Rejecting Censorship

[Gpguy]

Ahh, the censor. What memories it brings back. From the time that it altered all vulgarities to *cabbage*, its intricacies have caught my fancy. The censor serves a simple yet essential function. It serves to protect people from hearing undesirably obscene things. No doubt that it succeeds in its function, and no doubt it should remain in this game.

 

 

 

However, the limitations that it puts on communication are many, and therefore, I believe that it would be in the interest of everyone if the censor was made optional. By optional I mean that censored words said by people with the censor off will only be visible to others with the censor off. And, of course, the censor will only be optional for accounts of users over the age of 13.

 

 

 

Words can hurt, words can kill, and words can influence, but language is best judged by the intent behind it, and the purpose of it, rather than words arbitrarily judged to be obscene. A legal criterion established by the highest court in the United States for obscenity is that the work, when taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. Obscenity clearly deals with the intent and usefulness of what is in question. Bad words cannot be judged as obscene, and forced censorship seems unjustified. As you may have noted, there are many books, movies and informative texts that use these words constructively in a way that has value. Bad words do not have to be present in obscenity, and valuable manuscripts dont necessarily have to abstain from questionable language.

 

 

 

The censor has historically been a cumulative list, and as vulgarities have popped up, they have been promptly censored. As this happened, people took it as a challenge upon themselves to discover new bad words which circumvented the censor. In time, these words and accompanying phrases were added to the censor, creating a humongous censor list. More usernames were censored as the censor kept expanding. However, Recently, the censor was loosened. It allowed many words found questionable by a lot of the people I play Runescape with. This measure was evidently taken in order to lessen the complaints of Runescape being a childrens game.

 

 

 

However, I feel that they took a terribly miscalculated approach to this. The group of people who dislike bad words, and the group of people who find enjoyment in using them are two radically different groups of people, and finding a compromise between the two is an indomitable task. I do like that Jagex trusts its players to not abuse it, but there are people who simply do not wish to hear vulgarities whose wishes deserve to be respected. The optimum choice would have been making the censor optional.

 

 

 

Making the censor optional would mean that the rights of those who wish to maintain a civil atmosphere are not violated. And it certainly would not mean that rule 1 would be removed. But it would allow venue for discussion among many topics which were not present before. These topics, according to some, are undesirable, and therefore, the censor will make it so that they cannot see them, and according to others, hold much discussion value, and thusly, these people will be able to discuss them.

 

 

 

Some would express concerns that an optional censor will make vulgarities ubiquitous throughout Runescape. Others would say that this would open doors for password scamming, or online predation. These are very valid concerns, though the bad words will die down after an initial outbreak, and the censor, being optional, will still be available for those who do not wish to hear such things. Online Predators likely are only barely hindered by the current censor, and a censor on/off switch would give a chance to educate those who lack knowledge of the different people they may meet on the Internet. Password scamming is no different, and those with the censor on will continue to remain safe, while those who choose to turn their censor off will have to be careful not to say their password

 

 

 

Naturally, any loosening of the censor, or making it optional, requires a giant leap of faith in the community, and when people are given potential for abuse, there will always be those who will make use of it. However, Runescape has come a long way, and peoples rights can still be respected without a loss of freedom for others.

 

 

 

The most basic premise of an optional censor is that an optional censor will facilitate communication, rather than hinder it, and will satisfy two different types of people who are very different. While there are arguments against it, I believe that Runescape players can be trusted with the responsibility of free exchange of information. Although ultimately, that conclusion will vary from the perception of different people with different experiences in Runescape.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One point that I would like to address is the "children should be protected" viewpoint. Now, while I understand that some may view children as innocent angels who shouldn't be corrupted, I don't think such inductive reasoning can be applied on all children, especially ones who play runescape. Often, it is more likely that it will be children using language in a vulgar way rather than adults.

 

 

 

Moreover, children who are censored and told by oppressive rules that they should not say derogatory things develop a resentment toward the authority that imposes such sanctions upon them. They will simply search for more ways to amuse themselves with words which are not censored. And this leads to the adding of words to the censor and the impedance of communication between many people which I referred to in my original post. The children are unaware as to WHY using language in a vulgar way is detrimental to the environment of runescape.

 

 

 

As was the case with the RWT, children asked their parents for money to buy RSGP with, and the parents gave them birthday gifts of RSGP, and neither of them actually knew what was going on 8000 miles away with credit card fraud, human rights abusers, and other terrible things caused by RWT. When Jagex told of these horrors, the most selfish among the children probably only thought of themselves and the fact that they wouldn't be able to get money without working anymore. The compassionate would have realized that RWT was wrong. The exposure to evil is, however, evidently present among children.

