Wednesday, November 09, 2005

Brawling WITH WIKIPEDIA



Several months ago, I did battle with Wikipedia over their article on the Minoans. They refused to allow that the Minoans worshipped female deity! “Give us an exact quote,” snickered a Wikipedia arbitrator. Well, today, finally, I got around to getting him his quote. Here it is, placed regally in paragraph two of the article:
“One of the outstanding features of Minoan civilization was their worship of female, not male divinity (‘That a powerful goddess of nature was the chief deity of the Minoans was recognized already by Evans [the original excavator of Minoan culture] and has never been seriously questioned.’ Nanno Marinatos, 1993, Minoan Religion: Ritual, Image, and Symbol, University of South Carolina Press, p. 147 [NOTE: When I tried in the past to begin this article with information about the extraordinary fact that these advanced ancient peoples worshipped primarily -- if not exclusively -- female divinity, I was told I was wrong, and that if I persisted in inserting "erroneous" information, I must support it with a quote. Thus the reference by the well-known and highly respected Minoan archaeologist Nanno Marinatos; and thus the plight of modern woman in a male-dominated world]).”

I know they’ll pitch the last several of my magnificently whiny sentences (about being a poor woman in a male world), but at least a few people will read the magnificence before it’s pitched.

Frankly folks, this foray into the land of Wikipedia has been a bit forbidding: I’ve never before gotten this close to the smelly face of the patriarchy. I could feel its grimy whiskers brushing me on the cheek. Guh - ROSS!

Go HERE, to Wikipedia, to read the entire article, which still could use quite a bit of improvement, in almost every section.
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Thnx to the American Library Color Slide Co. for the picture of the highly reconstructed ancient Minoan triumfeminate (aka "The Blue Ladies").

3 comments:

Morgaine said...

I had an unpleasant experience with them recently, too.
For a project that's supposed to be inclusive, they certainly have a lot of judgemental, biased assholes working for them.

Have you ever taken the quiz at BeliefNet? It's totally male-god biased, and when I pointed this out (a while ago) they sneered, too. Feel free to pound on them a while too, if you like.

Anonymous said...

My hats of to you.

Anne Johnson said...

Want a laugh at Wikipedia? Type in "list of opiate addicts." It's quite long, of course. Scroll to "politics" HA HA HA HA HA!

Love it.