some kind of censor?
TappedOut forum
Posted on May 7, 2014, 7:03 p.m. by K34
This is directed at yeago! or whomever manages the site. Can we get some kind of a language filter on these decks? Scrolling down the front page I see a deck named fck your sht (sans stars). I have kids, I don't want them seeing this kinda stuff when I log on here. Would it be too hard to rig up some kind of a system that grabs those words and if nothing else just puts the stars in place of the vowels?
it's yeaGO!, linking makes it easier to see the post. I agree there should be a censor, but for entirely different reasons. some people do post some very offensive decks titles. I don't really care about names with rude words in them, but I recently saw a deck that was heavily anti-semitic title, and the description was all about hitler and the other leaders of the nazi movement. I would suggest a flagging system, so at least rude or poor word choices can be brought to attention.
May 7, 2014 7:31 p.m.
GoldGhost012 says... #4
We have a flagging system. It's called the community. I remember that deck and the discussion (oh god the discussion) it generated, and it didn't take very for people to notice it and call it out.
May 7, 2014 7:36 p.m.
For problems such as the ones you are bringing up, I agree for a censor of some sort. However, for the topics that are not blatantly inappropriate, and are simply "taboo", I think we can just leave that to the community to handle. It would be impossible to identify every subject that makes people uncomfortable anyway, and there would be a lot of grey area even then.
May 7, 2014 7:50 p.m.
Oh, I remember that thread. It devolved into ChiefBell and a few other people arguing about world politics. I love T/O :)
May 7, 2014 7:51 p.m.
@goofyfoot: The flagging idea is probably better. I remember seeing a deck title on here that was something along the lines of 8 bodies but 9 if you count the baby. I'm sure he was trying to be funny or sensational, but I certainly don't think it's funny. Like I said, I have a child, nothing about dead babies is funny to me. I also saw one once that remarked negatively on homosexuals.
May 7, 2014 7:52 p.m.
GoldGhost012 says... #8
Honestly, that discussion made me a little sad. Especially since we'd had like 2 more of those kinds of back and forth "discussions" in about 3 days.
May 7, 2014 7:53 p.m.
Ah yes, that one, RedSoxFanKy did a good job on that one.
I feel like an Old Fogey now...
May 7, 2014 7:56 p.m.
frankly, I'm fine with TASTEFUL dark humor, and I really don't give a crap about language. And in the end you can't censor the internet, and this site never did claim to be kid friendly. But hate speech and derogatory language are inappropriate everywhere, and some people do it to be trolls and they frankly shouldn't be tolerated. go troll youtube and 4chan if you need to be an ass.
May 7, 2014 7:59 p.m.
@GoofyFoot, Be careful, "hate speech and derogatory landguage" are very subjective (unlike generic swearing). If you censor things too much, it's easy to become worse than the people you're trying to quiet.
May 7, 2014 8:06 p.m.
Oh yeah that fascism one. Turns out the US has a different political system to the EU, which led to me and some guy arguing for ages about something that turned out to be nothing more than a language difference. Kind of funny. Whatever, the deck was still grossly offensive.
I don't mind language or offense, I just mind ignorance. I'll laugh about hypothetical situations that most wouldn't dream of, but I don't find real life funny. So for example the dead baby joke that people keep bringing up, I thought was ok because it wasn't directly referring to any real event or any intent to carry out these actions. Whereas laughing at the holocaust is referring to something that really happened where about 6 million people died.
I draw the line between real life and fantasy.
May 7, 2014 8:06 p.m.
GoldGhost012 That was an exhausting week for me because it really seemed like everyone on tappedout had become super right wing for a few days which made me sad. When I say right wing I mean it in the european sense as in believing in social hierarchy and inequality etc. I can't stand it when people use the internet as some sort of platform for hate speech and intolerance, which isn't actually covered by the First Amendment, but apparently I know more about your rights in the US than most US citizens actually do.
Advocacy of illegal action, fighting words, and obscenity are not covered by the first amendment and do not have to be upheld. If a website decided that they wanted to ban things they deemed as obscene then any educated American wouldn't argue in favour of 'free speech' because it doesn't exist in the form they think it does.......
May 7, 2014 8:13 p.m.
GoldGhost012 says... #16
Crazy discussion. I think I ragequit reading the comments a few times because I just got so fed up with the fact that nobody could agree on anything those days.
May 7, 2014 8:19 p.m.
I'm in the teaching field
and if I ever did run an MTG club
I would not recommend this otherwise awesome sight as a resource or advertise that I am part of it
.
