It seems bizarre to me that, in a forum dedicated specifically (in part) to complaints about other posters, we are allowed to say whatever nasty things we want about another poster, except a certain list of specific Very Bad Words.
The fact that “go fuck yourself”, and variants, is restricted is especially ridiculous, since it is at this point, if anything, an expression whose potency has been diluted by overuse.
I mean, I can think of a lot of insults that would certainly pass the Pit’s language guidelines, but are far more shocking and offensive than the now-common “go fuck yourself”.
Someone called someone a cunt or something, someone got all butthurt over it, and Ed made up these new rules. Yes, I agree, they’re stupid. A lot of people think they’re stupid, so I’m NOT the only one saying so. But what can you do.
The were instituted because Ed Zotti felt those specific phrases were too insulting to be allowed against other posters. Here’s the thread where he made the announcement about the new rules, and presented his reasoning for them.
The overall philosophy of these boards has always been that it’s a place for people to engage in interesting and polite discussions, both with like-minded and unlike-minded folks. Thus, insulting other posters (however ridiculous their ideas) was neverl permitted. However, it was felt that there should be one place where people can let off steam, and so the Pit was created. When things got too wildly out of hand, Ed (and others) felt that even in the Pit, there needs to be some minimal amount of courtesy to the person that you’re calling a jackass. It was extremely difficult to draw the line, however; when is something too insulting to be tolerated? And so Ed decided that the easiest way to draw that line was to define some insults that were over the top. Hence, the list of words.
It’s not an ideal solution, but it’s better than any thing else we could come up with.
Does there need to be a line at all? Yes. We still want posters to be able to discuss things on a friendly and polite level elsewhere, and it’s hard to have any kind of polite discussion with someone who called you a “fucking cunt”, even if they told you that in another room.
The tone of the pit has not changed. You just can’t use a couple of phrases. Nothing was wildly out of hand then or now. I expressed my opinion then because it was an arbitrary stupid rule. Still is.
That is true only if you are wholly unfamiliar with the entire concept of Cecil Adams’ work. The overall philosophy of *that *is to denegrate and disparage the ignorant.
This is nonsensical. You can still call, and be called, all manner of insulting and nasty names in the Pit. The idea that a few chosen words would make people unable to behave civilly elsewhere, while all the other words are a-ok, is just…less than I expect from purportedly intelligent people.
The Pit was fine before. No change was necessary. We’re now in the position of having to go consult the official Unacceptable Words List before composing a Pit post. This does not improve anyone’s SDMB experience.
I agree with previous posters that not coming up with anything would have been the best solution.
I admit that originally I thought that you were going to “sanitize” the board and that it was only the first step in this direction. Fortunately, I was wrong. But the fact that it wasn’t your intent makes this arbitrary list of “words too bad to be used even in the pit” even more absurd.
Just to be clear, Ed didn’t start with a list of naughty words, It’s where he ended up after pretty much everyone was attacking him for the first 8 or so really retarded attempts at rules that Ed tried before he ended up with the “naughty words” list.
Anyone remember his first try at this where there was to be no flaming of other members in The Pit? Or a later one when he said that there would be no list but he’d know an off-limits word/phrase if he saw it? No, he won’t list them. Or my personal favorite and yours, the “You can flame another member in the Pit but only if the mods find it sufficently witty/funny” followed by a lame a “Haha just joking” on that one" type post after a ton of members hogpiled him over it?
The “naughty words list” is just a face-saving measure. An admin screwed up horribly by Warning a poster because he disagreed with her politically, she was called a “cunt”, Ed overreacted and this was where we ended up.
You make this sound almost as if there were a semblence of an objective standard being applied here. Others might characterize what happened as a “meltdown,” a “temper tantrum,” a “fit of pique,” etc.
But a polite conversation is much easily imagined with someone who just called you a “idiotic shit-for-brains”, right?
Is there a significant difference, trying to have any kind of polite discussion with someone who wrote a 500 words essay on the subject of what a fucking cunt you were ?
I’ve seen some pretty funny insults in the pit, but I can’t remember one that involved a 4 letter word. Someone with Tourette syndrome in church might be funny, but it just isn’t so in the pit.
If there was one rule I’d vote about getting rid of in a heartbeat, it would be the no naughty words directed at posters in the Pit rule. The whole idea just makes me either laugh or shake my head in disbelief.
You can direct naughty words at other posters in the pit just not certain words. Like I could call poster “numbnuts” a “shit-eating, baby raping, goat feltching, son of a bukake loving cum bucket” but not “cunt, motherfucker” or any variations of “go fuck yourself or fuck off.”
My recollection of how it came about is someone called a female mod a “cunt”.
I dunno. I think this line “fuck you and variants, e.g., go fuck yourself, fuck off and die, suck my dick, etc.” is a pretty blatant loophole. If they’re considering suck my dick a variant of fuck off, I don’t see why goat felching or shit-eating wouldn’t be variants either.
You may remember that, at the time, I repeatedly asked Ed and others who felt the Pit had turned into an out of control cesspool to find some other threads that supported that assertion. No threads were ever presented. It’s always easier to make arguments based on unsupported generalities, but the facts in this case simply don’t bear them out. My own take is that The Pit was far more rowdy and abusive in the early years, well before the ‘no f-word’ rule was put into place. However, having just had all the poster outrage in the Pit over Ed’s blanket ban on complaining a few months before, my guess is that the admins came into the Lynn situation feeling defensive and wanted to blame the poster anger on the forum, not the actions that provoked the anger.
As for better solutions, you should have taken my suggestion to impose a “don’t sass the admins” rule rather than mucking up the Pit, which would have solved the problem you were actually trying to solve. But your pride wouldn’t allow it, so here we are. It’s unfortunate.
That wouldn’t have worked either–remember, the whole mess started because an out-of-control Admin felt the need to create a rule on the spot (that’s never been enforced except that one time) just so she could warn someone for having broken it (before it existed) because he dared to have a different political opinion than her. In the Pit. :rolleyes:
Given that, sassing the admins is quite reasonable
I’m not saying they should have argued that sassing the admins was against the rules at the time, I’m saying that’s the rule they should have imposed when it became clear they weren’t willing to put up with any more insults, e.g. “don’t insult the admins, if you want to disagree with what they did or said as admins, do it politely in ATMB.” Let everyone else throw things at each other in the Pit as before, but give some cover to the admins who are sick of getting yelled at. Some would have still argued that such a rule is unreasonable, but I contend that it would have been far more logical than the rules that were imposed.
Another wrinkle was that this all happened during a time when Ed (and who knows who else) decided to try to turn this place into a money-maker, and felt that all the Pit naughtiness would scare off the wealthy potential customers that they were hoping to attract.