Just how much gets filtered?

[Beholder1995]

Because in one thread, is saw the word 'penis', and was rather offended. I find it hard to believe that certain anatomical terms don't get filtered.

[The Rose Dragon]

Because in one thread, is saw the word 'penis', and was rather offended. I find it hard to believe that certain anatomical terms don't get filtered.

The word "penis" offends you? What are you, 13? :smalltongue:

Medical terms such as those are not filtered, obviously, but their more vulgar names are filtered. Penis is not a word used to insult others - the short of Richard, however, is.

There are other words that are not filtered due to more practical reasons, such as bastard, because of its use in D&D, and ass, because it is used to refer to donkeys and it is a part of other harmless words, such as "lass" or "sassy".

[Nerd-o-rama]

I don't believe formal, scientifically-accepted names for anatomy are filtered, no.

Like Rose Dragon said, "ass" is also accepted for practical reasons, but the term for the anus (and people like Dennis Leary) that uses that word is not.

Something I'm always curious about when I go to boards with profanity filters...I know "small gaps in armor" are censored, but is the phrase "spick and span"? Let's find out.

Okay, now I'm a little offended. For fairness's sake, if other racial epithets are being censored, so should "spic".

[Kosmopolite]

Well 'spic' is more likely to affect other words ('spice/spicy', for example) than said armour gap.

[Emperor Tippy]

Because in one thread, is saw the word 'penis', and was rather offended. I find it hard to believe that certain anatomical terms don't get filtered.

50% of the worlds people have a penis and use it every day, what are you getting offended about?

[The Rose Dragon]

"Chink" is filtered?

That's just silly.

EDIT: Well, it is not filtered, apparently. Now I wonder what is that other word for chink that gets filtered.

[Nerd-o-rama]

Actually, I thought that was the one that did get filtered. It made describing sneak attacks rather annoying.

Must have been on the old board. I'll live with it, then, for the sake of describing spices.

[Jack Squat]

I don't believe formal, scientifically-accepted names for anatomy are filtered, no.

Like Rose Dragon said, "ass" is also accepted for practical reasons, but the term for the anus (and people like Dennis Leary) that uses that word is not.

Something I'm always curious about when I go to boards with profanity filters...I know "small gaps in armor" are censored, but is the phrase "spick and span"? Let's find out.

Okay, now I'm a little offended. For fairness's sake, if other racial epithets are being censored, so should "spic".

Chink is censored? I thought that was changed with the board changeover.

EDIT: and it's not censored...I was hoping I hadn't imagined the whole thing about that filter being lifted.

EDIT II: ninja'd...looks like you live up that avatar.

From my understanding, the board, and it's filter, are set at a PG-13 rating, which means that ass, damn, bastard, and any other swear that appeared in Back to the Future is not caught in the filter*.



*Yes, I know Spaceballs was PG-13. Yes, I know it had the F-bomb and the second half to the phrase "bull----", and that Men in Tights had the entire phrase in it. Mel Brooks is the exception to traditional censorship.

[The Rose Dragon]

Well, my experience with the old boards is rather limited, as I first started posting only a month before the boards were changed.

[Haruki-kun]

Basically, all those very renowned four-lettered words are censored. But the scientific/medical term for a part of the body in a non-vulgar way isn't.

[Serpentine]

"Penis" and "vagina" are not naughty words. If you're gonna censor them, you ought to be censoring things like "spleen" and "eyeball" and "nose". I believe the only things that are censored are "vulgar", "derogatory" or "offensive". Checking in a good dictionary, the "naughty" words for "faeces" (****), "penis" (****), "vagina" (****, ****), "sex" (****), homosexual people (******) and "black person" (******) are all listed as "vulgar" or "offensive", and are all censored, while "penis" and "vagina" are not, so I think there's a good chance that's a good base for it. If these words offend you, I strongly recommend you avoid all biology classes. As a side note, I'm kinda surprised that piss isn't censored...

And just cuz I'm curious: Shag.

[Nerd-o-rama]

The four letter s-word for manure appeared in Back to the Future (once, and not referring to manure), and I'm positive that's filtered. You can get away with one or two four-letter words in a PG-13 movie; not so much here.