 

 

 

The compassionate learn about why to follow rules like offensive language, scamming, and RWT through their conscience. The selfish, through their personal losses, such as their accounts, or liberties. The latter group inevitably has a hard lesson to learn. Don't think any censor or restrictions otherwise can prevent this.

[Kirderf123]

Ever heard about paragraphs?

[RuneAge]

the limitations that it puts on communication are many, and therefore, I believe that it would be in the interest of everyone if the censor was made optional.

I aggree that it puts a bit too many limitations on our communication, but if it was optional, you'd get a whole bunch of hot-heads going round saying what they like to who they like :wall:

[Returnofmic]

I would read it, if you'd split it up ;)

[Wouter828]

Ahh, the censor. What memories it brings back. From the time that it altered all vulgarities to *cabbage*, its intricacies have caught my fancy. The censor serves a simple yet essential function. It serves to protect people from hearing undesirably obscene things. No doubt that it succeeds in its function, and no doubt it should remain in this game.

 

 

 

However, the limitations that it puts on communication are many, and therefore, I believe that it would be in the interest of everyone if the censor was made optional. By optional I mean that censored words said by people with the censor off will only be visible to others with the censor off. And, of course, the censor will only be optional for accounts of users over the age of 13.

 

 

 

Words can hurt, words can kill, and words can influence, but language is best judged by the intent behind it, and the purpose of it, rather than words arbitrarily judged to be obscene. A legal criterion established by the highest court in the United States for obscenity is that the work, when taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. Obscenity clearly deals with the intent and usefulness of what is in question. Bad words cannot be judged as obscene, and forced censorship seems unjustified. As you may have noted, there are many books, movies and informative texts that use these words constructively in a way that has value. Bad words do not have to be present in obscenity, and valuable manuscripts dont necessarily have to abstain from questionable language.

 

 

 

The censor has historically been a cumulative list, and as vulgarities have popped up, they have been promptly censored. As this happened, people took it as a challenge upon themselves to discover new bad words which circumvented the censor. In time, these words and accompanying phrases were added to the censor, creating a humongous censor list. More usernames were censored as the censor kept expanding. However, Recently, the censor was loosened. It allowed many words found questionable by a lot of the people I play Runescape with. This measure was evidently taken in order to lessen the complaints of Runescape being a childrens game.

 

 

 

However, I feel that they took a terribly miscalculated approach to this. The group of people who dislike bad words, and the group of people who find enjoyment in using them are two radically different groups of people, and finding a compromise between the two is an indomitable task. I do like that Jagex trusts its players to not abuse it, but there are people who simply do not wish to hear vulgarities whose wishes deserve to be respected. The optimum choice would have been making the censor optional.

 

 

 

Making the censor optional would mean that the rights of those who wish to maintain a civil atmosphere are not violated. And it certainly would not mean that rule 1 would be removed. But it would allow venue for discussion among many topics which were not present before. These topics, according to some, are undesirable, and therefore, the censor will make it so that they cannot see them, and according to others, hold much discussion value, and thusly, these people will be able to discuss them.

 

 

 

Some would express concerns that an optional censor will make vulgarities ubiquitous throughout Runescape. Others would say that this would open doors for password scamming, or online predation. These are very valid concerns, though the bad words will die down after an initial outbreak, and the censor, being optional, will still be available for those who do not wish to hear such things. Online Predators likely are only barely hindered by the current censor, and a censor on/off switch would give a chance to educate those who lack knowledge of the different people they may meet on the Internet. Password scamming is no different, and those with the censor off will continue to remain safe, while those who choose to turn their censor off will have to be careful not to say their password

 

 

 

Naturally, any loosening of the censor, or making it optional, requires a giant leap of faith in the community, and when people are given potential for abuse, there will always be those who will make use of it. However, Runescape has come a long way, and peoples rights can still be respected without a loss of freedom for others.

 

 

 

The most basic premise of an optional censor is that an optional censor will facilitate communication, rather than hinder it, and will satisfy two different types of people who are very different. While there are arguments against it, I believe that Runescape players can be trusted with the responsibility of free exchange of information. Although ultimately, that conclusion will vary from the perception of different people with different experiences in Runescape.

 

there, better?

[smobo]

Turning the censor off is a bad idea, in my opinion. But having too much of a censor causes difficulty playing. But at least its not as bad as before, when mistyping "You should go to Ardougne" could look like you're massively insulting someone.

[Bauke]

I despise the censor. It doesn't serve any purpose. When I say **** you ingame, everyone knows which word I'm talking about. With or without the censor, Jagex doesn't allow swearing and offensive language. That's fine. So ditch the censor please, or make it optional for the crybabies that'll start whining whenever they see the F-word.

