Moving Forward on Obscenity

[Brian P Long]

Hello all--

I am writing because, after mulling it over for a
time, I believe that it is time for Citizendium to
make some progress on the question of obscenity. My purpose
of saying this is not because I want to stir up the
hornet's nest again, or to start another 20-page
(at present count) topic. I am writing this because I
think that the CZ family-friendliness policy, as
written at present, has a few remediable flaws and a
few major problems. Above all, I am looking to put
forward a proposal or two to try to correct some of
these issues. Here are some of the specific proposals
I had in mind, and some of my more general thoughts.

My first thought would be to scrap "family-friendly"
as the term we use for our content policy (and,
accordingly, in the Statement of Fundamental
Policies). We can replace it with something to the
effect that, "We do not tolerate content that is
needlessly obscene," or something like that. I've
asked a number of friends and colleagues, and all
agree that in America, "family-friendly" tends to be a
code word. In particular, the librarians I've asked have
found it a particularly inept choice; apparently, there
are a number of conservative groups that harrass
librarians under the banner of "family-friendliness."

To be sure, it's lamentable that certain groups in
American life have appropriated what should be
pluralistic terms, but this is the state of affairs.
Furthermore, I think it is too vague to be really useful.

Personally, I didn't spend enough time reading the
Statement of Fundamental Policies before I signed on.
It was late, signing up was sort of a lark, and at any
rate, it was a while before I got really involved in
the project. Before Sanger starts howling that if I
don't agree with the Statement, I can leave, I want to
point out that I think there are a lot of people here
who aren't behind the obscenity policy as it is
currently written. My impression, particularly reinforced
by the exchange in the topic 'family
friendly policy discussion', is that people are more
committed to the intention than the particular
wording. A clearer policy would allow contributors and
readers to know what they are getting into.

(It is obvious from even a cursory reading of Wikipedia
that encyclopedia articles can be a fig leaf for writing that
seems obscene to most people. This is one of the obstacles
to reformulating our obscenity policy)

Furthermore, there are a number of areas where CZ
'case law', so to speak, has grown up and matured
around existing policies. Obscenity is not one of
them, and I believe that part of this is due to the
vagueness in the original policy.

Our current policy is incoherent. For one, we have an
explicit policy of family-friendliness, but this is matched
by an explanatory page (CZ:Family-Friendly Policy) that
claims we will have discussions of "sex, sex organs,
sadomasochism, etc."

What exactly are we trying to do with our obscenity policy?
If we include the above articles, we will assuredly not be
used in very many elementary school libraries! I think it's
mistaken to assume that unadulterated CZ articles will be
used in elementary school libraries anyway, just because the
reading level of our articles is so high.

There are a couple of ways we could make a better obscenity
policy. The first option would be to have an explicit,
age-oriented obscenity policy. We would want to have this
discussion in tandem with discussions about the reading level
of our articles-- cf. 'Catering for all audiences.' There are organizations
like Common Sense out there which give librarians and teachers
guidelines on appropriate material for students at different ages.
We could also enlist those teachers and librarians to help us
determine what they feel is appropriate for their students. We would
not be able to please everyone, but with some help we could probably
draw a reasonable line in the sand (aiming our articles, in content and
writing level, towards upper level high school students, e.g.).

That was the direction my thoughts took at first. But the more I thought
about it, and in particular after poking around on the website of the
American Library Association, my feelings have changed. The ALA is
very adamant about what they call 'Intellectual Freedom,' and they
make the point that though libraries should assist parents, they should
not act in loco parentis by censoring their holdings. The more I
think about this, the more compelling I find it, and for CZ, too.

At a gut level, I keep coming back to all of the literature out there that
depends on courseness and profanity for effect. How are you going to
translate Aristophanes without profanity? And what are we going to do
with Martial, or other writers of profane invective? I realize that there is
not a large amount of English-language literature with these qualities,
and perhaps this has shaped our discussion. Serious, academic
translators no longer refrain from using profanity to capture the spirit of
these works, and neither should CZ. Have some breath for beauty and
the arts!

I appreciate the concerns ex-Wikipedians have about profanity and obscenity,
but I believe it is time for us to outgrow the family friendliness policy. Happily, we
already have a system in place which will allow us to keep our
articles from appealing mainly to the prurient interest. We have editors, and
our Art History editor can make an educated judgment about whether a picture
of 'L'Origine du monde' is really necessary on CZ, or whether it would be
sufficiently true to the subject matter to gloss it in the article text. Our editors
should exercise restraint in including questionable material, but I believe we should be
bold enough to include it, unexpurgated, when necessary. Doing otherwise is
inconsistent with the ethos of Citizendium.