[Totally Guy]

There are some good local variants...

I'm sure that Durkon says Wanker more than once in the comic.

And on the boards **** isn't filtered. I remember that word being worse than the F word when I was small.Never mind

Retard and Spastic aren't filtered either and they're much worse than racial words. If I was to go around saying the N word all the time eventually, maybe some time down the line, I'd probably get beaten up for it. But if I go around saying words only offensive to the handicapped I can laugh all I like and nobody that gets offended can beat me up because I'm able-bodied, and in the worst case I can escape!

[Serpentine]

I don't like that "retard" and "spastic" have been so hijacked by the insulting community that it's offensive to apply them to the people they originally described, because they work. Retard = delay or hold back, and spastic = relating to or affected by muscle spasm. They were very adequate descriptions of such people. And now, it's all :smallmad: if you try to use them in their original contexts :smallannoyed: (more retard than spastic, the latter is still used properly).

[Amotis]

And just cuz I'm curious: Shag.

You have no idea how hard I just lol'd at this sentence. XD

[Serpentine]

:smalltongue: I was just curious, cuz my mum half-refused* to see "Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me" because she thought it was at least as bad a word as The "F" Word, so I was wondering whether the forum censors agree...

*the other half was it didn't interest her.

[Ego Slayer]

You have no idea how hard I just lol'd at this sentence. XD
Okay, how come I've almost never heard that word and this is the fourth time in a week I've seen it. WTF. :smallyuk:

[wadledo]

Because the world is an odd place.
Also, **** cat.

Edit: That still makes absolutely no sense to me.

[Totally Guy]

I don't like that "retard" and "spastic" have been so hijacked by the insulting community that it's offensive to apply them to the people they originally described, because they work. Retard = delay or hold back, and spastic = relating to or affected by muscle spasm. They were very adequate descriptions of such people. And now, it's all :smallmad: if you try to use them in their original contexts :smallannoyed: (more retard than spastic, the latter is still used properly).

When? Certainly not within my lifetime. English is a language that adapts and words do change meaning over time. Pulling out a dictionary in this situation is only good for backpedalling, "Sorry, I didn't know it was a bad word, here's what I thought". I've had to do that myself recently.

What you say sounds very much like the phrase "spade a spade".

So where's the bastard live?
It is a real word isn't it? That is what it means isn't it?
Bastard, bastard, bastard bastard lalala.

Same principle, certain to win, but the top prize is bothering people.

[Serpentine]

Well, the Concise Oxford English Dictionary lists the noun "retard" as derogatory (the verb is not), while the first definition of "spastic", which includes "of or having a form of muscular weakness typical of cerebral palsy", and "a person with cerebral palsy" is nothing of the sort. It is, however, listed as offensive when used to refer to "incompetent or uncoordinated" or "an incompetent or uncoordinated person". These definitions reflect current usage, including legitimate, unoffensive use, not merely backpeddling.

As for bastard, well, it was always bad to be called a bastard, whether you were one or not. It wasn't always bad to be called retarded or spastic if you actually were.

[Jack Squat]

The four letter s-word for manure appeared in Back to the Future (once, and not referring to manure), and I'm positive that's filtered. You can get away with one or two four-letter words in a PG-13 movie; not so much here.

ah, haven't seen it in awhile, so I wasn't too sure on if it had been used or not. I only really used it as an example, because I'm pretty sure it used just about every minor swear in the book. so revision: if it was used in Back to the Future several times it'll probably skip by the filter. Doesn't mean it's acceptable speech by default, so don't try to work it into every post.


While I'm at it, I have another correction; Spaceballs is rated PG, not PG-13...go figure.

[Zherog]

A) I'm pretty sure that one of the "guiding principles" of the filters is that if a word is OK for the comic, it's OK for the forums. That's why, for example, "bitch" is not in the filter.

B) Just because "chink" and "spic" and so on aren't in the filter, doesn't mean you won't get in trouble for using them in the context of a racial slur.

[Totally Guy]

That's a narrow margin of use though.

