Essay talk:Women

Do we need to quote the whole of a misogynist troll's edit? Some things are better left deleted (in my opinion). weaseLOId~ 09:35, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

I quoted the whole thing partially out of laziness and partially because, for me, the whole thing is so ignorant that there is no part which does, or does not, deserve ridicule. I'm more than happy for you, or anyone else, to edit as they feel fit. Silver Sloth 11:30, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

I was thinking more along the lines of deletion. weaseLOId~ 12:20, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

Pink said "...how is that any different from claiming *men* are superior?"

Well, it's TRUE, for starters. And I'm saying that tongue-in-cheek, but only partly. Tell you what; when a third of men have to experience sexual assault at the hands of women (usually women they know and trust), when women start to load up on the largely defensive weapon of gun and shooting up the local campus, when women maintain economic systems that pay men less and expect them to work just as hard and raise the kids, I'll take it back...PFoster 12:00, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

I appreciate your concern, but statistics like that don't translate into generalisations like "women are better". The rate of literacy in Georgia is nearly 100%, ahead of any other developed country in the world, but this doesn't mean we can say "Georgians are smarter than anyone else". Just my two cents, as they say.

Also, a person who doesn't "maintain economic systems" is called a corpse. Pink_(:)) 12:08, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

Literacy has nothing to do with intelligence. Rape and assault have a lot to do with moral goodness. And if you don't like "maintain economic systems, read "perpetuate economic injustice." PFoster 12:12, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

Isn't it cute how people think that sexism doesn't count if it's making sweeping generalisations about men. Harmonic wisest Phantom! 16:29, 28 February 2009 (EST)

Yeah because bigotry against men is okay to many people.TheDarkMaster2

Nominated for deletion

Nominated for deletion under Don't feed the Troll policy. We only have this article because of a mysoginist troll. At present it consists of the troll's post in its entirety (which is not really in the spirit of Don't feed the Troll), plus a finishing sentence about equality which is provoking a minor sex war / edit war (see above). A RationalWiki article on women could certainly be written, but a large unattributed quotation from a nobody isn't really a great way to do it, and we don't have to fill the space just because a troll decides to create a sexist article here. I say either delete or write something from scratch. weaseLOId~ 12:32, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

I agree.--Bob^{bing up} 12:53, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

Me three. PFoster 12:55, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

I concur with deletion. I was thinking that the "drive-by" template could be added, but this thing is just trash and should never even have been moved to essay. If anyone cares to save the troll's silliness, put it in a wandalism subpage... but why bother, it's not even funny. ħuman 14:06, 4 November 2008 (EST)

The reason I resurrected this in the first place was to get Fall down to stop vandalizing. He was vandalizing various pages repeatedly in order to protest this page's deletion, and he was proceeding to burn through every IP on Tor to get around our blocks. He'd used a dozen IPs by the time I got him to stop. While I don't like the idea of letting him hold us hostage, I also don't like how a single unblockable troll managed to grind our other efforts to a halt while we worked to revert his vandalism. I dislike both options, so I'll let you all pick your poison. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 21:37, 4 November 2008 (EST)

No real reason to delete. Orphan it and forget about it. It's not clever enough to do any harm.--Tom Moore^{fiat justitia ruat coelum} 22:27, 4 November 2008 (EST)

Harmless enough if it slowed down/stopped some idiot. We should slap the driveby template on it, though. And revert the essay template to its older version. ħuman 22:40, 4 November 2008 (EST)

DELETE. it's hate speech, pure and simple. No reason to clog up our tubes with it. PFoster 16:17, 7 November 2008 (EST)

DELETE

TOAST

^{and butter} 16:31, 7 November 2008 (EST)

It's pretty inane. I'm relaxed with leaving it to gather dust as an essay, I've think (though I could be mistaken) that we've got a got a few others which are equally bizarre. I seem to recall that one of the reasons that essay was created was to allow people to write articles which don't fit the consensus - though the last time I tried to source that I couldn't. On the other hand RA's comment above sort of suggests that the user tried to hold us hostage to keep the article alive. Which would seem like a good reason to delete it.--Bob^{bing up} 16:36, 7 November 2008 (EST)

RETAIN with a driveby template. No need to start deleting essays that we disagree with just yet. If we get a flury of them then fine but otherwise lets just let the inanity of the work and the views held speak for themselves.--Damo^Hi 17:12, 7 November 2008 (EST)

DELETE. Would we keep it if it were racist? Probably not. Corry^{Then there's me. The joker. The goofball. The magician.} 17:15, 7 November 2008 (EST)

