Conservapedia:Difference 7 - No Obscenity
From RationalWiki
| “ | 7. We do not allow obscenity, while Wikipedia has many entries unsuitable for children. Wikipedia has pornographic images, without meaningful warning.[1] | ” |
Modern conservatism and pornography has a long history, Conservapedia is no exception. Its distrust and distaste for naked bodies, bodily functions and facts of reproduction run deep. As a resource for homeschooled children, it would be wrong to complain about Conservapedia's policy on adult content, and thus its stance towards it is one of the more respectable and sensible views. That said, however, this is set under "differences with Wikipedia" and we can certainly poke holes in that...
[edit] Wikipedia and naughty pics
Wikipedia, is, of course, not a children's encyclopedia and never will be - for this, there is a cut-down version of the site's content entitled Wikipedia Selection for schools. The main site itself does have "adult" themed articles, but then what self-respecting information repository wouldn't feature such things?
Wikipedia does, however, have specific optional instructions for people who want potentially offensive images gone. And even then, it uses "pornagraphic" images on articles directly relevant to the image; for example the articles on Masturbation and BDSM contain numerous pictures illustrating the subject matter, often in great detail. I.e., you'd have to go looking for them in the first place, and if you're typing "fisting" into the search, you're quite likely to know what you're going to get. But if you define "porn" as something that arouses someone, this can only mean that Conservapedians have very low expectations for their own smut.
[edit] Hypocrisy
Like when anyone tries to regulate or moralize, hypocrisy is inevitable. Saying "pornography" in Conservapedia is evil. Saying "Pornography is evil!", on the other hand, is perfectly acceptable, because it's in line with the ideology of the site - no matter if the kids start to wonder what this "pornography" thing even is, anyway. Saying "We do not allow obscenity, while Wikipedia has many entries unsuitable for children. Wikipedia has pornographic images, without meaningful warning" is even more wholesome and child-friendly, because it exposes the obvious Liberal Values of Wikipedia. This is only in line with other ways Conservapedia expresses itself, it will feature page upon page about how an abortion will give you breast cancer, but will not dare reveal how you actually get pregnant in the first place, and it espouses the evils of homosexuality while barely touching upon the subject of what it actually involves.
One need only look at CP's entry for Silent Scream to see how "family-friendly" Conservapedia claims to be. Casual users should be warned, the links from the Conservapedia site are not family-friendly (as the first page on one of the links clearly states). If a "family friendly" encyclopedia linking to something that it specifically calls not family friendly isn't hypocrisy, then nothing is.
One can also examine their entire compendium of knowledge on all aspects of human reproduction. As the fourth difference - "conciseness" - showed, this is somewhat concise on the crucial details. On the other hand, to balance things out, the wholly wholesome Summa Homosexualita proudly stands as the bastion of verbosity and butch quoteminin'.
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