User:SOTO/Forum Archive/Help!/@comment-43874324-20200702151414/@comment-35218602-20200901181843

CzechOut wrote:

Yes, some slurs are awful. But we do have to balance that against the larger effort to help people understand what's going on in the stories that comprise the DWU. I mean, we're not deleting the article clown just because there's a possibility a reader might have coulrophobia. Nor are we "hiding" it in an article about circuses.

Not at all the same thing. Colorophobia is an irritational fear, clowns can’t hurt you (somebody dressed as one conceivably could, but that wouldn’t be related to their costume/occupation). Slurs are an utterly rational thing to dislike if one is of the group they are INTENDED TO WOUND. To say that, for example, a black person not liking the N word, which their enslaved ancestors were called as they were beaten, or me as a trans woman not wanting to be addressed as a "she male", is tantamount to an irrational fear of the painted smile... I really struggle to explain how this is different, since it seems to obvious. It’s like trying to explain to being poked in the eye with a kitchen knife hurts. It just... blatantly does. Slurs are purely hateful, and targeted at certain groups. Clowns are not. I feel it may be easier to understand if one is part of one of said groups. Well, there are slurs for all categories of person, but not seriously wounding ones.

I do agree with you on the topic of words like wanker and stuff, or pages like cricket, insofar at least as they’re not really relevant to the discussion. I don’t think this wiki desperately needs them, but nor does it desperately need rid of them. Not does it the clowns article, for that matter. But to equate this with slurs is simply a false equivalence. I don’t have "transphobiaphobia". Racial minorities do not have "racismphobia". And nobody has "misogynyphobia", "classismphobia", "homophobiaphobia", you get the picture.

Please, you must understand how inflammatory these pages are. I’m fine with them on Wikipedia, but on a Doctor Who wiki they are better off "hidden" under a single banner. I’m trying to come up with a snappy final sentence but honestly I’ve run out of stuff to say so I guess I’ll just