I'd need to be able to identify what was wrong with a person. So without prior knowledge to cerebal palsey in the person I was describing I'd have too much hesitataion to work it into a sentence anyway.

I was pointing out there is a scale of rudeness.

Baby talk bad words,
innuendo,
blasphemy,

then there's expletives,
genital references slang and sex words

then at the top you've got directed abuse
that specialises into racist language,
and the other groups such as disabled and gay.

Of all the directed abuse tier, I personaly think that targeting the particular group we have been talking about is the worst of the directed abuse.
Being near the top of the scale has affected those words that medically, accurately say what you want to say. It's made them taboo. Yes that is a bad thing as by making it taboo we reinforce my belief that it is a bad thing to say and we make you feel like you are being robbed of accurate words.

How to stop a word from being taboo? One way is use it more in the correct situation. I can't however bring myself to do this without the prior trust of the affected individuals and I only have one such friend. So my impact is very much limited to a small circle.

Alternatively I could try to stop it's misuse say by perhaps mentioning to a worldwide audience that in my locality it's a bad word.

[Roland St. Jude]

I won't speak to the technical aspects of the filter or what it does and doesn't allow. That's not my area of expertise. The the filter is just a tool to minimize the number of profanities and slurs and to make them obvious (and obvious that they're not wanted). It's not perfect, but it serves its purpose reasonably well. Posters see asterisks and realize there are somethings you can't say here; moderators see them and realize that someone's going a bit overboard with the profanity. With the change to the new board software, the option certainly existed to go enable the filter or not, and the policy decision was made that, imperfect as it is, it's more helpful than not.

If you have specific problems with what the filter does or doesn't "catch," please let us know. PM would probably be better than in a thread because a thread like this quickly becomes a game of "let's test which words are filtered and which aren't" and then gets locked (which will probably happen to this thread shortly). I'm not sure what is involved in changing the filtered/unfiltered list from the pre-set list, but my sense is that any greater precision probably isn't worth the effort. But if you have specific issues, I encourage you to contact us. I think we've made some adjustments to the filter in the past.

More importantly, (in my opinion), from a Rules perspective, the rules don't permit excessive profanity or any graphic sexuality, flaming, or slurs based on race, gender, ethnicity, etc. It doesn't matter whether the offending material is caught by the filter or not. (Though you can earn a separate infraction for evading the filter to post something improper.)

I'm sure there are any number of ways we could analyze the language based on shock value, severity, directedness, etc. I don't think we want to get into that level of analysis in how we administer things. It's simpler to have a rule of reason that says:

1. don't say things you understand to be profanities
2. don't say things our filters tell you are not allowed here
3. don't make comments that otherwise violate the forum rules (because they are flaming, graphically sexual, epithets, etc.)

Doing 1 or 2 will earn you a warning with the potential for escalation from there. Just try to keep things polite and family-friendly, and think of the filter as an imperfect guide not an authority.

Doing 3 will probably earn you an infraction straight away. And flaming includes any insult to another, even one as linguistically mild as "doo-doo head."

As for the OPs comment, it's a technical term. It's not a profanity or inherently pejorative. Unless it was directed at another as an (exceptionally wierd) insult or made as part of a sexually graphic discussion, I don't think it's a problem under our rules. I might think it unusual to see it here, but I'm surprised that it was offensive.

[Edna]

And just cuz I'm curious: Shag.

Judging by your spelling of "faeces," you must be from a part of the world that uses British English, where "shag" does have a vulgar meaning. In the US, the most common uses of "shag" describe: 1) a type of rug (popular in the 70s), or 2) the act of retrieving baseballs. Nothing to censor there :-)

Edna

[Kosmopolite]

Actually, I'm English and 'shag' isn't obscene. Although it does refer to sex, it's very mild and probably analogous with 'bum' (the noun) or 'booby'. :)

[Bookman]

Judging by your spelling of "faeces," you must be from a part of the world that uses British English, where "shag" does have a vulgar meaning. In the US, the most common uses of "shag" describe: 1) a type of rug (popular in the 70s), or 2) the act of retrieving baseballs. Nothing to censor there :-)

Edna



Or, if you're in the South, it means a popular type of dance traditionally done on the beach.

