Think twink

Truth is stranger than fiction. I tried to dream up Biggest Bubblebutt in the Department as an example of an award that was too over the top to seriously exist. Reality outdid me. Here's the actual caption for a young man's portrait in a Wikipedia article.

"Young and smooth" pornstar Brent Corrigan was nomimated as "Best Twink Performer" for his work in Fuck Me Raw which was also nominated for a 2008 Golden Dickie "Best Twink Movie".

Well...how else would you illustrate an article called Twink (gay slang)? In case you wonder why such an article exists at all, deletion has been tried. I don't make these decisions. Wikipedia is not censored so I coexist with this type of article, usually ignoring it until a dispute arises when I alternate between facepalms and wry laughter as I aim to apply the same policies and standards that work everywhere else.

Yeah, the caption is relevant to the image and the article. It's an outdoor photograph of a celebrity, properly licensed, that's pertinent to the subject. Could be more illustrative if we had a replacement that showed more of the fellow's body.

There used to be a different image. The alternate version is a redlink now because I deleted it from Commons. I'll explain why in a bit. But first it's worth noting that that a minor edit war and a noticeboard thread took place, along with a userblock that was not taken very well by its recipient. People get worked up about these things. I won't link to the page where this was posted, but here's a copy/paste of the text.

This is the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen on Wikipedia. A month block for restoring a free image to an article that had been there for months. What about all the other images of people on Wikipedia that are being used. Autofellatio is a good example. What about the guy in the article sucking his own cock?? Or Bear (gay slang) which features free pictures of people. I mean seriously, this is total bullshit. The only thing I'm guilty of is not knowing that a free image of someone can't be used in an article per BLP and that sure as fuck doesn't warrant a month block. You just came along and removed the image from the article, citing BLP but not explaining on the talk page or in the summary why it was a BLP violation.. so for people who don't know that a free image can be a BLP violation, how the hell are we supposed to know if you don't give a reason why. All you said on the talk page was BLP APPLIES but BLP doesn't say SHIT about images anywhere. This is a mountainous pile of bullshit because fuck, Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons doesn't have the word image in it anywhere. Total total total bullshit. And Gwernol called it vandalism?? WHEN the fucking image has been in the article for MONTHS????? Did I mention this was total bullshit??

The noticeboard discussion itself concluded that the block was too long and went into considerable depth about whether twink is a pejorative term. I had nothing to do with that conversation; somebody pointed it out to me today. The image had already been replaced at that article before I came along. I deleted it outright because, in my opinion, urgent deletion was necessary.

There's a priority of questions that need to be addressed when evaluating these matters. When the subject itself is a hot button issue people often lose sight of which questions take precedence.

1. What's the license? The shot itself was under free license and had been bot-uploaded from Flickr. That part was proper.

2. Are there personality rights and permissions issues with the image? Yes there were. This was an indoor photograph and the young man's face was recognizable, yet the upload lacked model permission. This renders it unacceptable per Commons hosting policy. I prioritized the deletion because the subject also was holding a cocktail in his hand and may have been underage.

So a significant part of the noticeboard discussion was irrelevant. The question of whether twink is pejorative really doesn't come into play until after the basic license and permissions issues have been satisfactorily addressed. With the earlier image they hadn't been, and the replacement image avoids that dilemma by selecting a public figure whose notability is a direct result of his twinkitude. So although the previous image was shirtless and somewhat more illustrative of twinkdom, there can be no question that the present model consented to become an emblem of twink pride.

This does leave me wondering about the permissions for the autofellatio photograph. It was taken indoors and I see no confirmation of model permission. Apparently it was previously deleted and restored. Although I've got lingering questions about its propriety (regarding model permission and policy compliance, not subject matter), the model appears to have reached legal majority and no alcoholic beverage appears in the shot. So I won't give it rushed handling the way I did with the previous twink illustration.

Now excuse me while I lean back and shake my head, muttering heaven help us for covering this stuff, and get on with other work.