As a practical matter, the word “fuck” does not show up often on the main SDMB page. It appears pretty frequently in the Pit “last post” listing, but that’s at the bottom of the list. On most screens, the Pit listing isn’t visible unless you scroll down.
The word does appear often on the main Pit page, but not in other forums. Anybody who calls up the Pit page at work, where “fuck” or worse appears frequently, deserves what he/she gets.
We are willing to protect people from links to pages that are not workplace safe, but that’s a different animal. Such links involve pictures and graphic displays that are quite noticable, even for a boss wandering by at a distance, rather than just text which is not readable from across the room.
We do find random profanity irritating, and we might change our approach if it were to start appearing frequently and everywhere, that is, in all forums. However, barring something like that, we don’t see any reason for change. Those who are viewing the SDMB in a place where the word “fuck” itself is potentially awkward should not go to the Pit until they’re in a less restrictive environment.
Phew. I didn’t even know this was brewing and now it’s like finding out WW3 almost started last night. Censoring thread titles? Fuck no, and fuck any attempt to treat the paying membership of this board like children in an effort to protect the sensibilities of people too delicate to handle the real world. I blame their parents and their churches for crippling them so.
I think it was more about giving the paying members of this board a choice about how they would like it run (something the board administration has in the past been accused of ignoring) in one specific area.
Why not just quietly get some censoring software installed on your own computer that can automatically replace “fuck” with something innocuous like “bunny”, thus not advertising your general pansy-ness to the membership?
Well, be helpful and make your position clear as though to someone who showed up late. Were you voting for a policy of removing profanities from thread titles? In all forums or just non-Pit forums? And all out of concern that your friends might think less of you if you told them about this place and a big ol’ fat FUCK was right there on the main page?
If your friends would react that way, who needs 'em?
Or you could just read what I said on the previous page, where I explicitly stated that it wasn’t because I thought my friends were too delicate. Or you could not bother, and just make a massive leap to whatever conclusion suits you, oh, wait, you already did.
Sure, why not? I’ve read your post #40 where you “refrained from introducing people to the SDMB, not because I think they’re too delicate to read the word ‘fuck’ in appropriate context, but because of the first impression they might get if the main page shows a thread title like, well, like this one.”
(a contradiction - they’re not too delicate but their first impression could cause them to over-react)
And your post #45, where: “This is more about my reservations than the actual reactions of my friends and colleagues.”
(you’re apparently concerned about something, though it isn’t their reaction, it’s… something else, undefined).
Your vague concerns about your friend’s reactions (but not really about their reactions) are spineless and nebulous yet you want us to be concerned about them, i.e. you are a wuss.
So did you vote in favour of a no-swearing-title policy or against it, assuming you expressed an opinion? If in favour (and frankly, your statements in this thread have been too nebulous and wishy-washy for me to assume either way), weren’t you trying to make it our concern?
