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Xyzzу

What's the stupidest censorship you've ever seen?

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Man of Doom said:

I recall that in the "censored" version, they replaced the penis with a graphic that says "European version only."


that's actually very funny in itself XD, kinda shows the absurdity of censoring it

the stupidest censorship i remember was on some cheesy telenovela (eva luna i think) there was this small michaelangelo david decoration on the background, and the crotch of the figure was blurred out

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One of the stupidest acts of censorship of the recent time was when a small French town had to remove a newly installed statue of St. Mary, because it was funded from public money and thus disrupted the secular republican principle. In a country where you have statues like that on every other corner already.

But I fucking love it, because the law was primarily aimed against Muslims and their women's headware and whatnot. Yet it swung the other way somehow. Fuck Christians that cannot believe they're getting the yard stick over something that was meant to bully just everyone else, ahahaha!

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Anyone remember the case of Youtube gaslightning the whole web? I kinda wished it would have generated more outcry than it did but alas.

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dew said:

But I fucking love it, because the law was primarily aimed against Muslims and their women's headware and whatnot. Yet it swung the other way somehow. Fuck Christians that cannot believe they're getting the yard stick over something that was meant to bully just everyone else, ahahaha!



That's bound to happen with nearly every law which is supposed to keep minorities in check but can't be phrased as such because it'd be considered discriminating. Eventually it backfires against the people who cooked it up and then they cry foul.

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dew said:

One of the stupidest acts of censorship of the recent time was when a small French town had to remove a newly installed statue of St. Mary, because it was funded from public money and thus disrupted the secular republican principle. In a country where you have statues like that on every other corner already.

But I fucking love it, because the law was primarily aimed against Muslims and their women's headware and whatnot. Yet it swung the other way somehow. Fuck Christians that cannot believe they're getting the yard stick over something that was meant to bully just everyone else, ahahaha!

Yes, it was a big problem, burqas being funded by taxpayer money, that's why the anti-Muslim veil laws apply to statues...

Maybe you shouldn't be conflating stuff that are barely related together? The principle of secularism and separation between church and state have nothing to do with Muslims and are much older than Maghrebi immigration to France.

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Gez said:

Maybe you shouldn't be conflating stuff that are barely related together? The principle of secularism and separation between church and state have nothing to do with Muslims and are much older than Maghrebi immigration to France.

Eh, you're right. I love the heartwarming irony of the situation, but I fully support the way it was handled.

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dethtoll said:

People who censor their own dirty words. What's the fucking point?

There was actually this one guy on another forum I frequent that had an e-nanny installed after his parents saw his deviantart history, and it automatically censored ALL swear words. It was hilarious since it also censored posts he quoted so it looked like he was doing it all himself.

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I'm surprised no one has mentioned 4Kids' mere existence as a contender.



I still cringe on that national anthem everytime.

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bedbug182 said:

I cant seem to embed videos on here.

Put the link between [yt] tags instead of [url] tags.

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scifista42 said:

Put the link between [yt] tags instead of [url] tags.

Yes, but just put the 'x5VhBatNLTE' part between the tags, not the whole link.

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^ It used to work only that way, but since a year or two ago (thanks to Linguica), it works even if you put the whole link between the tags.

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scifista42 said:

^ It used to work only that way, but since a year or two ago (thanks to Linguica), it works even if you put the whole link between the tags.

Oh, nice. I haven't posted many videos since then (well, slightly less than that...closer to 0), and I'm used to the old way.

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Anybody ever been to a forum with a strict word filter installed? I mean, obviously the Scunthorpe Problem is a thing, but I once saw a website that censored all instances of "Hell" into "heck", unconditionally. This resulted in the forum's own Welcome thread tripping the filter, coming out as "Heck o, new users!"

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I was playing Wizard 101 with my niece some time ago, and I remember that they have some of the oddest words to filter, which would show up as '...'. Some examples:

whole
savage
any number, except 'one' curiously
any digit, including '1'

If you wanted to use numbers, it would have to be something like "third ty sixth".

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Who knows? But they do, and it made communicating some things much harder than it should have been. Not impossible, of course, but it made some conversations downright silly at times.

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Ichor said:

I was playing Wizard 101 with my niece some time ago, and I remember that they have some of the oddest words to filter, which would show up as '...'. Some examples:

whole
savage
any number, except 'one' curiously
any digit, including '1'

If you wanted to use numbers, it would have to be something like "third ty sixth".


Apparently numbers are censored to avoid the exchange of phone numbers and addresses with minors. Go to the fourth post in that thread.

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That might explain the digits, but why are number words (two, nine, etc.) censored too?

