Homestar Runner Wiki Forum

What is yor opinion on censorship and how everything has to now be polliticly correct. I mean it has gone so far that Christmas break now has to called Winter Break, and we get in trouble if we write Merry Christmas on the board at school. What do you think?

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Wow, It's been like three or 4 years since I've last been here

Well, it depends. Some censorship I have no problem with--for example, I don't think gory or sexual pictures should be shown on the news or where kids will almost definitely see them. (This also applies somewhat to Interweb censorship--for example, I think things like Goatse should be taken off the Interweb entirely.)

Political correctness, however, I have some problems with. For example, one time--I think I was in 4th or 5th grade--I brought an issue of MAD Magazine that parodied the second X-Men movie. Of course, it had Mystique in it. Of course, Mystique was naked (remember, she was naked in the movie too). It wasn't even remotely explicit--you couldn't actually see anything, but some girl saw it, complained, and got the magazine banned from the school. I have a major problem with that kind of thing.

I'm also not a huge fan of censoring every little thing. For example, in 4th grade, we weren't allowed to say "darn", because it was a "euphemism for a swear word and therefore just as bad as the real thing". (The teacher's words, not mine.) Again, I have serious problems with that.

I can kinda understand the whole "Christmas Break/Winter Break" thing, especially if there are a lot of kids at your school who don't celebrate Christmas. The thing about getting in trouble for writing "Merry Christmas" on the board, on the other hand, is pretty bad. Freedom of speech and all that. It's not like you can pretend that Christmas doesn't exist.

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No, almost everyone celebrates Christmas and well we really didn't get in trouble fo it, but it is a rule that is not really enforced.

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Wow, It's been like three or 4 years since I've last been here

I think censorship of almost any kind (except things like curse words on little kid shows and stuff like that) is pointless. People who are easily offended usually have no reason for being offended other then whatever made them upset is strange to them and can't find an emotion for it. It's like if you say underwear in a pre-school and all the little kids laugh, except the little kids are soccer moms and underwear is some "un-politically correct" thing.

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Sorry dude, but ABP'D.

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Darn it BTG! You got dibs on all the good topics!

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nope this is our personal opinions on censorship and how everything needs to be polliticly correct. Not if censorship is constitutional.

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Wow, It's been like three or 4 years since I've last been here

What I love about the Internet is that it has so much more freedom than television and other media when it comes to censorship. I would be pretty ticked off if the government came in and tried to censor the Internet. It would be extremely hard for them to enforce it, though, because unlike television the Internet is run by average people, where anybody can create content.

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[porplemontage studios]
>>internet entertainment

Good point. Though there are some things that are simply obscene that I really don't think should be on the Interweb.

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There are some horrible things on the internet, that's for sure. The problem, though, is gonna be who gets to decide what's obscene. One person's nudity is another person's art (if all parties are consenting, then let them have their fun).
There is a lot of things on the internet that I wish weren't there, but that doesn't mean someone should be punished for putting it there.When we start getting more tolerant towards restrictions on freedom, we lose more freedoms.

I'm all about protecting the kiddies online, but, if parents want to do that, they need to monitor their kids and not just turn them loose on the big bad internet. It's not a safe place for kids, but, then again, neither are the schools where they send their kids.

When it comes to giving up things like "Merry Christmas" for the sake of political correctness, I think it's all a bunch of crap. There are 2 reasons I feel this way.
1)Christmas isn't a Christian holiday anymore. It's purely a reason for people to spend ridiculous amounts of money and behave like absolute lunatics. Look at the malls this weekend if you don't believe me.
2) You're not gonna please everyone (or, in most cases, not even a majority of people). Changing things to make some people happy will just make a different group mad.

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If you can't fix it with a hammer, you have an electrical problem.

There's a certain point where it's okay. For instance, I have no problem with banning, say, curse words from being displayed in a day care center. But it's been taken WAY beyond 'too far', far beyond 'ridiculous', and lately it seems like linguistic McCarthyism.

I personally feel that while censorship might be good in some cases, it is uncontitutional. (The freedom of speech is in our first amendment). A case in which it is bad is when political correctness gets violated. For instance, celebrating Halloween has been banned at my sister's elementary school due to the fact that three Wiccan parents complained that "Halloween gives them a bad image". But here's the kicker: the three Wiccan parents don't send their kids to school on Halloween anyway. So why make a fuss? Because of human nature. Everybody wants to have it their way, even if it means upsetting others. This case has happened with many people before, and I guarantee you it will happen again.

Just my $0.02.

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Going as far as banning words is downright awful. Who's to decide what is and what isn't offensive? I do realize how somethings may affect young children. That's where parents come in. Censorship should be a family thing. Not something the government should do.

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TIRES TIRES TIRES

Actually, I don't even think that this kinda censorship should be mandated from a legal standpoint.
If people want to put obscene stuff all over the walls of a day care, let them. The parents will censor it by putting their kids in another day care.

I've always felt that, for society to be free, there should be no legally mandated/enforced censorship. Let the public deal with it however they want.
I don't even think that so called "hate speech" should be censored. If you don't like people like the KKK, and you think they're a bunch of morons, let them speak.. Their words will prove your point.
As the often cited saying (I want to call it a Chinese proverb, but I doubt that it REALLY is) goes, "It is better to remain silent and be assumed a fool then to open your mouth and remove all doubt"

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If you can't fix it with a hammer, you have an electrical problem.

Well, I don't make a lot of posts here, but this topic sparked my inspiration.

What I don't seem to understand is why some words are "more bad" than other words. They most(Maybe all, I'm not going to check) have alternate meanings of regular ol' things. What's odd is that cursing is not allowed at our school, yet some teachers allow it. Of course, it's from the "rapper/hip hop immitators who think slang words and sagging clothes are awesome" type of kids, so I'm not sure if they get the benefit of the doubt from that.

