It looks like somone else changed my post in this forum.

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Where I grew up slang for a woman's vagina was a c**t, but that word is censored here. If we thought a woman was worth a bad word, it would the word for a female dog was used. I lauged because to me, c**t was genteel and a female dog was rude and crude.

and being an Aspie, I just thought they were teasing me about it all those years!

Merle

In a similar vein: on THIS THREAD, it appears MissConstrue has run into another example of the swear filter being too heavy-handed.

Is there any way for members to even know what words are banned, and what the filters are doing? This is getting absurd.

Which word this time? The filter seems to be really ret*d. Hehehe. So r-etard-ed now changes into the word delayed.

That's not so bad, now my life story is closer to the truth, but changing words is still wrong, somehow.

So now if we say that something re-tarded the growth of something else the filter will say it delayed the growth? Delayed is not synonymous with re-tarded in that instance -- slowed would be a better choice. In this case the swear filter could actually cause quite a bit of confusion.

And why on earth does it change words like re-tarded to another word entirely, but only replace parts of other words with asterisks so that anyone with half a brain can figure out what word was originally typed?

Edit: To "CanyonWind" I'm sorry. I went to far!

Last edited by Aldebaran on 14 May 2009, 3:56 am, edited 1 time in total.

I have to agree with the powers that be on this one.

I had a friend years ago who was R., one of the finest people I've ever known, and I have some idea of the disrespect and abuse those people are forced to live with.

Freedom Schmeedom. I hate seeing the term tossed around as a casual insult or an expression of contempt, something that can only serve to make those people's lives even more difficult.

I don't think anyone is saying that using the r-word in that context is ever acceptable.

The argument seems to be whether the issue should be handled by a swear-filter or by the mods. My vote -- not that I get one -- is for the mods to handle the issue. Swear-filters not only cause inadvertant problems, but they're ineffective. You'll notice that most people in this thread simply circumvented the swear-filter as soon as they realized what it was doing. Some things are just better off being handled by a human rather than a computer.

perhaps more awareness from the membership as to how they use the word will make them more sensitive to PM the mods that abuse of the term is happening. A good forum relies on an alert membership.

If I also have to agree with the powers, then no logical arguments apply.

Buddha had a disciple who was R. His name was Pranya.

In his younger years Pranya had tremendous difficulty following the convoluted intellectual discussions that went on in the temple. His brother was embarrassed to be related to him, and finally his brother told Pranya to leave and go someplace else.

When Buddha arrived at the temple later that day, he saw Pranya standing outside the front entrance crying.

Buddha put a hand on his shoulder and said, "Pranya, what's wrong?"

"Everybody makes fun of me because I'm stupid," said Pranya, "And my brother threw me out of the temple."

Buddha paused, then said, "Pranya, I have a job for you. It's a job that only you can do. Will you do it?"

"Sure," said Pranya, delighted that Buddha had shown him that much respect.

"I need you to clean the temple," said Buddha, "And all the time you're working, keep saying, 'Sweep away the dust, wipe away the dirt.' "

Pranya went into the temple, picked up the broom, and started to work, repeating the words over and over, "Sweep away the dust, wipe away the dirt."

A few hours later, Buddha came by to check on how Pranya was doing. Pranya was still working, but he was laughing while he sang the same words.

"Pranya, what are you so happy about?" asked Buddha, already knowing the answer.

"I'm happy because now I understand," said Pranya, "My job is to sweep away the dust and wipe away the dirt from my own mind."

Pranya went on to become one of Buddha's most respected disciples. There were things he understood more clearly than anybody else.