OpenGeofiction
I was wondering about the status of making important religious sites - Like the Vatican, Mecca, and Jerusalem. I would think it is okay to do it, but after reading some wiki talk pages about it, I am not so sure anymore.
It would be great to see a place like that somewhere in OGF.
I plan on creating one of the above if I can indeed create one of those places.
Thanks,
Zekiel
Discussion
Comment from The_Cute_Chick on 2 October 2018 at 12:27
@Trombonist2003,
I believe Peritan City (map/wiki) is the OGF equivalent to Vatican City on OGF. So I don’t think making another one is a great idea.
Other religious sites would also need checking as other mappers may have already mapped them too.
;)
Comment from lars on 2 October 2018 at 12:45
@Trombonist2003
Ascot will be the capital of the asvenism religion/culture. there will be something like a Vatikan City, with a palace and a huge Sacral (church).
It would be amazing to see some other religion capitals, but I wouldnt take the main religions, perhaps some subreligions or fictional ones…
Comment from Alessa on 2 October 2018 at 14:03
I have a few religious sites for the Mauro pagan religion, but it is a religion that I crowdsourced and isn’t a real-world one. The community rails against pinning down real-world religions in OGF. My advice: if you create a religion that isn’t real-world, you can build the site; if it is a real-world religion, then don’t build anything extremely special.
Comment from Luciano on 2 October 2018 at 16:26
Here’s my opinion. I’m speaking not as “semi-retired” admin, but just as member of the community.
Real religion does not belong in OGF. Period. It creates too many points of potential conflict.
I say this as someone who enthusiastically maps religious sites. And at the start they were all catholic churches and buddhist temples. But i have come around to the idea that these should be for “parallel, non-Earth religions.”
Unfortunately, there is going to be confusion about this - because, since we are using the OSM toolset, we are forced to use “real” religious references in our mapping: e.g. amenity=place_of_worship; religion=christian. This is because we have no choice - the real world OSM has those features built-in. We’re stuck with them.
But please. No real religion on the wiki. Period.
Comment from varnel_maiser on 2 October 2018 at 19:04
Okay, understood. I will refrain from doing that then. Thanks for the correction.
Comment from LemonKing on 2 October 2018 at 19:22
Please no real anything, right? I mean, let’s not make such a big deal about religion in particular, same rules apply for all mapping. No Olympic Games, no CocaCola, no McDonalds, no Christendom (just to name the top-4 global brands according to some survey). But using fictive OGF equivalents that mirror globally important RW things to some extent is not only allowed, it is necessary for versimilitude. A world without international religions and sacred places would be an outer space fantasy.
Comment from Luciano on 2 October 2018 at 20:56
@LemonKing - you’re right, of course. But religion feels exception in that even as we create OGF-parallels, we will end up in debates about religion, where these parallels are standing in for real religious issues. It can lead to conflict. A few years ago there was some conflict about where the “vatican” of OGF was. There have been many people who want to claim or develop a “holy land” and of course, because everyone’s REAL religions are different, they will have different notions about that. I doubt it can end well. I personally would prefer for “holy lands” and “church headquarters” type questions left vague as possible, so that no one claims it so no one else resents that other person’s claim. Does that make sense?
Comment from iiEarth on 2 October 2018 at 22:50
@Luciano I agree with the fact that religion should not belong in OGF… We need history, roots, and so much more as relating to this diary entry. I might be atheist, but for me, atheist is not the reason why I am not supporting religions in OGF but my reasons. Even though this might start quite an interesting topic (which I used to think about), let’s not get too deep into it.
-Sincerely, iiEarth
Comment from iiEarth on 2 October 2018 at 23:12
But can we still create churches, temples, monasteries, etc?
Comment from Alessa on 3 October 2018 at 02:39
I am of the belief that we need common-use facilities for the realism of the map. This would include churches/temples/mosques/etc. along with some other specialized facilities such as monasteries, seminaries, healing centers, etc. Even so, these are more generic and not full-scale religion-wide pilgrimage sites or anything that would prompt theological discourse. Basically: keep the map looking realistic but avoid fighting about religion.
Comment from Luciano on 3 October 2018 at 03:27
I think @Alessa said it less abstrusely and more politely than I did. That’s probably the best way to look at it.
Comment from histor on 3 October 2018 at 07:32
as Alessa says: +1
Comment from LemonKing on 3 October 2018 at 10:03
I agree that no-one should make universal claims that could trigger theological conflicts. Nevertheless, sort-of-vaticans could be created if any limited number of users agree upon creating a common history for a specific religious branch with only a vague relationship to RW religion and other OGF religions. Several parallell “vaticans” or “meccas” is no problem as long as we keep in mind that the OGF religions are fundamentally fictional. There’s no need do discourage peaceful cooperation in this sector.
Personally, I would love to see an OGF equivalent for Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route network. This should be a safe topic, as even the RW Camino attracts hikers across cultural and religious boundaries, only some of whom are religious at all. The history of such a network could be left vague, but the mapping could still be detailed and exiting.
Comment from zhenkang on 4 October 2018 at 00:47
About religions, it is kinda taboo to talk about it. I once even raised the issue about where Israel (at the time even then I did not even know there is the Israel-Palestine Conflict). It is quite sensitive, and even if we want to bring in RW religion, it will be difficult to bring them in and adapt. But we can generally assume there are parallel of RW religion, such as Christianity (Christic Movement/Chriticism), Islam (Iman) and Buddhism (Idk, no offenece, but I believed there is a buddhism somewhere…)
Being a Christian myself, it is kinda sad that talking such is taboo, but for any religious debate we can do it privately, instead of here. There are other platforms, as what Isleño will say.