How come I'm seeing "removed" all over the place?
I gather some server is for some arcane reason censoring naughty words to protect our delicate sensibilities. Is it on my end, on lemmy.ml? Is it the server people are posting from? Is it something happening in the federation? Is it the Romulans?
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Lemmy has a slur filter regex. In case you're curious, you can see an instance's regex using this url (replacing the domain as needed):
https://lemmy.ml/api/v3/site
CTRL+F "slur_filter"
Well, that's a nice place to go see a list of slurs.
I didn't see cracker or honkey on the list. Maybe that's punching up. What about redneck?
Huh, there are some filtered slurs in there I've never heard of before! I guess this probably isn't the place to ask to whom they apply and how, though. Still, the list isn't as long as I expected, and doesn't seem to apply to profanity so much as just offensive slurs. I feel like the "b-word" is a little bit of a stretch, but I can appreciate the intent there.
Thanks for giving the best answer here!
This filter was very controversial, especially because at first it was hardcoded into Lemmy itself, and the devs initially were insistent in keeping it that way. Fortunately they eventually allowed it to be configurable by instance, which is a much more sensible approach. Especially considering other languages and even some english variants. And while most people like you and me appreciate the intent, many are still unsure if this is a good approach to fight the problem. It does seem hard to avoid a lot of silly false positives. I remember someone mentioning being really confused by this "Sremovedew Valley" mentioned everywhere, until they realized it was just Stardew Valley being mangled by the filter.
It’s the clbuttic problem, also known as the Scunthorpe problem.
See also: particitrousers
The only one I didn't recognize was the mud + slime one (apparently it's a derogatory corruption of "muslim"). The rest are relatively common/well known.
Wоrd fіltеrѕ аrеn't thаt еffесtіvе thоugh‚ lаnguаgе јuѕt еvоlvеѕ аrоund thеm․
Аlѕо‚ hоmоglурhѕ․․․ Тhеrе'ѕ роtеntіаllу thоuѕаndѕ оf wауѕ tо wrіtе bіtсh wіth Unісоdе ѕubѕtіtutіоnѕ․
A lot of people use slurs like "narcissist" without thinking, and won't go to the effort of bypassing a filter. In that case the advantage is it gets people to think about their actions. I am perfectly happy with a system where moderates don't use slurs and reactionaries can, because it allows us to educate the moderates while banning the reactionaries.