Thanks,
Brian Long

(sorry for the length of the post, and also the weird formatting!)

[Hayford Peirce]

Okay, let's stipulate that "family friendly" is a poor choice of words because, unbeknownst to whoever first wrote it at CZ, it is a code of kinds, sort of like "states' rights" definitely had a hidden meaning in the South for many years and probably still does.

But what in particular has led you to write all these words about a problem that, so far as I know, hasn't yet arisen? Do you have a broad agenda planned to write dozens of articles that you fear may not, under present guidelines, be allowed in CZ? Do you have friends who plan to?  If so, what is the actual nature of these articles? Or even a single article for that matter?

In other words, what is the practical, not theoretical, problem to which we need to furnish an answer?

[Brian P Long]

I am not writing because there is some hidden agenda or plan to write a bunch of profane articles. For the most part, I intend to keep writing stolid history articles. I am a literature person at heart, though, and there was a discussion a while back about censoring the poetry of a Chinese poet. It caught my eye, and also got me thinking. It was, I suppose, the proximate cause.

I also feel like humanities people are pretty underrepresented on CZ. I think that for the most part, folks in the humanities feel that there's a particular, wrong-headed kind of censorship: the kind that has historically taken place in the publishing industry, and continues to, when, for instance, the gray lady has to engage in bizarre contortions to write about philosopher Harry Frankfurt's book 'On Bullshit.'

The primary task of CZ is to write a good encyclopedia, but, in doing so, we can avoid making some of the mistakes the traditional publishing industry has. I think we should take advantage of that opportunity.

-Brian

[Robert_W_King]

Obscenity isn't always offensive, but usually it's a pre-requesite to becoming.  That's the fine line.

[Brian P Long]

Obscenity isn't always offensive, but usually it's a pre-requesite to becoming.

I'm not 100% sure I understand exactly what you mean here, Robert. My broader point is that there are definitely cases where our goals of writing the best free encyclopedia out there and keeping it "family friendly" are in tension. However the broader community wants to decide this, I think we should make our policy more explicit so that people signing the Statement of Fundamental Policies have a better idea what they're getting into.

I think I agree with you that obscenity (by which I think you mean profane language) is a tricky question, and particularly for an online community. On the other hand, I think there are a number of cases where, in context, profane language is not really offensive-- linguistic discussions of four-letter words, for example. Furthermore, there are a certain number of subjects that it is very difficult (and probably impossible) to discuss fairly without using profanity-- in this case, I am thinking primarily of literature.

There are naughty bits in the works of almost any literary figure. Going through Chaucer or Shakespeare and pulling out only the dirty jokes would probably not fit well in a good, general article on 'Chaucer' or 'Shakespeare.' (To use your words, it would be offensive as well as unfair) In those cases, we could probably get by with saying something like "Chaucer had a complex and interesting mind, and he was able to range freely from philosophical speculation to scatological humor"-- leaving particular examples out.

Figures like Aristophanes or Martial, though, are much harder to do justice to without the use of profanity. You can do it, but it reduces you to a lot of Latinate vocabulary and circumlocution. I would contend that we should ever so cautiously keep the door open for unbowdlerized versions of that category of article.

-Brian

[Robert_W_King]

Obscenity isn't always offensive, but usually it's a pre-requesite to becoming.

I'm not 100% sure I understand exactly what you mean here, Robert.

Here's my point.  It's kind of a snowball effect.

If I am writing an article, and somehow whatever it is includes the word "Fuck", I'm probably going to write it if it's not in an offensive context.  Let's pretend that Richard Nixon is quoted as saying "Fuck the commies."  That is quite controversial, but not necessarily offensive.

However, I wouldn't write that "...he wanted to [[expletive]]..."  That would be considered offensive.  Or even "Fuck you" would be offensive.

[RJensen]

If CZ includes naughty words it will automatically be baned from schools with millions of students.

[Robert_W_King]

You know, I'm thinking http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/CZ:Write-a-thon#Questions might have got us banned from some schools thanks to Christian.  (Scroll down to the naughty bits)

[Hayford Peirce]

You know, I'm thinking http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/CZ:Write-a-thon#Questions might have got us banned from some schools thanks to Christian.  (Scroll down to the naughty bits)

That's a perfect example, and one that I had been thinking of bringing up myself. As far as I can tell, Christian inserted that for absolutely no reason other than the same impulse that leads a schoolkid to write dirty words on the wall. If he were actually serious about whatever point he was trying to make, he would, like Brian, have brought the subject up in a serious way in a serious forum. As it is, I consider his entry to be borderline vandalism. And I certainly consider it to be both stupid and childish.