DELETE. It's of no interest to anybody but FallDown, who's only showed up twice & might not reappear again for a long while. Meanwhile it's quite a dubious thing to have around on our site. I had a look at other drive-by essays & they're mostly just harmless stuff like arguments for believing in God & suchlike; not stuff like this. It's not a big deal but I'd be quite happy to send this back to unmarked grave. We don't give in to Fred who shows up every day, so why give in to FallDown who's only showed up a couple of times? weaseLOId~ 17:28, 7 November 2008 (EST)

& If FD does pull the same stunt again, we could always restore it again & then delete it again after he's gone. :-) weaseLOId~ 17:30, 7 November 2008 (EST)

(ECx2)I believe a precedent was set here: Essay_Talk:Women If we want to overturn that precedent, fine but at least be aware that we are changing a policy.--Damo^Hi 17:32, 7 November 2008 (EST)

What? weaseLOId~ 17:35, 7 November 2008 (EST)

Sorry I meant here : Essay_Talk:Atheists_cannot_understand_the_true_God

I don't think it's quite the same. The 'atheism is wrong' essays can just be pushed to one side & ignored. Whereas if we got left with a racist essay, I think we would delete it without question. A sexist essay isn't quite as bad as a racist one, but I think it's quite a lot worse than a pro-religion one. weaseLOId~ 18:05, 7 November 2008 (EST)

I understand the distinction you are trying to draw; one essay is potentially offensive whilst the other is merely stupid and badly written. However, scanning through the discussion on the above page where this type of situation was first considered, from my reading we more or less said that essays were beyond reproach and should be left that way, though drive by templates can be used. For example AKJeldsen made this comment that to me seems representative of the community decision:

This seems like it would set a dangerous precedent. It has always been policy that users could write whatever the hell they wanted in Essay space without interference, and I think we should be very careful with changing that policy.

I see that it has been deleted, I disagree with that decision, but nonetheless we must be clear as to why we are deleting it. We have always said we support free speech, even by idiots. I agree that this is hardly a fine piece of written prose, and potentially offensive, but I do believe the best way to deal with it is to put a disclaimer at the top, saying that it is not reflective of the opinions of RW and to just leave it alone. --Damo^Hi 20:10, 7 November 2008 (EST)

This wasn't written in essay space. It was written as an article & as such was not protected from others editing or deleting it. It only got moved to essay space after Fall Down went on a vandalism spree & insisted that it be restored. I think that it was a mistake to restore it, but we should remember that it started out as an article. weaseLOId~ 06:48, 8 November 2008 (EST)

DELETE, I will not take misogynist crap any longer. I've had to deal with that enough (****ing Bible Belt), a Rational place should not play host to such. ^{— Unsigned, by: InaVegt / talk / contribs}

DELETE - Where's SusanG when we need her? Totnesmartin 05:21, 9 November 2008 (EST)

We have always said we support free speech, even by idiots.

Yes. But free speech by racists and misogynists is another thing altogether. I have no problem with allowing essays that promote religion, or creationism, or timecubes. But I would have nothing to do with a website that gave space to the promotion of the hatred of any particular group of human beings--even if it consigned those views to the margins and put up all sorts of templates disavowing those views. It stays, I go. PFoster 20:16, 7 November 2008 (EST)

Hmm, why would you let this ridiculously poorly written "essay" bother you in the slightest? --Damo^Hi 20:25, 7 November 2008 (EST)

Just being a drama queen. PFoster 20:33, 7 November 2008 (EST)

Indeed. Anyway it seems the mob has spoken and it appears the "essay" is gone for good now. I don't think we have to worry about losing you just yet.--Damo^Hi 20:53, 7 November 2008 (EST)

Re, the header line here. Yes, we support free speech, but we don't promise every bigot on the planet a place to spew hatred. Keep in mind this was originally posted as an article in the mainspace. We moved it to "essay" - it wasn't written as one. Except for RA's note above as to why that happened (quiet down the troll), it would have been simply deleted or overwritten. ħuman 22:24, 7 November 2008 (EST)

That distinction is the only reason why I haven't restored it. I trust that if someone else does decide to write an absurd amount of misogyny as an essay, it won't be deleted just because it offends someone. The essence of rational decision-making is input and discourse of all kinds.--Tom Moore^{fiat justitia ruat coelum} 01:08, 8 November 2008 (EST)

link

[1] - Just in case you have not seen it, this link might be of use in deciding the pages fate. -- Icewedge // talk 01:47, 6 November 2008 (EST)

Nice work, Icewedge. Where the hell did you pop up out of to save the day? PS, everyone else, this is where our troll brags about writing this dreck. ħuman 01:11, 8 November 2008 (EST)

I was just checking the Google results for "RationalWiki" over the last 24 hours and came up with that very interesting link, thought you guys might want to know. Seems I missed the best of the drama however. -- Icewedge // talk 01:47, 6 November 2008 (EST)

You may have "missed the drama", but you also provided the most fascinating reality-check on it. One more, Icewedge pwns. ħuman 03:26, 8 November 2008 (EST)

late to the discussion bu I've had a look at that site Icewedge found, they appear to be a misogenyst, right wing, mob who should be treated with contempt.