May 7, 2014 8:20 p.m.
Shouldn't disagree... know it will end in forum war eventually... CAN'T RESIST...
@ChiefBell, while TO can ban things they deem unsavory, I don't think they should. Not only is it hard to enforce and something of a slippery slope, we shouldn't even find most statements ban-worthy. Most offensive statements come in these forms:
Offensive statements by stupid people who believe in them. In this case, it should be elementary for a somewhat educated community member to refute what they're saying and either convince them otherwise or at least make evident the stupidity of the statement, thus solving the problem in a better way than banning it.
Offensive statements by intelligent people who believe in them. Well, if they are intelligent, it most likely means there is a legitimate argument behind that statement. Best course is to have a discussion with them, which should be enlightening for both sides. We really shouldn't ban statements that have legitimate supporting arguments, so it is once again a preferable method.
Offensive statements by trolls. Here, the problem is not even with the statement, but rather with the troll itself. Trolls with troll with or without content bans, better to simply ban the source.
In all cases, it seems to me that it is better to simply not ban particular veiwpoints/statements. Feel free to disagree, but I think the current system is pretty good.
May 7, 2014 8:33 p.m.
Blakkhand - you're welcome to disagree. You should know that I don't get annoyed or angry when people do, I just sort of say 'here's my view, here are the facts supporting my view, I hope you change your mind' etc.
Regarding points 1-3 - it's just so exhausting trying to show people why they're wrong all the time. You shouldn't put the onus on a small group of people to protect the community from offensive statements because it's tiring and unfair. When I had to argue about fascism for 3 days I was bloody tired and disgusted but I felt like I had to do it to protect the community. It's really, really unfair to assume that it's the duty of some individual to always be there to say 'this statement is damaging because reason X and fact Y' etc. It's honestly better to just get rid of these sorts of inflammatory statements.
Also the slippery slope argument isn't really true. You can set a threshold and stick to that threshold. For example - any statement that attacks a group of people is removed. That's a very specific rule that won't lead to escalation but will prevent stupid comments about fascism or supporting homophobia and racism. But it won't stop jokes about other things. A clear, set, agreed-upon threshold doesn't need to lead to this slippery slope.
A more interesting question is - why do you care if it's a slippery slope? Do you feel some compulsion to say things that you know will upset people? I think the slippery slope argument is really interesting because it means that the individual wants the right to say something that they know or fear may be banned. What rights does this individual actually want? Do you want to go around making inflammatory comments just because, hey, it's cool, no-ones going to stop you? I think my question is - to what end? why?
May 7, 2014 8:47 p.m.
ChiefBell's way with words/ability to explain himself will never cease to amaze me. Are you like majoring in political sciences or something? I mean this in all seriousness. I have rarely seen/read a more well spoken thoughtout individual IRL or on the net. (Except maybe Epoch).
I am a 28 yo father of two and while I try to shield them from some things, language is not one of them for a simple reason. I have taught them what is and isnt okay (not that the original poster isn't or anything) to the point where when my 5 yo gets mad he asks "what's the mad word I can say dad?"and I reply "dang it or darnit".
But there is a line. Gross uses of "dark humor" such as the DB jokes or things about the holocaust and the like I don't personally think are funny and my kids wouldn't get them anyway but it's the principal of the matter. This is why my kids do not get unsupervised internet time.
Just my 2 cents
May 7, 2014 9:12 p.m.
GoldGhost012 says... #21
For real, I might actually pass my AP Lit course if I had ChiefBell's superpower with words.
May 7, 2014 9:14 p.m.
Rasta_Viking29 says... #22
Let's not beat around the bush... I was the one in defense of that Nazi decks right to exist. I still feel that way for the simple fact that mob rule and automatically assuming that an opinion or idea differing from your own is wrong is a fault of American culture.
History and politics were discussed. History is what it is, most people are uninterested the truth and enjoy the U.S. government version of it. Politics are opinions and therefore no one is correct.
I in no way supported that deck. It was trash and had a deck description that was stupid. Only damage done was to the creators own self dignity.
No need to derail this thread.
May 7, 2014 9:22 p.m.
Oh I got ninja'd. Sorry Rasta_Viking29 if that came across negatively toward you. That was supposed to be just after gold.
May 7, 2014 9:35 p.m.
Uhhhh kind of feel a bit embarrassed. I write essays about human rights, normally focusing on feminism but I also write about medical ethics and people's right to withdraw consent and things. Spent a fair amount of time with lawyers and reading so I just learnt the law and how to express my opinions.
