Talk:Transsexualism/photos

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I set this up as temporary workspace for discussion, editing and displaying of images to be used as a potential photo-montage in the Transsexualism article - Alison^✍ 18:25, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

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Here is the original photo as User:Hfarmer had proposed;

[edit] Montage Take Two

Well I have more free time for at least the next month so I can figure this out. I will be taking another crack at the photo montage. I will use images taken from wikipedia articles that are either public domain or "fair use". I figure it is fair use to use a picture here under the fair use rule because I looked up the issue on the website of the US copyright office. US copy right office:Fair use. The first use it describes as fair use is "the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes," This sounds to me like it is taylor made for a situation like this. I will use images from many of the same wikipedia articles I got pictures from before except ones that have been explicitly objected to already. Since these pictures have been found to be of the community standard of wikipedia I really can see no valid reason to object to them now.--Hfarmer 18:12, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Montage the second serve (Pun intended)

This version is just as I said it would be above. With only the exception of the image of the Iranian Transsexualin the lowest center row all of these pictures are from wikipedia articles and have passed the wikipedia community's standards of quality. They are all each and every one of them in the wikipedia as a fair use. In reference to the government copywright offices document I refered ce above I claim that this is an educational not for profit work and as such this is also a fair use of each of these pictures. I have licensed the whole montage under the GFDL.

What do you all think of this one?--Hfarmer 19:06, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I think that it looks fairly good, except some of the pictures (in particular the two in the lower corners) appear to have been distorted. I would suggest keeping the same ratio as the original pictures, so that no one looks like they've been put through a fun-house mirror. --Puellanivis 23:13, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Oh god. This one is even worse. None of these pictures is suitable to illustrate an article such as this, and nothing along these lines would be considered suitable to put into man or woman. Rebecca 01:25, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Well Rebeca I dont know what to say. These are all pictures from the wikipedia. If theey are acceptable for the articles of the people they describe then they should be acceptable for use in this capacity as well.

Puellanivis, I will try to address the concern you raised and make those pictures more true to their original aspect ratio. It is just hard to get them to fit together that way.

I do have to admit that I liked the original one better. It had more people from more different backgrounds. The positioning of the pictures aslo conveyed in a way both the comonalies of being transsexual and the seemingly stark differences that can result purely due to cultural influence. --Hfarmer 03:07, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

You've got two tacky, sexual pictures. You've got one where the person's face isn't visible (is she even trans? it's a picture of the back of a hijab, not a person). And the only transman is represented by this buff caricature. That's not even starting on the ugly motif in the centre that's been poorly tacked over everything else, apparently again in MSPaint. These images may well be suitable for the articles on their respective people (how else would those articles be illustrated?), but used in this way, the product is downright tacky. Rebecca 03:26, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

The "ugly motiff" is the international symbol of transgendered persons. I found it in the article Transgender. The transman "Buck Angel" is the only transman with a picture in the wikipedia article that is about him. I want to represent ftm's that seems to be as good a representative as any. If you have ever seen him on tv you would find that he is actually a very well spoken and inteligent person who gives a good account of female to male transsexualism. The picture of the muslim transsexual is about as revealing as pictures of them get. Usually they only show a bit of their profile. But yes she is transsexual. I got the picture froma BBC article on transsexuality in Iran.

As for the rest of the pictures they came from wikipedia articles all of them. If they are appropriate for the articles they came from then they are appropriate for this article. Just which ones do you think are so darn sexual? I mean all of those pictures are pictures of attractive people. Do i have to find some fat ugly people? --Hfarmer 11:28, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm just pointing out that using celebrities probably isn't the most representative of means of illustrating an article, and that if you're going to do it badly, why do it at all? The collage looks terrible on present, and I still object to its entry in the strongest terms until and unless a) we actually use free images, rather than exceptionally dubious fair use claims ("I want this and it's an encyclopedia" is not a defence), b) we use actually representative and not tacky photos grabbed from the nearest page, and c) the collage stops looking like it was designed by an artistically retarded five-year-old in MS paint. For the umpteenth time, just because an image is used to illustrate an article on that person does not mean either that a) a fair use claim for any other usage is usable, and b) that it automatically makes sense to use it in a broader article on a group which that person is part of. Woman and Man don't use tacky pictures of celebrities to illustrate those pages, so why the fuck should we do it here? Rebecca 12:26, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

I am doing the best I can Rebecca. I am not saying this in a hostile way. ( :-| You should read this reply with the matter of fact tone with which I speak). I really wish you could at least point to (with a link) to a picture you would use for this article.

