[WikiEN-l] Writing about sexual topics responsibly is not censorship

Sun Feb 13 21:19:28 UTC 2005

Some people have been talking about putting explicit images
of sexual activities on Wikipedia.  Still images are being
discussed just for now - but what about when we get more
bandwidth and server space?  Will some people also want to
put on actual videos of these sexual practices?

Remember - our goal is to create an encyclopedia, and
encyclopedias are not repositories for just any
information.  In fact, the goal of making an encyclopedia
is to bypass 99.9% of the vast amount of images, videos and
text that are already extant, and instead use such raw info
to construct a summary.

Our goal always has been to write a reliable (and thus
well-referenced) encyclopedia-quality article on as many
topics as possible. Not including certain phrases or images
is *not* censorship.  In fact, I get the idea that people
who are still crying censorship have no idea what the word
means, and have never been subjected to it.

Censorship occurs when you prevent other people from
writing about what they want to write about. That is simply
not happening here, end of story. I just checked for myself
- there are millions of explicit sex images available on
the web, easily found on images.google.com.  No censorship
is occuring.

Christiaan writes:
> this is essentially what the argument boils down to.
> To treat such pictures differently is a cultural
> statement in itself about that picture. This debate is
> not so much about what constitutes an appropriate image
> but which cultural point of view will prevail on
> Wikipedia. It's one of those issues where 

True, but is our task to show pornography in the name of
freedom of speech or open culture?  Our task is to make an
encyclopedia.  As such, we should have an academic and
well-referenced article on pornography and on various
sexual acts, but not host a repositary of shocking sexual
images.

> To hide or remove such an image is a statement.
> To keep such an image inline or linked is a statement.

Yes - and our statement is "This is an encyclopedia, not
Hustler magazine."  If someone wants to view explicit
images and videos of sexual acts, then freeedom of speech
already exists - there are thousands of outlets for just
such things.  But presumably people come to Wikipedia to
read a professional academic article.

In any case, our encyclopedia is useless if people refuse
to read it...and thousands of schools will ban its use if
it continues to offer pornographic images (and eventually,
videos.)  What good is our work if few people can access
it?  Even if it is not officially banned by entire schools,
many teachers will tell their students that Wikipedia is
not reliable or professional if we continue this course of
extreme sexual explicitness.

Do not get me wrong: We need not censor ourselves by
adopting the least offensive text and images - that would
be impossible.  Somebody will find everything about sex
offensive.  But we also do not have to go to the other
extreme by shoving in what is essentially pornography.

At every edit we should be asking ourselves "Am I helping
educate people by creating an encyclopedia?"  An educated
adult should be able to professionally write about human
sexual practices without being coarse, and without showing
photographs of men sucking themselves off. I hate to be so
blunt, but this is what we are talking about here.

In between puritan censorship and outright use of explicit
sexual photographs (or videos) there is plenty of room to
write a set of real encyclopedia articles. 

Robert (RK)

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