But, I almost got in trouble for saying "crap" today during Math after messing up on half the work. The teacher's all like, "What did you say?" so I played dumb and just replied with I messed up.

As for Christmas and such at school, it's all fine and dandy by me on some occasions, but sometimes after what my dad says about back when he was in school and they all made ornaments for their parents after hanging them on a tree really makes me feel like a part of school is missing for the most part. But, since schools are mainly multi-cultural now, I understand.

Then again though, our teacher played the Home Alone 2 video during Health today as we had nothing else to do. It was basically all about Christmas but no one in our class was offended by it.

So, I don't know, I don't care. Life's how it is.

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This is for another topic, but let me remind you that we don't have unlimited freedom of speech. Toast paint.

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Actually, I'm against unlimited freedom of speech, firstly because we DON'T have it, and secondly because I don't think people like Pat Robertson should be allowed to use the media to spead ideas which are accepted by most academics as hateful in the manner which he does.

I don't think the government should decide it, but over in England they have the ITC which do a good job, though often go a little fat with the P.C. stuff, it's pretty rare.

I think it's crazy why some words are considered "bad" and others aren't "bad" it's like they chose random words and said, "Alright, this, this, and this word are going to be cut out of everything." They could've chosen "the" for all we know!

"Alright, children, we have new rules! One, no one will be able to say the following words, and if they do, they will be sent to my office for a metting...
Flamingo
Cake
Straw
Yar
Blender
..."

Anyways, some censory is okay, some isn't.

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I ahte how people say "You can't write "Merry Christmas" on the blackboard because it's enforcing relkigion!" How the heck is that enforcing religon? By nto allowing people to, it's forcing them to not be religious! People liek that are doign the opposite of what they say they';re doing! Some people think that every little thing anyone does that offends them even slightly is racist, sexist, or any number of this. It's not: IT's LIFE!

I also don't get why swears even exist. The F bomb is a word, so what if I say it? I don't, but how can a wod hurt anybody? A word nis nothing without it's meaning, and a meaning is a group of words, so words mean nothing. Why do they offend people? It only has a meaning if yopu let it have a meaning.

Everyone has their thing, and I know some things are strictly forbidden for people under age 18. I think you know what I'm talking about.

But really, for almost all of these things, there is no way to prevent underage people from viewing them. Most sites with offensive content simply say, "DO NOT ENTER IF YOU ARE UNDER 18" but they don't HAVE to obey that. Some make you provide a credit card number, but kids can really just find their parents' credit cards and do that. The safest precaution in this case would be to make EVERY SINGLE INAPPROPRIATE THING ON THE INTERNET PAY-TO-VIEW.

As it is, I'm very much against Internet censorship. Put whatever you want on the 'Net, just make sure people are warned, and use approppriate protection.

There's a law against cursing in IM conversations or emails, which I think is completely out of line. How are they going to find out if people are doing it anyway? If every email and IM conversation I had was sent to authorities, I'd be mighty suspicious. And yet there is no law against posting it on the Internet, where any ol' chap can read it.

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Can't be true, the conservative branch wouldn't allow it, it goes against the first amendment right, freedom of speech.

No, that's rubbish. There is however, a ridiculous law against harassment. I once got an email from someone's "lawyer"(i.e. someone had a lawyer in the family) because I emailed someone that "didn't want" to be emailed that had already treated me in a very hateful manner.

The guy made up lies about me attacking his server too. I have no such capability. WHat I did do was try to access the site under another account and possibly IP to PM various people - and also made a topic as most people hadn't known what had happened (I had been banned even though people were ganging up to me in an extremely shameful but somehow "Mature" manner). They editted it to say "Just a troll, move along". Which is a LIE, going by the definition of troll, they were attempting to cover up what had happened behind the scenes, so I attempted to post with another two accounts, which met a similiar fate. After which, I gave up completely(this is important) and emailed the guy an hour or two later.

They were pretty mild mannered emails, all thing considering.

It was a demonstration of how nutty some Texan people can me, and how messed up most of U.S. law is.

Luckily, she couldn't really do anything. My IP didn't trace back to anything useful, nor did she have my real name.

But they actually were threatening to sue me if I didn't keep away from their server permanently(which, at the time, I was already doing). They knew I was a young transgender, with no money, almost no friends, who was horribly depressed and unstable. They wanted to use their "Power" for something. They wanted to hurt someone and feel like it was justified.

It's one of the few times I've come face to face with a truly evil person.

It was still a frightening, horrible but almost amusing experience.

When I get old enough and have enough money, I have a good mind to seek that asshat down and sue the pants out off him.

I've still been trying to find somewhere relavant I can take everything that happened.

E-Harassment shouldn't be illegal. That person could have ignored me at any time - and I wouldn't have attempted to access the forums again if one of the mods/admins had spoken to me.

It was a completely avoidable situation.

I don't think I've ever heard of anyone using the law for anything good in his type of scenario, but to bully someone.

It's pretty disgusting.

I think a more appropriate statement would be, "how nutty some PEOPLE can be."

Also, please watch your language.

As it is, I heard the law against cursing in IM and email from a private investigator and former police officer. I think it IS a breaching of the Constitution, and a poorly enforced one at that. I'll continue to swear at my leisure in IM conversations.

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It can't be illegal. I severely doubt I broke any laws in what I did, either, but if you have a lawyer, you have a lawyer.

If eh was going to sue you because you emailed someon who didn't wnat to be emailed, then can't I sue Viagra? Or "Naked barn Animals Photos"? Seriously, I got that oen once.