[Rockphed]

Retard and Spastic aren't filtered either and they're much worse than racial words. If I was to go around saying the N word all the time eventually, maybe some time down the line, I'd probably get beaten up for it. But if I go around saying words only offensive to the handicapped I can laugh all I like and nobody that gets offended can beat me up because I'm able-bodied, and in the worst case I can escape!

I can understand retard, but not spastic. Maybe I am just weird, but I have never heard spastic used to insult someone. On the other hand, I have frequently used it to describe people's behavior when freaking out. That the process I describe with "Being spastic" can be described as "Seizure like Action" never occurred to me before.

[Serpentine]

On retard and spastic: I had a look on Wikipedia, and apparently in the UK "spastic" is widely considered the 2nd most vulgar/insulting/nasty/...bad word, after retard. So, Glug, I think we might have a bit of a cultural clash here, cuz it seems as though these words are exceptionally maligned where you live, whereas most (I think) of the rest of the world would put them substantially further down your scale.
Spastic is still a medically used term. It has no more narrow a usage than, say, "scalpel" or "clinical depression". It's even the name of a society (The Spastic's Society), formerly in the UK I think, but I'm pretty sure it's still used here. Spasticity is the spasming of the muscles and so on. If you see a disabled person doing that stereotypical scrunched-up arm thing and twitching and the like, they're almost certainly spastic. Retardedness is harder to identify, and relates mostly to intelligence and mental development, so it's a lot easier to use as or misunderstand as an insult. I have to admit, I use "retarded" in a derogatory fashion on occasion (normally about things, events or policies, so sometimes it can be fairly applicable <.<), and I don't like it, so I'm trying to stop. I have also been known to use "spaz" or "spazzy" (especially in reference to my cat), but I use that to mean "hyperactive, silly and weird", and don't even really associate it with spastic.


More to the point: Roland, personally I don't think Silly Richard should be filtered. It's used in so many other ways, a lot of the time it's just annoying, more so than the others. Okay, so my dictionary has "vulgar" next to two of the definitions... >.> Still!
I have to say I was surprised that "dyke" isn't censored. Not that I'm complaining, at least it means the "van Dyke" can be made out in "**** van Dyke", but still... I was also surprised by poofter, but I guess that's a more Australian/UK one?

[InaVegt]

Dyke most like isn't censored 'cause it's also, and in my eyes mainly, a word used to refer to "A wall used to keep water inside a body of water", or something akin to that definition.

[bluish_wolf]

I was playing a game recently, and "penis" was bleeped. I thought that was weird, but upon seeing this thread, I guess it's not that odd.

[Icewalker]

A fun fact which may in fact be completely wrong and not a fact, and I used the word 'fact' four times in this sentence somehow. Yeah.

You can only say the word, the 4 letter/f/generally highest of the profane word, once in a movie, more than once and you get an R rating. One movie, I forget which, only used the word once, in the context of "You can only say (blank) once or it gives the movie an R rating" (and not in the context of breaking the fourth wall, it was a movie about other movies, I think)

[Zherog]

More to the point: Roland, personally I don't think Silly Richard should be filtered. It's used in so many other ways, a lot of the time it's just annoying, more so than the others. Okay, so my dictionary has "vulgar" next to two of the definitions... >.> Still!
I have to say I was surprised that "dyke" isn't censored. Not that I'm complaining, at least it means the "van Dyke" can be made out in "**** van Dyke", but still... I was also surprised by poofter, but I guess that's a more Australian/UK one?

In the past, the mods have said it was OK to use filter dodging methods if you were using a legitimate use of a word. So, for example, if you wanted to talk about **** van Dyke, you could do so.

[Serpentine]

I had to quote you to see how you did that... Kewl.

[Jayabalard]

hmm... curiously, of the 7 dirty words, only 3 are completely censored, 1 is half censored (the mother and er are still readable) and three get through: piss, tits and the other multi syllabic word.