Honestly Rasta_Viking29 you have a good point about opinion diversification. It IS important to consider everyone's point of view. I just don't support it in relation to views that aim to silence other people - like when you say something like 'I hate insert group here'. All that does is erode the rights of other people and then you have a paradoxical situation where you're supporting speech under free speech protection that only serves to encourage the removal of free speech for Jews or homosexuals or African Americans or whatever else. If we encourage equal opinion then we can't support an opinion that says 'muslims don't get an opinion'. Put simply.
I support controlled censorship of tapped out. Not on the level of swear words and jokes but on the level of intolerance and hatred. More than anything else this should be a friendly community.
May 7, 2014 10:04 p.m.
Right - so I see that I should have used the word "site" - not "sight", yep, I am not quite perfect but at least I am aware of that!
I think that tappedout.net can either be a "respectable TOU enforced community" - the kind where it is safe to give profile details about yourself and advertise your membership in the community - or - it can go the way of 4Chan and we can all either make sure to never log in or check it at work (and hope certain people there never learn that we are members).
May 7, 2014 10:26 p.m.
MindAblaze says... #27
For the record "8 bodies and 9 if you count the baby" is a reference to the Tarantino film Kill Bill.
We live in a world where the right to free speech should be expected. I think we also live in a sensationalist world where people get there jollies from being shocking. Trolls aside, I think having calm informed conversations around any topic will leave us with the most fair site we can hope for. You can't change a persons mind once it's been made, you can only give them new information.
May 8, 2014 9:42 a.m.
But this is a magic site, not a political site. I don't come on here to have debates with people about why fascism is right wing. I come on here to have a fun time. If I then see someone being offensive it makes me feel upset because I have to waste my time explaining to them why their opinion is offensive and damaging. I do that because I want people to understand that there will be others who stand up to that sort of nonsense and say 'no, stop that', but I don't want to do it. I just feel like there should be a system in place where it's not an issue anyway.
May 8, 2014 9:48 a.m.
MindAblaze says... #29
Yes, I agree completely. Stating your boundaries is a difficult process that requires a lot of patience to do repeatedly, and we don't come to this website and expect it.
Having a broad censor seems overly complex and attempts to write the law...It could be something as simple as a "Report Deck" form where instead of having to get into a long-winded debate with them, you just submit a form and let the higher-ups give them a "please be wary that some statements may be offensive to others, yadda yadda yadda...potential ban etc etc..."
I realize this makes more work for someone, but maybe it could generate an automated response and also gives the user who submitted it feedback that it was submitted so that yeaGO! doesn't have more work every time somebody gets offended?
May 8, 2014 10:40 a.m.
megawurmple says... #30
I'm just going to be really controversial here and say that I actually enjoy debating on these kinds of matters, and seeing people's opinions and how diverse they can be. Just as an example, I found the debate over the deck full of Nazi references interesting as there were logical and well reasoned arguments on both sides. Obviously I don't want to encourage people to post deck names and descriptions with hateful and derogatory messages, but the debates can be intriguing. However, I do feel that this is most definitely the wrong place to host these debates. Feel free to have an opinion, but don't discuss it on a Magic site that people visit with the intention of having fun and discussing their hobby. I feel that a "report deck" button, or something to that effect, would be a very good addition to the site so that decks such as the one discussed can be removed or changed. Hateful messages are never tolerable, but they shouldn't distract from the purpose of this site.
On the topic of swearing, that's a bit of a non-issue. Even if some automated system was put in place to replace parts of the words with asterisks, most kids will know what the cencored word is anyway. There's no realistic way to stop kids being exposed to swearing on the internet, and in all honesty, it's not a huge problem if they are. There are worse things out there than swear words (such as the aforementioned racist and spiteful messages that can be found everywhere) and kids will learn swear words eventually through school friends and exposure to the outside world. My little sister, who is only 10, already knows the word c*nt, and she sure as hell hasn't seen that on any of the sites she's been on. The need for an automated censoring system is non-existent in my opinion.
May 8, 2014 2:36 p.m.
i'm never implementing anything like this, sorry. i only come down on deck creators when their decks are clearly and flagrantly hateful or there is a specific victim of harassment.
if you can only prove a hypothetical victim of a deck, i will only hypothetically remove it.
May 8, 2014 4:37 p.m.
Thanks, I didn't even know those kinds of programs existed. I'll try one out.
Rasta_Viking29 says... #2
I have a kid and would be opposed to this feature. If you are concerned about your kids reading cuss words then simply make the choice to not view this website in front of them.
May 7, 2014 7:06 p.m.