TOAST

^{and butter} 06:45, 8 November 2008 (EST)

This is why the essay mustn't be restored. Freedom of speech is all very well, but if people are posting content just to troll us & "try to take down this place", we don't have to put up with it. weaseLOId~ 06:54, 8 November 2008 (EST)

Fun?

Now that the "essay" has been re-created, it seems to fit better in the Fun namespace than Essay (presumably, same applies to the Men page it links to). What say you? --Kels 00:28, 8 November 2008 (EST)

No, I think now it really deserves deletion. It's just junk... If either were actually funny in any way whatsoever, I'd agree. ħuman 01:06, 8 November 2008 (EST)

Do we need a Garbage namespace?  Lily ^{Ta, wack!} 05:51, 8 November 2008 (EST)

Women

I'm writing it.--Tom Moore^{fiat justitia ruat coelum} 01:10, 8 November 2008 (EST)

I hopes it will not only be teh funny but teh smart too :) Will there be a complementary version at "men"? ħuman 01:17, 8 November 2008 (EST)

I haven't studied them as much, but maybe.--Tom Moore^{fiat justitia ruat coelum} 01:27, 8 November 2008 (EST)

If one is "interested" in les "women", it is equally important to study les "men", eh? ħuman 03:28, 8 November 2008 (EST)

Nope, not my field. I specialize in H. sapiens vaginus.--Tom Moore^{fiat justitia ruat coelum} 05:54, 8 November 2008 (EST)

Rebuttal

I do feel a little uncomfortable just deleting this essay, so I'm preparing a side-by-side rebuttal. Thoughts on letting this back out into the world? Also, any help would be much appreciated. --מְתֻרְגְּמָן וִיקִי ^{שְׁלֹום!} 04:58, 8 November 2008 (EST)

If you want to put it up, put it up. I don't think even the proponents for its original deletion will have a problem with replacing it with a point-by-point.--Tom Moore^{fiat justitia ruat coelum} 05:54, 8 November 2008 (EST)

If you do this I think you should make a mention of how and why the article/essay came into this world, and why you decided on the side by side.--Bob^{bing up} 10:52, 8 November 2008 (EST)

"I do feel a little uncomfortable just deleting this essay" - it's not an essay - it was written as a mainspace article - how would you feel about it if you came across it in that "format"? Would any of it survive? I repeat, it's not an essay, it's just drive-by bigotry. Of course, as an example of such bigotry, we can "refute" it as a project, although there might be "better" examples of misogyny out there to work with... ħuman 13:42, 8 November 2008 (EST)

"Methinks he doth protest too much" Carptrash 20:24, 8 November 2008 (EST)

Human thinks too complicated. "Garbage goes in the garbage can" is much more precise. Oh, and it's Shakespeare. --Kels 21:47, 8 November 2008 (EST)

I have no idea what just happened. :) ħuman 23:11, 8 November 2008 (EST)

Not to worry Hman. It was not aimed at you. Tho, (more Shakespeare?) Who the cap fits, let dem wear it. Carptrash 12:14, 9 November 2008 (EST)

Given that it wasn't written as an essay originally, but as a mainspace article, I retract my objections to its deletion. --Damo^Hi 23:16, 8 November 2008 (EST)

Hindsight is a wonderful thing and it's clear now that we gave ourselves this problem by moving it into essay space. Essentially we gave this trash protected status by moving it to essay. And then tortured ourselves over what we should do with a protected item. The moral should be "Take care with unilateral moves to essay". Perhaps we should move weird stuff to "fun" in future where it is guaranteed no protection.--Bob^{bing up} 03:03, 9 November 2008 (EST)

A good idea. I think it would actually be wise to make it general policy that only the writer of an article should put it in the essayspace.--Tom Moore^{fiat justitia ruat coelum} 09:45, 9 November 2008 (EST)

Is this still going on?? I don't think "fun" would be a good place to put anything as hateful as this. I don't see why deleting this has been made into such a big deal. It's in the nature of a wiki. Wikipedia says somewhere that if you don't want to see your contributions changed or deleted, then you shouldn't post, & the same goes for RW or any other wiki. Now if this was an essay by a respected editor, then yes we would keep it around. Since it was an 'article' by a known vandal who has shown absolute contempt for this site & whom we now know was putting it here deliberately to subvert RW, why have any qualms about deleting it? Writing a rebuttal is all very well if anybody really wants to, but we shouldn't feel obliged to sit down & analyse every piece of crap that comes our way. I wouldn't have said this piece was worth the effort of a refutation. weaseLOId~ 09:58, 9 November 2008 (EST)