[guitar_god_2007]

I must admit one side of jagex that has really annoyed me is how they say its a game targated at people in late teens, they should know that 90% of people over the ages of 13 swear its a way of life now adays. They need to have a filter which you can personally control. If you want to see people F'ing and blinding then leave it on if not then turn it off.

[Earth_Poet]

People have been talking about an optional censor at least as long as I've been playing. It would be all well and good if everybody ascribed to the "mind-your-own-business" club, but they don't. There are a minority of people who want to enforce their social policies on everybody. Even with their censor on, it will irritate them to no end knowing that curse words are slipping through to someone's screen, somewhere. Ironically, these are the people we try to please. These are the ones we don't want to upset, because these are the ones that take their cases to the Supreme Court (by the way, the case you are referring was about pornography, and they had to go back and add in the word, "serious"). It may be as simple as Jagex wishing to avoid law suits.

 

 

 

I don't mind cursing. I just don't want to be cursed at by a complete stranger. There should still be a line somewhere on what is offensive. And of course, I do have my ignore button.

[Lielac]

Weell, besides the lack of paragraphs...

 

 

 

I agree. I'd still censor MYSELF, of course (oh how I love my line of 'f's whenever I die and didn't mean to), but there are some pretty dumb things still censored.

 

 

 

I'd probably go around with my censor off trolling for swearers to report, though... :lol: Not a wbm, just got too much time on my hands and am a completely shameless hypocrite (swearing over here, reporting for that exact same word over there...)

[Zaaps1]

Words can hurt, words can kill,

 

 

 

The irony, please space out your paragraphs more, or else words literally can hurt and kill (your eyes).

 

 

 

You have good points, but if you format it like that no one's going to read it.

[Wizz]

Actually it's true, bad words don't really exist. It's then content it is used. Any word can become a "bad" word if used correctly.

 

 

 

Also no the censor should stay, for those of you who say "Well how about we make it so only 13+ can see it" that's not really hard to avoid.

 

It's like pornagraphy sites "Click here if you are over 21" *click* a 20 year old person can figure it out....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

EDIT: I have a feeling some is going to siggy the pornagraphy thing.

[Aussietroopa]

You all realise it IS paragraphed? The paragraphs don't have a line inbetween them, but this is also a very valid way to type a response as well. On the topic, I don't particuarly care about the censor, I'm still able to type my msn address in the window without it being starry, hence, people I want to talk to I have on msn anyway.

[Zierro]

I despise the censor. It doesn't serve any purpose. When I say **** you ingame, everyone knows which word I'm talking about. With or without the censor, Jagex doesn't allow swearing and offensive language. That's fine. So ditch the censor please, or make it optional for the crybabies that'll start whining whenever they see the F-word.

 

 

 

Exactly. The result will still be the same, censor or not. Plus I always thought censors were stupid anyways - there are no censors in real life.

[Zaaps1]

You all realise it IS paragraphed? The paragraphs don't have a line in between them, but this is also a very valid way to type a response as well. .

 

 

 

What's the point of making paragraphs? The point isn't to press the enter space once for the hell of it. The point is to make your words easier to read. Who cares if he put paragraphs or not? The fact is: it's hard to read. Sure there are paragraphs, but since they don't accomplish anything, they're as good as not there.

 

 

 

EDIT: There are censors irl, they're just all metaphorical.

[Zierro]

What's the point of making paragraphs? The point isn't to press the enter space once for the hell of it. The point is to make your words easier to read. Who cares if he put paragraphs or not? The fact is: it's hard to read. Sure there are paragraphs, but since they don't accomplish anything, they're as good as not there.

 

 

 

Yeah, he could have at least used the tab key or something.

 

 

 

EDIT: There are censors irl, they're just all metaphorical.

 

 

 

What do you mean?

[Moonshadow]

I once played a game the had a censor you could toggle on and off like you have proposed. It was quite a [cabbage] hole, filled with the age group that feels random and aimless swearing and obscenities makes you cooler and more macho.

[Zaaps1]

What's the point of making paragraphs? The point isn't to press the enter space once for the hell of it. The point is to make your words easier to read. Who cares if he put paragraphs or not? The fact is: it's hard to read. Sure there are paragraphs, but since they don't accomplish anything, they're as good as not there.

 

 

 

Yeah, he could have at least used the tab key or something.

 

 

 

EDIT: There are censors irl, they're just all metaphorical.

 

 

 

What do you mean?

