Iv seen posts with people substituting rape with r@pe. Other than bypassing filters I can’t see a reason to censor just 1 letter that doesn’t actually censor the word? I see if you fully censor the word, but even still context completely ruins the censorship.

  • Cryptic Fawn
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    10 months ago

    Pretty sure it’s done to avoid videos/posts being removed by TikTok/Twitter/FB and the likes. For example, you can’t use or say the word “Suicide” on TikTok, that would get the video removed. So people say “Unalive” to get around that. This way, they can still talk about difficult topics without the dumb censorship.

    If you’re seeing it in places where that isn’t an issue (like Lemmy, for example) they may just be doing it out of habit.

    • Sami
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      3610 months ago

      There was this tiktok where a woman was talking about how her cousin was shot and killed for knocking on her neighbor’s door to get her kid’s thing and she used “unalive” to describe it. It was very jarring to hear in such a somber context. It feels very dystopian that people have to self censor for the algorithm. Same with youtube and any mentions of covid.

      • @LanyrdSkynrd
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        910 months ago

        A lot of this self censoring is algorithm voodoo. Nobody knows what makes these platforms mark your videos as age restricted, so people do silly stuff like say, “unalive”. I’ve seen many videos where people use the word kill that aren’t age restricted.

        • Sami
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          310 months ago

          She went on to say kill a few minutes into the video so it might just be the start of the video. Could be legit or just what people have been conditioned to do for no reason. I’ve also seen youtubers specifically say that they can swear after the first 30 or so seconds of a video and not get demonitized.

          • @Lorela
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            210 months ago

            So I think “kill” is fine for the Tiktok censors as it can be used in various contacts that don’t necessarily mean death. Murder, suicide, and rape are definitely words that will get your content or comments removed, hence “grape” (or r@pe), “unalived”. Which is a bit frustrating when educational creators can’t actually talk about their specialist subjects but oh well.

      • Sternhammer
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        210 months ago

        It’s sounds like Orwellian Newspeak. How double-plus-ungood.

    • @EmperorGormetOP
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      810 months ago

      Makes sense, figured it was filter dodging. The fact it’s has made its way outside of those places is slightly annoying

  • magnetosphere
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    2510 months ago

    I think it’s asinine. Rape is a serious subject. I find it insulting when someone “censors” the word in such a ridiculous way. Does the word “rape” make you uncomfortable? WELL, IT SHOULD. It’s sexual assault. You shouldn’t be comfortable thinking about it.

    • @SCB
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      10 months ago

      This seems kind of puritan to me. Why should I be made uncomfortable by the mention of sexual assault? Are you uncomfortable thinking about war?

      Why SHOULD the word “rape” make anyone uncomfortable? IMO this kind of thinking is what leads to suppression of victim’s voices. It makes even speaking about SA into a taboo thing.

      In an ideal world, wed speak of SA with, at minimum, the same frequency we speak about bullying. We’ve seen successful efforts to lessen both the frequency and impact of bullying by speaking about it more.

      • magnetosphere
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        910 months ago

        I see your point, and an explanation is called for. I don’t mean “uncomfortable” in the sense that one avoids discussing rape, only that the idea isn’t a happy one. For the same reason, I don’t gleefully think about war, either. I don’t delight in its consequences.

        The possible suppression of victim’s voices is a major part of the problem. Rape is an important subject and should be discussed openly, but it’s too serious to be mocked with silly attempts at censorship.

        • @SCB
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          210 months ago

          Totally agreed.

  • @TheBananaKing
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    2310 months ago

    It’s really shitty for people that actually want to filter triggering stuff out of their feed.

    Putting in stupid characters doesn’t make it any less upsetting for the people it upsets, but it does force them to see it because fuck them, apparently.

    It’s a shitty, entitled thing to do, and people who do it should feel bad about themselves.

    • @EmperorGormetOP
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      310 months ago

      Exactly what I’m thinking, it solves nothing but does create a problem.

  • @Deestan
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    1610 months ago

    When asking people, they seem to think it is “rude” to write out the word in full and consider it a confused courtesy.

    Whatever the reason, it fucks with people who have filters set to avoid certain topics or just want to skip discourse that uses rude language.

    It’s shitty and should stop.

  • Eavolution
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    1510 months ago

    Why can’t it be normal for everyone just to use the correct words (to me it feels like it’d be kinda insulting to substitute a word like rape because it feels like then you’re putting the platform above the very serious topic), then people be able to set up their own filters to filter out words like rape if they don’t want to see them.

  • @[email protected]
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    810 months ago

    It is to get around filters on more oppressive platforms. My recommendation is if you see people self censoring themselves in places where they are free to say the words, tell them to say it!

  • ᴇᴍᴘᴇʀᴏʀ 帝
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    710 months ago

    My understanding is that content creators have figured out which words trigger demonetisation of their videos (and to a lesser extent other content) so they’ve bowdlerised what they say to get around this. Other people presumably picked that up and used it.

  • @iRyu
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    710 months ago

    I saw a post somewhere saying that changing 1 letter can prevent it from being searched for by people who just want to troll posts with that particular word

  • @DrQuint
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    710 months ago

    No, you’re right, it is stupid. I have to agree it doesn’t work, since it largely fails to censor the word for those people the censor was made for. I have seen platforms that do full word censorship (like Steam) and when people post screenshots of “I ♥♥♥♥ you”, the only accomplishment isn’t making me not think of a slur - it’s actually rationalize even harder that they did say one of either Rape or Fuck, nothing else. Congrats censorship, you went from 1 slur, to 2 slurs.

  • @berkeleyblue
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    710 months ago

    It’s just as dumb as spelling it f**k everyone still knows what it says and no one should fucking care.

  • @zeppo
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    610 months ago

    It seems pretty useless to me. The words are obviously still legible and comprehensible, so I don’t see how it has a different effect than just typing it out all the way.

    • FaceDeer
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      210 months ago

      I suspect sometimes they don’t really think about it, it’s just something they think “everyone does.” But sometimes I think it’s an annoying sort of virtue signalling.

  • key
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    10 months ago

    I would assume it’s mostly habit from platforms with content filters and uncertainty if usage of the word is prohibited despite a lack of filter. And then a dash of “online subculture”

  • @[email protected]
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    10 months ago

    Some proprietary social media (looking at you meta) have filter, removing any sensitive topic. So if you write rape you can’t post while if you write r@pe you can.

    The ridiculous result is that a health-educator talking about sexual health and condoms will get censored while a teenager twerking in underwear won’t.

    n was talking about how her cousin was shot and killed for knocking on her neighbor’s door to get her kid’s thing and she used “unalive” to describe it. It was very jarring to hear in such a somber context. It f

  • MxM111
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    310 months ago

    Why would anyone sensor the “rape” word?

    • @[email protected]
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      010 months ago

      Some people would rather not see that word. And importantly some algorithms don’t want people to see that word.

      • axum
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        10 months ago

        Unless you are hiding the word entirely behind a spoiler tag every common substitution list would account for this and it doesn’t look visually different enough to just not think “rape”

        • FinalFallacy
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          410 months ago

          I’ve been raped and it’s hard to have honest conversations now days because of this superficial escapism. It’s definitely not an easy subject to discuss but hearing people say shit like “They’ve been graped” or “r@ped” seems to cheapen the gravity of the word and the experience. It’s a word and topic that should make people uneasy and uncomfortable. On the same token people should be mature enough to see and hear these things or mature enough to leave, move on or skip it if they aren’t able to handle it.

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