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While I don't think the censorship of the word "nigger" is stupid, I do think it is kind of excessive. I understand why it is considered a very strong term under certain circumstances, but it has come to a point where it is even being censored in Spanish as well. The problem is that in Spanish the word "negro" is not considered offensive. It is just the word "black", basically. As such, it does not carry the negative connotation of the, huh, "n-word". I say this because a while ago, there was this product called Negrito (meaning something like "little black person"), made by Grupo Bimbo (it was one of those little breads with chocolate sold in a plastic bag, I don't know how you call that in English), that has his name changed to Nito (I assume they had the intention of selling it in the U.S. maybe?), I suppose to avoid offending anyone*. But why rename it for the Mexican market as well? And a lot of people were very surprised by this, because, as I stated before, it is not an offensive word by any means. Actually, it is not unusual hearing it being used like a term of endearment: "¿Qué pasó mi negro?" ("What's up my nigger?"), or being used as a nickname for people that is usually not "black" (as in "african american"), but just a dark brown: "Ahí viene 'el negro', abre la puerta para que pase." (literally "Here comes 'the nigger', open the door so he can pass."). And no one gets offended. Like, not a single person. I think one of the main reasons for this is the fact that there are very few "african americans" in Mexico (I mean, there are quite some of them here, but they are relatively very few), and those that you find "in the street" are usually business people, or tourists, or foreign students (I have never seen a "poor black person" here, so there you have), so people tend to treat them accordingly (of course we have our fair share of idiots, so racism against black people is not unheard of, but it is no that common). Instead, racism here tends to be focused on indigenous (native?) people, and here we have the opposite: while in English the word "indian" isn't considered offensive, here the word "indio" is usually seen as offensive (not as offensive as "nigger", but still offensive), and it is actually difficult to use it without sounding like an asshole (the term "indigena" is preferred, especially in formal talk).

I say all of this because, I insist, the word is just a "normal" term, but with this move it is possible that people might start seeing as a "bad word". But unlike in English, in Spanish we have no alternative. You have the word "black". We do not have an equivalent. There is no other way to describe something black in the Spanish-speaking world without using the word "negro". And I think that stigmatizing the word for no apparent reason is one of the consequences of this very, very stupid censorship.

*Another thing: the image for this bread was (and still is) a guy with an afro. The only difference is that in the earlier version (Negrito) the guy was black, and now (Nito) is white. But the afro (and the new name) still hint at what it's supposed to mean. It reminded me of the quote about the n-word by Louis CK (I think?): "It’s bullshit ‘cause when you say ‘the n-word’ you put the word nigger in the listener’s head. That’s what saying a word is. You say ‘the n-word’ and I go, ‘Oh, she means nigger.’ You’re making me say it in my head. Why don’t you say it instead and take responsibility … for the shitty words you want to say?".

TL;DR: It makes no sense at all to censor the "n-word" in another language than English. In no time, we will be talking about "The N-Country".

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Ichor said:

That might explain the digits, but why are number words (two, nine, etc.) censored too?


So you can't spell out numbers.

Perhaps you can use these words instead if you want to give some kid your phone number so badly.

Won, too, thuhree, fore, phive, sicks, sehvin, ate, nein, zearoh.

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Swine & Roses said:

Replacing all characters with robots is a classic in German video games.
Like Soldier of Fortune 2, which had its Mercenary vs. Terrorists gameplay replaced by a plot involving Androids from another world assimilating mankind.


Holy shit. I never realized they did that with Soldier of Fortune 2 in Germany. I mean, I knew games were censored when they had Nazi symbols, and gore was a sensitive issue that could cause issues. RTCW was pulled because they forgot to replace a blurry texture, but it still had full gore in it. But to replace all of the enemies in SOF 2 with robots with exploding heads? That just seems like a joke. Like the censored version of The Big Lebowski.

I would actually like to play the censored version after modifying the explosion sprites to make it look like giant exploding clouds of blood. The shotguns in that game were already satisfying, might as well make a giant bloodsplosion as well.

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TraceOfSpades said:

So you can't spell out numbers.

Perhaps you can use these words instead if you want to give some kid your phone number so badly.

Won, too, thuhree, fore, phive, sicks, sehvin, ate, nein, zearoh.

I read a study awhile ago where scientists put a five year old infront of a computer with a mature filter and asked him to write all naughty words he could think of. After five minutes he had written "I want to put my giraffe in your elephant". Taken from my memory.

This proves a main point -- I believe, of the futility of trying to censor language: Language change, and you can always implicate what you mean.

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Zed's post on the use of the word "nigger" outside of America is fascinating, and unfortunately a sign that we as a culture have completely given in to fear, to the point that we're not questioning why the word is considered offensive, we just assume it is and try to make sure no one says or even spells it. It is literally the only ethnic slur in English that has a euphemism. I cringe when my adult ass friends say it, because I want to just shake them and go, "You're not a goddamn child! You can say the word!" But they have grown up around a society that has been very hush-hush about it, so they think that's the appropriate protocol.

Furthermore, I think it is deeply offensive to black people to use the phrase "the 'n' word" because it implies that black people are so savage and uncivil, that if you use the word in full, you'll get your ass beat. I've seen this behavior many times, where white people will suddenly get deeply uncomfortable around a black person they don't know, because they assume if they do or say the wrong thing, they're in for a ass whupping. That is a disgustingly racist attitude that makes some really broad and ugly assumptions.

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