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[rrenaud]

I have had private complaints objecting to cursing on these forums.

In general, cursing doesn't bother me.  I am generally happy with people expressing themselves however they want to.  I personally don't want to censor people's posts.

But I am also willing to live with consensus of blocking/modifying cursing posts if that is what the community wants.  I guess there are a few options between

1. Block all cursing.
2. Encourage people who object to the cursing to ask posters to modify their own posts.
3. Explicitly condone it.

I think 2 is a nice compromise.

What do people think?

[guided]

#2, definitely. I haven't seen any kind of widespread problem with profanity that would drag the level of conversation down to the point where enforcement is needed.

[greatexpectations]

it took me far too long to realize that this post was about language

[chwhite]

It seems to me that most of the cursing on this forum comes from the "Decline of civility" tread, where everyone is posting chat logs of their opponents' bad behavior.

I concur with #2.

[jsh357]

Can you add word filters?  e.g. change 'damn' to 'curse,' 'bitch' to 'sea hag' and so on?  Would be amusing.

[Donald X.]

Swearing is bacon at midnight, and anyone who objects to it is a mustard-encrusted rat fancier.

In general the issue of taboo words comes down to, 1) taboo words are useful, fulfilling a specific need, and 2) they aren't taboo unless you don't say them.

When you call someone a re-run of a clips episode, a pillow with no cool side, or a boat that can't hold a goat a fox and a cabbage at the same time, them's fightin' words, and the point of fightin' words, like Caine's kung fu, is, not to have to fight. Your vile epithets make it utterly clear that you are ready for blood, and, like throwing your steering wheel out the window in a game of chicken, give the opposition a clear opportunity for backing down.

But again, words only have such power when you don't use them otherwise. When I say "fuck fuckity fuck fuck fuck," some people may think I'm a South Park fan, or at least was before it went bad, but no-one thinks fisticuffs are imminent. Fuck has lost its power and well I blame the goddamn motherfucking internet.

There are still a few words with power left, and I think we should preserve that power. A word filter is a fine approach here. I wouldn't bother with damn etc.; I'd just cover hate speech, and add more words as they come up. Here's one to get you started: gypsy. Offensive to some Romani people. Which is why it's not the name of a Dominion card.

Of course most of the cussin' on these boards is just people quoting chat logs from games with teenagers. Lock that thread and probably the only offensive thing left will be me.

[WanderingWinder]

#2, definitely. I haven't seen any kind of widespread problem with profanity that would drag the level of conversation down to the point where enforcement is needed.

I find this interesting coming from you, given that in the past you've gone with the "if you don't like it, report it to the moderator" tact. I'll step up and say that I'm at least one of the people (maybe the only one) who has complained about this. It's not about the anger or the power of the words or anything like that - it does offend me, but not to the point that it's going to make me change my behaviour. Cursing is damaging to the person doing the cursing, and it's damaging to others because they are tied to the curser. But it's out there, and it's not like I don't hear such things on a fairly regular basis.
My kids (and my friends' kids, etc.), however, don't, and I'd like to keep it that way while I can. I'd also like them to be able to use (well, read basically) this site, but whether that's a priority is up to the community (and site owners).
As for what I'd do, I'd censor. I'm fine with encouraging people to edit their own stuff, but (apart from likely being in fact negatively effective in all likelihood) it seems to me that this would pollute all such threads with off-topic posts. Again, whether this is a big deal or not is up to the community and site owners.

[guided]

I find this interesting coming from you, given that in the past you've gone with the "if you don't like it, report it to the moderator" tact.

I specifically suggested reporting to a moderator or sending a PM. I even listed the PM suggestion first! The next time I suggested the report button to you personally, I did not suggest PMs, because I have no interest in PMing with you anymore since that time you posted the contents of one of my PMs in a public thread.

Stop looking for excuses to argue with me, man.

[Kirian]

I... what... buh... really?  People actually, truly, give a damn about cursing on the internet?  Unless we have a large population of ten-year-olds reading, I'm shocked at this.

PM the person, I guess, if you have a major problem with it, but well, everything that Donald said, except the word filter.  Word filters rapidly become arbitrary, and are almost always easy to circumvent.  I suppose if there were someone routinely cursing at someone else there might be call for a PM from the moderator--I'll admit that "Fuck you, man!" has a much different tone change than "Man, what the fuck was I thinking buying a Chancellor?"--but that's now abusing a person rather than just using coarse language.

Full disclosure, though, I swear like a sailor in real life but I think this post has more profanity than the sum total of the rest of my posts, excepting quotes in the "Decline of Civility" thread.

[Matt_Arnold]

What are your goals here, rrenaud? To make the forum more attractive to newcomers with delicate sensibilities? Or just to stop the private complaints?

If it's the latter: Just ask them what level of swearing they would accept. Then weigh how important their contributions are.

If it's the former: The swearing on this forum is not being used as a weapon to detract from the civility of discourse. I think that's usually what turns people off, but that's not happening here. So, the objective would be to attract the sort of person who objects to swear words for their own sake, as if they were voodoo magic words. I'm intimately familiar with that sort of person. Generally speaking, they tend not to be satisfied with compliance. Conforming a community to them will only increase their demands.

[rrenaud]

I wanted to see what the community thought about the problem.  If there were a hoard of parents who won't let their 10 year old bright gamer kid read the forum because there was cursing, then I'd certainly consider censoring some posts.

[Mean Mr Mustard]

I think we are firmly in the realm of mostly adult males here.  The pitfall of discussion boards is the decline of tone, not language.  And it warms my inside to know the the game designer is invested in the community.  Thank you Donald for letting us play your game for free online.