www.kentucky.com/latest_news/story/1011029.html

FMF



On Tue, Nov 17, 2009 at 9:40 AM, Gregory Kohs <thekohser at gmail.com> wrote:

> Here is a good example of what can happen when we set free those children
> who "have gained the trust of their parents to use the internet within
> whatever
> limits those parents (or, indeed, the minor) believe is appropriate":
>
>
> http://www.gq.com/news-politics/big-issues/200907/wisconsin-high-school-sex-scandal-online-facebook?currentPage=all
>
> So, if that's too long for you to read and consider the implications,
> there's always
> this Wikimedia image that has received nearly 2,000 page views this month:
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cock_and_Ball_Torture.jpg
>
> Or, there's this one that has captured the attention of over 2,000 visitors
> this month:
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Estim_penis.jpg
>
> I have trouble understanding how these images help "that girl in Africa"
> emerge
> from the abject poverty that surrounds her, but I'll trust you guys (we're
> all adults here,
> right?) that you're helping to fulfill that mission with publication of
> images like these,
> with little to no concern whether there are minors consuming them.
>
> Gregory Kohs
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