 

 

 

Go to a Kindergarten class room, and say "F--k you" some random kid at the top of your lungs. You'll get screamed at by the teacher, and then by all the parents after. While there's nothing ACTUALLY stopping you, your brain will tell you there are consequences to it, and therefore your brain acts as a censor and keeps you in check (or so we hope).

[Chained_life]

If you can't talk to your friends without cussing up a storm, that's your problem. I really don't care for the censor, religiously; jagex has screwed us over already, so why not allow the derogatory names for gays, whites, blacks, Hispanics etc? They allow the use of using God's name in vein and that's really the only problem I have with cussing, besides being a gentleman around the ladies of course. :thumbup:

 

 

 

I say keep the censor, little kids play. Whether you like it or not this is a game for kids... Playing cards? Good grief. Have a little self control.

[RSBDavid]

I mainly use IRC or ventrilo to talk to other 'scapers. In my opinion, Jagex should allow the optional use of the censor , but if you gain a blackmark for offensive language, it will stay on.

[Bauke]

If you can't talk to your friends without cussing up a storm, that's your problem. I really don't care for the censor, religiously; jagex has screwed us over already, so why not allow the derogatory names for gays, whites, blacks, Hispanics etc? They allow the use of using God's name in vein and that's really the only problem I have with cussing, besides being a gentleman around the ladies of course. :thumbup:

 

 

Why not turn it around? If you have problems with the language other people display, then turn on the optional censor. With or without the censor, those people will be rude, and will be swearing. No censor will ever cure that. I can still flame at you all I want ingame, without the censor.

 

 

 

And about using god's name in vein, well, you can't force me to NOT say things because that'll offend someone's belief.

 

 

I say keep the censor, little kids play. Whether you like it or not this is a game for kids... Playing cards? Good grief. Have a little self control.

 

Not only little kids swear. Everyone swears.

[mikeg0477]

religiously; jagex has screwed us over already, so why not allow the derogatory names for gays, whites, blacks, Hispanics etc? They allow the use of using God's name in vein and that's really the only problem I have with cussing, besides being a gentleman around the ladies of course. :thumbup:

 

 

Religiously, Jagex allows pretty much all the "commandments" to be broken. Other Gods, false idols, name in vain, no sabbath day, killing(both npcs and PvP), stealing(there's a skill for that!), and more! But to use that as justification to allow racial slurs is just wrong.

 

 

 

OT: I see no need to change the censor. I've yet to have a problem communicating with people on RS, and I think that shutting it off would cause too many instances of ignorance running amok.

[RuneAge]

The only problem i have with the censor to date is, when you say for example: "I'm going for 99 fishing" Reply: "oo, gl" = "o***" which i find very frustrating :wall:

[Wizz]

What's the point of making paragraphs? The point isn't to press the enter space once for the hell of it. The point is to make your words easier to read. Who cares if he put paragraphs or not? The fact is: it's hard to read. Sure there are paragraphs, but since they don't accomplish anything, they're as good as not there.

 

 

 

Yeah, he could have at least used the tab key or something.

 

 

 

EDIT: There are censors irl, they're just all metaphorical.

 

 

 

What do you mean?

 

Tab key does not work here unless you want to put spaces, wich won't work either.

[Gpguy]

Thank you Wouter, I did not realize that this did not have breaks in it when I typed it in Microsoft Word.

 

 

 

I added the following to the original post, here it is:

 

 

 

One point that I would like to address is the "children should be protected" viewpoint. Now, while I understand that some may view children as innocent angels who shouldn't be corrupted, I don't think such inductive reasoning can be applied on all children, especially ones who play runescape. Often, it is more likely that it will be children using language in a vulgar way rather than adults.

 

 

 

Moreover, children who are censored and told by oppressive rules that they should not say derogatory things develop a resentment toward the authority that imposes such sanctions upon them. They will simply search for more ways to amuse themselves with words which are not censored. And this leads to the adding of words to the censor and the impedance of communication between many people which I referred to in my original post. The children are unaware as to WHY using language in a vulgar way is detrimental to the environment of runescape.

 

 

 

As was the case with the RWT, children asked their parents for money to buy RSGP with, and the parents gave them birthday gifts of RSGP, and neither of them actually knew what was going on 8000 miles away with credit card fraud, human rights abusers, and other terrible things caused by RWT. When Jagex told of these horrors, the most selfish among the children probably only thought of themselves and the fact that they wouldn't be able to get money without working anymore. The compassionate would have realized that RWT was wrong. The exposure to evil is, however, evidently present among children.

 

 

 

The compassionate learn about why to follow rules like offensive language, scamming, and RWT through their conscience. The selfish, through their personal losses, such as their accounts, or liberties. The latter group inevitably has a hard lesson to learn. Don't think any censor or restrictions otherwise can prevent this.