As for the selection of pictures I use restricting myself to the wikipedia is kind of restrictive as you have noted. The people who will have wikipedia articles written about them almost always are celebrities. I have also reached out farther to images available in various news sources such as the British Broadcasting company and National geographic. But by the nature of those publications they are going to publish mostly pictures of celebrities and/or attractive people.

For me to assemble this montage out of pictures of regular people I would have to travel the world taking pictures of various non famous transsexuals. I would have to obtain a "model release" from each of them giving me the right to use those pictures. I don't have the time or money to do that. Plus someone going around the world doing that could seem kind of creepy, no.

Under the circumstances this is the best I or anyone else can reasonably be expected to do.  :-| I would also like to point out that you have made it abundantly clear that you object to the whole notion of illustrating this article period. So perhaps the picture or collection of pictures that would satisfy you does not exist? I don't know. All I know is that it seems most interested parties are trying to work with me on this and compromise. One picture comprised of many small ones is a compromise between having no pictures and having several pictures.

Furthermore as it says in the US compywright office doccuments I cited and the wikipedia policy on fair use the way I am using these pictures for non-profit educational purposes is a fair use. I have written that arguement in greatl length enough times. It is the same arguement that got those pictures into the wikipedia in the first place. --Hfarmer 13:09, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Another try

Under the advisement of you all this is the third iteration of this process. I took Rebecas suggestion and removed the transgender symbol. In it's place is a picture from mideast online which is a news source. The picture doccuments a historical event and a totally free alternative does not seem to exist. I also like that this picture for the center of the composition

1) does not prominently feature anyone's face.

2) presents a very different and unexpected (to the islamophobe or just the islam uneducated) cultural context for transsexualism.

The picture of Nong Toom came from National Geographic Magazines website. I have no idea where there is a free alternative to this picture.

The picture of the transman biologist Ben Barres is also from a news source, Scientific American magazine's website. I have no idea if a free alternative exist.

The pictures that I did not take from wikipedia articles I claim are a fair use of these pictures for not-for-profit educational purposes. As described by U.S. Copyright Office-Fair use:

• The purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes

• the nature of the copyrighted work;

• amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and

• the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

That's what the United States government has to say about this matter so the issue of weather the manner I am using these pictures in is in violation of any copywright should be settled. Surely this montage passes these test.

Last but not least the "sexuality" of these pictures. As I begged Rebecca to understand these pictures are all from media outlets so they are going to be heavily biased towards beautiful people. That's just the way the visual media works. They want people to be intrigued and mystified by how such a convincing looking person cannot be what they seem. Furthermore it is the nature of the sources that are available to me that they will be mass media. Unless I go and take images from people's websites who are not already highly visible transpeople.

--Hfarmer 13:30, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

I like this picture much better, the only thing I could say could use improvement is the lower middle picture of the transsexual man. His picture appears pixelated, as if it were scaled down poorly. I think it's good, as it avoided *sigh* any nearly even remotely sexualized view of any of the transsexuals, (although I cannot speak for everyone's opinion on this matter.)

Of course none of the pictures from your second try were as sexually explicit as the picture at Woman or Breast. I totally understand wanting to avoid people fetishizing us, but Jesus Christ, natal females have had to deal with men oggling them since the invention of the oggle. The notion that we can't be allowed to show any sort of sexuality in our bodies or person is just as retarded as telling a natal woman that she can't lest she become a rape target.

Honestly, the number of people who will "whack off" to our article from any of the pictures that hfarmer has put forward is going to be significantly lower than the number of people who will "whack off" to the articles "Woman" and "Breast". I am very much against allowing some fridged person from pulling out an edit war to keep a picture that included a Kathooie wearing a reasonable dress off our page. --Puellanivis 23:04, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

I have two problems with the pic as it stands; 1) the licensing is messed up. This is fixable, I feel. 2) It's unrepresentative. Look - all transpersons are soooo passable, whereas in reality, that's so not the case. Thus, it's unencyclopedic. I can understand where User:Hfarmer is coming from on that issue, but that is not our remit here. - Alison^✍ 23:41, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

FWIW, I see nothing titillating/explicit in the above pic but then again, YMMV and all that. May I suggest that we put up a request for free/GPL pics amongst the trans WP editors here? That way, we can get representative pics (not necessarily 'famous' people - just ordinary folks) that have no licensing issues. I'll volunteer my own pre/post images if anyone likes - Alison^✍ 23:48, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

User:WAvegetarian has already tagged the image as {{fair use disputed}}. I'm going to try to update the image page with sources for each of the composite shots to see what we can do about licensing - Alison^✍ 23:57, 26 October 2006 (UTC)