Censorship

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Censoroship in my view is unconstitutional.

When done by government. Private censorship is merely the exercise of control over how one's property is being used by another.

If I refuse to rent my assembly hall to a person who views I detest I am not legally censoring him. If it is my assembly hall I can rent it to whomsoever I please.

ruveyn

Private censorship makes more sense then censoring music and tv.

When it comes to censorship and this website, I think it is really a dead end argument. I can empathize with people's feelings on the matter, but that does not change the reality of the situation

I can't believe that I wasted 2 minutes scanning this thread. What a pointless exercise.

I determine solely and exclusively who is and who is not an as*hole.

Okay, yes, that was sarcasm. Actually I was joking in my original post. I mean, there is no objective criterion obviously.

I'll throw in my opinion regarding censorship and this site from my own moderator perspective. Other mods may or may not agree with my opinions, but they are probably not too dissimilar.

I am guided by the site rules and terms of service, also by previous moderator precedence. The site is first and foremost a support site. I treat the site as though it has three categories and I treat each category slightly differently from a moderator perspective:

1. PPR
This is a special forum. It is for debating and as such pretty much anything goes provided it stays within the site rules. It is more or less freedom of speech. It doesn't matter if some people have obnoxious or ill-informed opinions regarding politics, religion or virtually anything else. People can debate and criticize any religion, atheism, political party, public figures etc. Just because some members may belong to a particular religion (or atheism) or political party does not exclude it from debate. If people want to criticize atheism that is fine. Criticise Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, Paganism, Confucianism, Judaism, Satanism, Scientology etc all fine too.

The site rules DO protect a few groups. So it is not acceptable to make posts that attack based on (a) gender, (b) race or (c) sexual orientation.
a) So creating sexist threads is not acceptable. It would be acceptable to discuss sexism itself however, for example regarding the glass ceiling in job promotions faced by many women or other social issues associated with sexism.
b) Creating threads attacking black people (or any other colour) is not acceptable. However, it is quite acceptable to discuss issues regarding racial tensions and racism itself. So there would be no problem debating why race riots occurred somewhere, but it would not be acceptable to say that a particular race smells bad or are stupid.
c) Creating threads referring to fa***ts or making offensive remarks about people who are gay, lesbian, queer, transgender etc is not acceptable. It is acceptable to debate sexuality itself and the reasons why some people are not heterosexual. It is also acceptable to talk about gay lifestyles and culture etc, though that is perhaps better done in the LGBT forum.

One final point on these protected groups. While threads can be made discussing "around" sexism, race and sexual orientation, if a member creates a significant number of threads about these topics it may start to look like he has an *agenda* i.e. is pushing the rules a bit too close to the edge attempting to provoke or belittle these groups. In which case I (or other mods) will intervene.

I ask that people refrain from making personal attacks. Do not call people stupid or a***holes etc for not agreeing with you. You are allowed to think this - mods aren't the thought police! just don't express it in your posts! Attack the opinion not the poster. Personal attacks are a slightly fuzzy area because criticising someone's political or religious beliefs could be interpreted by some as a personal attack (I don't consider it such) similarly it is easy to insinuate that someone is stupid for having various opinions and frankly the mods don't have the time or inclination to wade through every post looking for sarcastic comments! Provided people don't get too out of hand this forum is given a wide scope for debate. Which frankly is what the members themselves want here, not mods stepping in all the time censoring their opinions.

2. The other forums (excluding PPR and The Haven)
Here the emphasis is on members sharing information, mutual support, general chit-chat and socialising. These forums are more heavily moderated than PPR and the rules applied more strictly. Mods are the door-keepers to keep the party running smooth and any trouble makers kept in check. The same thread that can happily exist in PPR would not be allowed to exist in the Random forum for example. Hot topics of debate belong in PPR.

3. The Haven.
The Haven is protected more than any other forum on this site, so if someone is in distress and posts there it is for help and support from other members, not to debate with him/her about their religion or atheism. Trying to persuade an atheist to pray to God or Jesus for support is not appropriate in the Haven, similarly attacking a believers religious views in the Haven is not appropriate either.

