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Swearing

Nebulous

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We've always allowed it here and I never saw a problem with it.

But on some other forums out there it is frowned upon. Some even will set the software to automatically correct swear words to something like this: f**k

What are your opinions on using swear words in a forum community?
 
On this one forum I go to they change all swear words with kitten. They go as far as censoring words like "down". xD

All censoring is ridiculous. I really don't give a shit if ppl swear.
 
I think that, to some extent, it often just depends on the forum. I don't allow heavy language on mine to protect the reputation of the forum and to discourage low quality content, but I don't really see the need to censor everything to every detail. It's a PG-13 forum. I don't know of any 13 year olds who are unable to handle seeing one bad word.

I refrain from using profanity myself on my forum to protect the reputation of the fourm. I'm not especially big on my profanity use anyhow. :P
 
@Darth how is profanity going to damage your forums reputation? This isnt 1942, it's 2014. :P
 
Nebulous said:
@Darth how is profanity going to damage your forums reputation? This isnt 1942, it's 2014. :P
Ah, but to certain parents it is!
Suppose you're a video game company, you've made a decent game and you've got kids playing it. You maintain a forum so fans can share experiences or whatever and everything's just fine... Till some kid's parent discovers their kid's being corrupted by your vile and evil forum filled with naughty words. Lawsuit in 3... 2... 1...

Telling people to lighten up probably won't cut it :P


As for my opinion, I don't give a fuck! If you're just censoring things because you can, that's a bit sad, but if you've got a reason to, well, have at it. Not being able to use certain words won't kill me.
 
Nebulous said:
@Darth how is profanity going to damage your forums reputation? This isnt 1942, it's 2014. :P

Not 1942.

1947.

You missed by five years... and it was truly disgusting words that got them in trouble.

This happened to Red Skelton on NBC Radio.....

ebe271_8bc2f6dc295e3b0e11eb4f7dd8da00be.jpg


On April 22, 1947, Red was censored by NBC two minutes into his radio show. Red and his announcer Rod O'Connor began to talk about Fred Allen being censored during Allen's NBC show the previous week; they were silenced for 15 seconds. Comedian Bob Hopewas also given the same treatment once he began referring to the censoring of Allen. Skelton forged on with his lines for his studio audience's benefit. The material Skelton insisted on using had been edited from the script by the network before the broadcast. Skelton's words after he was back on the air were, "Well, we have now joined the parade of stars." Skelton had been briefly censored the previous month for the use of the word "diaper". After the April incidents, NBC indicated it would no longer pull the plug for similar reasons.
http://www.redskelton.com/#!radio/c57m
 
Fatal Dawn said:
Nebulous said:
@Darth how is profanity going to damage your forums reputation? This isnt 1942, it's 2014. :P

It can have a bad impact on your website's SEO ranking. They're called poison words and like your email, search engines are trained to filter for these types of words.

Maybe that's why our page rank is 1/10 ...all these potty mouths :P
 
Oh well, I never really was concerned about SEO optimization and all that.

Now, if I was running a business or some other professional type of website, SEO would be a priority.
 
Nebulous said:
We've always allowed it here and I never saw a problem with it.

But on some other forums out there it is frowned upon. Some even will set the software to automatically correct swear words to something like this: f**k

What are your opinions on using swear words in a forum community?

i think people's common, everyday language usage has changed so that few people are offended by the simple presence of vulgar language if it's not used in a hateful context, especially words like fuck, shit, piss and asshole. they're common exclamations and it looks stupid when some anal board admin puts in a word filter to censor them for the easily butthurt.
 
They could easily put them in to ensure no one uses them and "poisons" their forum in terms of SEO. The search engines only see the actual words and won't notice a censored version of the word which is why the use isn't the problem as long as the search engines can't tell. Unless you built it, the forum you are on is not your own and you have no right to demand anything as you can either accept the conditions the owner has laid out or leave. While I don't have a problem with cursing, I understand now why some do on forums at least. I personally don't curse much anyway so I wouldn't really care if they have a filter for common curse words.
 
In the other forum I'm in.Swear words gets turned to "carp".
 
I personally don't have a problem with swearing at a forum. I thinking its great for people to express themselves. :)
 
I don't give a shit about users swearing on my forum. Hell, I do it all the time. :)

One time, I messed with my users by changing a bunch of swear words to funny things, like 'bitch' to 'eggplant', and 'asswipe' to 'toilet paper'. :D
 
Crusader said:
Fuck the censor!

This.  

Listen, you're online. The internet is a vast plane of information and data traveling all over the world from this country and that, and there are people of all ages using it. I could understand if a forum administrator/owner wanted to censor swear words, but I feel it's dumb considering whoever is foruming/browsing the net probably saw a handful of swear words on other websites. And let's face it, there are a lot of other worse things than swear words.
 

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Off Topix is a well-established general discussion forum that originally opened to the public in 2009! We provide a laid-back atmosphere, and our members are down to earth. We have a ton of content, and fresh stuff is constantly being added. We cover all sorts of topics, so there's bound to be something inside to pique your interest. We welcome anyone and everyone to register and become a member of our awesome community.

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