[Brian P Long]

If CZ includes naughty words it will automatically be baned from schools with millions of students.

I appreciate your concern, Richard, I really do. (I am assuming that you mean secondary schools here) Having done some teaching at the middle school and high school level, I strongly feel that one of the largest problems with secondary education in America (in particular) is that secondary teachers have a limited interest and competence in the subjects they are supposedly teaching their students. A free encyclopedia that is boldly written could go a long way towards getting bored, bright students to realize that they don't know everything in the world, and might spark some academic interests. To the extent that having profanity on CZ might prevent a few students from reading the site, this is an admittedly strong argument against what I am advocating.

It would also be helpful if we could have some of the tech folk weigh in on how exactly NetNanny-type software works. I doubt that having one f-bomb on the site will get the entire domain banned in millions of schools. Knowing just how this works would greatly enhance this discussion, and if no one knows precisely how these programs work, I can do some research on the subject.

I think you're missing one of the broader points about the way schools and school libraries work here, Richard. There are some schools which will ban us if we have profane language on CZ, but there are also schools which will ban us if we have frank discussions of human sexuality. There are many, many school districts in America where having any, non-abstinence based sexual education is a politically touchy subject. (I went through school in one of them) There are schools where just about any information on homosexuality will raise a ruckus.

Individual schools have a responsibility to the community within which they're located, and teachers and librarians are advised to select their materials in accordance with local sensibilities. Schools and school libraries have procedures where parents can raise concerns about books and other reading materials. Citizendium, on the other hand, is on the internet. We do not have local patrons who will give us feedback if we have transgressed community standards. The point here is that we will not be able to please everybody; we're going to have to make an arbitrary decision, and one that will be acceptable in some communities and unacceptable in others.

Furthermore, it's mistaken to assume that any profanity at all will get us banned. The American Library Association and school librarians have been vigorous in their defense of material (novels, mostly) with profanity. If we are providing something of demonstrable utility for school libraries, I believe we might win some of those librarians over to our defense. The Common Sense rubric for library materials says that 'ass,' 'shit' and 'bitch' are all OK for high school-level readers (this is off the top of my head, but I am sure 'shit' was in there).

The more I think about it, though, the more I feel that we should hew to the policy public libraries have, of trying to help parents figure out what is appropriate for their children, and not trying to make those decisions for them. Children are funny; there are a lot of bright children who might be able to understand our articles, but who are not emotionally mature enough for our content-- whether or not it has profanity. And vice versa.

My first argument is that "family friendly" is a poor choice of words, and doesn't come anywhere close to capturing what is already our de facto policy. My more contentious claim is that there are a limited number of cases where, in the enterprise of writing an engaging, truthful encyclopedia, we may have to include profane language (and maybe explicit images, too).

Thanks,
Brian

[Robert_W_King]

Brian, I'm afraid your response ignores all realities and is largely all in theory.

[Brian P Long]

Brian, I'm afraid your response ignores all realities and is largely all in theory.

What do you mean? Most of this is based off of my conversations with teachers and school librarians? Where are you getting your information?

-Brian

[Robert_W_King]

Brian, I'm afraid your response ignores all realities and is largely all in theory.

What do you mean? Most of this is based off of my conversations with teachers and school librarians? Where are you getting your information?

I'm telling you that while what you have to say is interesting, it doesn't apply to real world network monitoring and restriction standards.

[Brian P Long]

Brian, I'm afraid your response ignores all realities and is largely all in theory.

What do you mean? Most of this is based off of my conversations with teachers and school librarians? Where are you getting your information?

I'm telling you that while what you have to say is interesting, it doesn't apply to real world network monitoring and restriction standards.

How specifically do they work? I'm not asking this rhetorically, I actually want to know.

[Robert_W_King]

Brian, I'm afraid your response ignores all realities and is largely all in theory.

What do you mean? Most of this is based off of my conversations with teachers and school librarians? Where are you getting your information?

I'm telling you that while what you have to say is interesting, it doesn't apply to real world network monitoring and restriction standards.

How specifically do they work? I'm not asking this rhetorically, I actually want to know.

They work roughly like this:  there are a ton of filters that scour sites for inappropriate content that has been pre-determined by the network admins.  And on top of that, there are real people who make decisions about what those filters should include.

So all sites aren't necessarily about the software, they're about what the mucky-mucks decide on what is appropriate or not and that is not something we can change.