[Roland St. Jude]

hmm... curiously, of the 7 dirty words, only 3 are completely censored, 1 is half censored (the mother and er are still readable) and three get through: piss, tits and the other multi syllabic word.

This is the type of post that ends up getting these threads locked, though not necessarily the first of its kind in the thread. Please don't make this about testing or reporting what is or isn't filtered - not even out of benign curiousity.

[Serpentine]

I don't see "tit" as bad enough to be a swear word, personally :smallconfused:

[Renegade Paladin]

Because in one thread, is saw the word 'penis', and was rather offended.
Then grow a thicker skin? :smallconfused:

Seriously, you're not going to get very far if you're offended by simple words, regardless of use or context. Life is offensive; the Internet is worse. The best advice is to learn to live with it, because it isn't changing. Besides, why be offended in the first place? Did it hurt you? Where's the blood and broken bones?

[bluish_wolf]

Then grow a thicker skin? :smallconfused:

Seriously, you're not going to get very far if you're offended by simple words, regardless of use or context. Life is offensive; the Internet is worse. The best advice is to learn to live with it, because it isn't changing. Besides, why be offended in the first place? Did it hurt you? Where's the blood and broken bones?

You're taking the "fend" part offend too literally. It doesn't mean to be beaten up, at least, not any more.

[Renegade Paladin]

You're taking the "fend" part offend too literally. It doesn't mean to be beaten up, at least, not any more.
No, you're taking my analogies too literally. :smalltongue:

[Lord Fullbladder, Master of Goblins]

I don't see "tit" as bad enough to be a swear word, personally :smallconfused:

Indeed. How else are we to talk about our birds? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_tit)

Okay, moronic joke aside, a lot can get under the radar. Some of it's necessary, because D&D likes it's bastard swords and assassins and other such things. Others are slightly more optional, but are allowed because this is one big community with various needs as to it's discussions, from medicals terms to whatever, for the most part.

Can't we all just get along?

[willpell]

On retard and spastic:

This is amusing to me because I have a friend who calls herself "Spastic Whiptastic" online (no she's not a dominatrix, at least not that I know, she's just goofy and chaotic). However, she works with the developmentally delayed, so the R-word is awful to her, and she has convinced me not to use it or to tolerate its use by others. (I won't bother complaining here, but watch what you say to me in other forums.)

[bluish_wolf]

This is amusing to me because I have a friend who calls herself "Spastic Whiptastic" online (no she's not a dominatrix, at least not that I know, she's just goofy and chaotic). However, she works with the developmentally delayed, so the R-word is awful to her, and she has convinced me not to use it or to tolerate its use by others. (I won't bother complaining here, but watch what you say to me in other forums.)

You do know that retard means "something that holds you back," right? It's not that offensive, not any more so than, "developmentally delayed."

[Serpentine]

Actually, retard means "to hold back or delay". What you're looking for is "retarder" or "retardant" :smallwink: :smalltongue:

[WalkingTarget]

You do know that retard means "something that holds you back," right? It's not that offensive, not any more so than, "developmentally delayed."

Except that "retard" has been hijacked by people who use it in a pejorative sense.

Take the phrase "That's _____" where the blank means "stupid or otherwise undesirable" and insert any number of words that had perfectly cromulent definitions that were originally inoffensive and were simply descriptive (referring to rate of development or sexual orientation, say). The fact that people caused a negative connotation to be attached to these descriptive words is the problem.

[Quincunx]

There's little wrong with trying to hijack words back to their original usage, especially when no equally precise word exists.

*pushes up imaginary sleeves and strides towards the LGBT community, there to kidnap back a few adjectives*

[WalkingTarget]

There's little wrong with trying to hijack words back to their original usage, especially when no equally precise word exists.

*pushes up imaginary sleeves and strides towards the LGBT community, there to kidnap back a few adjectives*

By all means, go right ahead. From what I've seen it's easier to add meanings to words than it is to remove them, so you're going to be fighting an uphill battle with that one. I salute your efforts though. *salutes*

(would that limit the LGBT thread to happy BT's from a particular island in the Aegean?)