I don't think there is such a thing as "private censorship". In general, individuals and businesses can set their own rules about any number of things. A restaurant can refuse to serve you if you're not wearing a shirt, and they can also refuse to serve you if you're wearing a shirt with expletives printed on it. That's not censorship.
Real censorship, in which the expression of certain ideas is prohibited by law, is a serious threat to liberty and must not be tolerated.

Just to go back a minute, I often see this statement or a variation on it made when a moderator call is contested and/or someone has expressed unhappiness with a thread lock or edit, and I think it's a bit of a straw-man, if an unintentional one. No one wants the mods to back off of enforcing things like anti-spamming, trolling, or personal attack rules, what I've been seeing lately has been people reacting to subjective moderator calls about what is "offensive" as far as the TOS is concerned and declaring whole subjects off limits for discussion without discussion. As Tallyman points out later in the thread, PPR especially is different than the rest of the site in that it is explicitly not a support forum and is a designated area for debate and discussion, making content based restrictions, especially subjective and arbitrary ones, seem inappropriate.

That's not what I've seen (derp derp derp). Remember that you're dealing with Aspies here who tend to have very black and white perspectives and often don't understand social conventions; toss in the language barriers that are involved in with some of the disputed parties, and your mockery starts to look... unsporting.



Why would anyone want to censor you? This is PPR, we call out behavior and hash it out; censorship is for amateurs.



Good for you.

Your commentary is even more pointless. Next time, you might try developing and expressing your own elevated points, rather than simply telling us how pointless we are.

Trolling?!?!?!?!? Are you accusing me of trolling, especially after I've awarded you a gold star, which is the highest honor that anyone can bestow upon anyone? If I weren't such an honourable man, I would tell a moderator on you, and get you in trouble.

I find it interesting that people in the USA can get on the radio or cable television and say all sorts of vile and malicious things about our president, and about other personnages (such as, what's-his-name, that Jewish billionaire, or that college student who wanted her birth control pills paid for). In Thailand, you can do just about anything you want, but, say anything that could be construed as even mildly unflattering about their King, and you could be in a Thai prison for the rest of your life.

In North Korea, say anything unflattering about the Beloved Leader, and you will be liquidated.

See what happens to your career if you can't butter up your boss. I already know.

If we were employees in the same company (rather than just typing messages in the same thread from various parts of the world), then Vigilans would certainly be well positioned for a promotion and other honours, and I would be, well, the company's arrant pariah.

Which makes me wonder why Vigilans is going to so much trouble to butter up the moderators. Is it just his nature? Or, what in the world could he possibly be after? He does demonstrate quite a lot of skill.

I think that the distinction that some people here are making between government censorship and censorship by private organisations is just artificial. After all, it is not difficult to imagine a situation we could get ourselves into where the only effective way to distribute an idea is through private channels. If a certain means of communication or forum becomes ubiquitous, then it is important for free speech to be defended on it, whether it is private or public in nature.

Unsporting? How do you mean? People have been throwing insults at moderators and me making what amounts to very light mockery is somehow unsporting? I guess you have only been reading the recent things I have written about it, as my patience for these stupid arguments about censorship has grown thin. I have had threads of mine locked before, and I have never decided to go engage in a fantasy freedom of speech conflict with the administration. Furthermore I think it is just attention seeking behavior by people who want to drag their personal conflicts with other members into the limelight. If you don't believe me, check out the posts from ArrantParriah, who is belittling me instead of actually saying anything useful irt the topic at hand. I have not insulted anybody, I have mocked their positions when they have repeated the same s**t ad nauseam. This last part is pretty much a PPR tradition

I live in a place where you cannot even put a sign on your business unless it is the government approved language and there are authorities who will fine and prosecute language violators. So excuse me if complaints of "censorship" on WP earn my contempt