OK. But in that case we should say something like "Essays which are overtly racist, sexist or clearly offensive in other ways may be deleted." We already make some provision of this type for user pages. I'm not saying this is a good idea, only pointing our that if we are to do this then we all should (or the majority should) agree that it's the way to go. And I also think that unilateral moves to essay should be avoided.--Bob^{bing up} 10:33, 9 November 2008 (EST)

OK, looking at the history, the fact that we made this essay out of his article justifies its deletion. HOWEVER Bob's comment above is an important point, and one which I think we should have a large, hurtful debate over, in which several users threaten to leave. --מְתֻרְגְּמָן וִיקִי ^{שְׁלֹום!}

No problem. I'll start it off with:

What B.S.!!!!! Terms such as "clearly offensive" are just more code words to be deciphered as " in my opinion " and I am already holding my breath and starting to turn blue.

That should keep the ball rolling. Carptrash 12:24, 9 November 2008 (EST)

I agree it's debateworthy. So I've started one here. weaseLOId~ 12:36, 9 November 2008 (EST)

Deleted.

The graveyard thing means it's one revert away from coming back. This essay is disgusting and has no place here. We can do better. PFoster 23:07, 24 November 2008 (EST)

And one revert away from going away again. Also, artikl can be written over it. Well, not in "essay", though I guess anyone could. ħuman 00:00, 25 November 2008 (EST)

One revert by a sysop when it's deleted, no? At least the fucktard who put it here can't bring it back, or any random bunchanumbers editor. PFoster 00:02, 25 November 2008 (EST)

What I meant is that is some idiot reverts it to the ugly version, any editor can easily undo said revert. And I think the odds are low of such occurring. ħuman 01:11, 25 November 2008 (EST)

Protect buried pages? - User $\pi$ 02:03, 25 November 2008 (EST)

Another option is to delete the essay, then put the buried template on it. It would mean the essay could only be viewed by sysops, using the view deleted edits function, but that's most of us anyway (& noobs here don't need to be exposed to this stuff), + it would stop FallDown linking directly to the buried version of this, as he is currently doing on his user page, which kindof defeats the object of burying it. weaseLOId~ 07:29, 25 November 2008 (EST)

I'm always in two minds about restricting things to sysops. But since the position is given out to anyone it probably doesn't matter. The thing is, we have the clear "burried" template, the "you're a tool" template on the usertalk and userpage. I think anyone with half a brain will know that this is one moron using rational wiki as a platform for spouting shit, it's quite clear. Otherwise, we do run the risk of burning the evidence and censoring people, which isn't good. I don't want to add a slippery slope argument to it, but it's clear that, in the mobocracy, as soon as it's been done once, the second time is much easier. ArmondikoV^postate 07:35, 25 November 2008 (EST)

We seem to be spending a lot of time squabbling about an essay we disagree with but can't agree what to do with it, so here is my thoughts. What would Andy do with an essay posted on Conservapedia he disagreed with? That should give us a launching point from what not to do with it. - User $\pi$ 07:43, 25 November 2008 (EST)

I don't think what Andy would do should influence us either way. I also don't think censoring people is much of issue when they're people who have complete contempt for the site & only come here to try & subvert it. It feels a like we've already opened a can of worms with the Buried template, & I'm starting to regret it. E.g. We've implicitly sent the message to FallDown that we will host his shit in some form, so he's written another offensive essay (anti-gay, pro-pedophilia) in his user space. What do we do with that? Drive-by tag it, bury it or just ignore it? We're probably gonna get more trolls as the site profile grows, so we need to take a line on what we do with this stuff. weaseLOId~ 07:57, 25 November 2008 (EST)

I can't believe you guys have been nattering on about this obvious troll for the better part of a month now. Some mobocracy we are. All the other mobs must be laughing at us. I've excercised my awsum powahz to get rid of it. If you don't like it, go throw bricks at something. --AKjeldsen^{Cum dissensie} 10:30, 25 November 2008 (EST)

Remember that the first restor was commented "to bury it, as per new experimental process". If people think that said experiment has failed, then by all means kill it. ArmondikoV^postate 10:40, 25 November 2008 (EST)

A compromise

Whilst I am fundamentally against the suppression of free speech in any form, I can see a lot of people are upset about this essay. I propose we do a "deep bury". Delete the page but leave a template saying that it is available on request from a sysop. Would people be happy with that? - User $\pi$ 23:23, 25 November 2008 (EST)

Interesting. I might join the New Movement as described. As far as free speech - 1. it ain't free, and 2. any moron can make their own website to promote garbage, and 3. see 1. We pay for this microphone (god I love that line) ħuman 01:03, 26 November 2008 (EST)