Over-zealous swear filter

Post Reply New Topic

I tried to pass comment on the band "Pu**y Riot". Unfortunately, the swear filter adjusted the first word to "p****". No capitalisation, and it actually makes it look worse than it is (as there are ruder words that can be substituted in there).

I think that is a perfectly legitimate word. Now people cannot discuss p**** cats without the forum turning their innocent discussion into sexual innuendo. Similarly vulgar words that have legitimate uses (I am thinking particularly of terms for male genitalia) are not censored. So I am proposing that the word in question be removed.

Unfortunately it's biased somewhat to words that are considered offensive in the USA. (and it's actually "pussycats" )
Its use in the name of the group is, to my thinking, using the (allegedly) offensive meaning if the sex of the group members is any indication.

I would agree with you there.

So do Americans find that more offensive than "he was annoyed, he was really uriney?" (I notice that word isn't filtered, which is ironic considering that urine is produced by intensive filtration)

If it has to be filtered, then would it be possible to at least maintain capitalisation? I'm guessing it's something Alex would have neither the time nor the inclination to do, but it can't hurt to ask...

Alas, it's a "filter of very little brain" and forms part of the basic forum software.

The secret solution to your problem is something called 'Context Based Comment Filtering' where the filter looks at the words either side then makes a decision. The experts on this are the British because of what they delightfully call the 'Scunthorpe Problem', it's a town in North Eastern England where an unfortunate four-letter word appears in the middle of the name. Finding a way to censor the Internet without wiping the town off the web proved to be quite a problem!

Edit, after checking a map I find that they are nowhere near the sea so I changed my post.

None of it is really satisfactory because what might be considered a naughty word "here" may not be considered one "there", and neither can personal ideas of acceptability be taken into account. At least, not without introducing some weighty language analysis code which would likely dwarf the code providing the ability to input naughty words in the first place...
But at least the existing simplistic word filtering doesn't trip over words like Scunthorpe.

I had the same problem once when I tried to say pu*** footing. Even now I find it funny that I have to mutate that expression.

what's really weird is how the filter here reacts to certain plurals and permutations; for example, a**hole is censored while a**holes is not, s**t is censored but not BS or horses**t, while I've yet to see any version of f**k that gets past the filter. Personally, when the site is upgraded I'd like to see the thing ditched entirely for forums not designated as being for children, as I find the whole thing infantilizing and screwy, it's not like we don't know what's behind those asterisks, and we still have mods to handle abusive behavior anyway.

Exactly. Dump all the filters and rely on users reporting people who make offensive posts, far more effective