Language on CS?

[BlissfulFarrago]

I've noticed some curse words on CS...and I'm wondering, which can be used, and which can't. I think that CS should be appropriate for all ages, so seeing this bothers me, but I don't want to report things that are perfectly fine and make more work for the mods. So is the "a-word" okay? The "s-word" or the "b-word?" Thanks. ^^

[Ricorn]

The "b-word" is okay ONLY in RPs and it best be referring to a female dog and NOT directed towards another member. The others... not okay. Think how would you talk in front of kids in elementary preschool.

[Tess]

in general, we don't accept curse words on CS, but occasionally a few can be overlooked if it's posted in a reasonably private topic and not aimed/targetted at any other user.

E.g. in some RPs the characters are angsty teens and occasionally let loose the 's-word' or the 'b-word' which I will most of the time overlook UNLESS there is a complaint or unless there is a huge amount of swearing going on. Basically, if no-one in the RP reports it then I assume it hasn't bothered them and so it's not a huge deal. However if someone is continually posting swearword after swearword they can receive a board warning and even be banned as a user recently found out.

If it was posted in a more public thread like the pets discussion thread then it would definitely be censored out if I saw it, because there are a lot more people viewing that topic and they are not able to predict there might be bad language before going in to read the topic.

Many other words e.g. the 'f-word' would never be acceptable on CS, and I also don't accept people replacing half the letters with *** because it's still very obvious what the word was.

If by the 'a-word' you mean ass/arse then I do not view that particular word as a bad curse word and you can use it on CS without getting in trouble (e.g. saying 'wow this cold weather is a real pain in the ass' is fine), however if someone uses it with the purpose of offending another user (e.g. saying 'wow you're an ass') then they can get in trouble because bullying is against the rules anyway.

When it comes down to it, if you are offended by someones language then you should feel comfortable reporting the post for a moderator to come see it, even if you're not sure if the words OK or not. If the word is deemed inappropriate then it will be censored/removed from the post and the person who wrote it may get a warning if they had a particularly bad potty mouth. If we decide the word was ok, we will just close the report and there won't be a consequence to you for reporting it. The person who reported the post would always remain anonymous except to the staff member dealing with the complaint.

So, if you have a problem with something in particular, feel free to report it for a moderator to check it out We do like to keep the language here safe for kids, but we can't read everything, so you can help keep the board clean by reporting naughty stuff you see along your travels.

[BlissfulFarrago]

All right, thank you for the answers. C: I understand.

[.kestral]

Ah, sorry to leap in on this topic but some websites ban the words Crap and Damn and I wanted to know if they were acceptable here? Personally I see them as ok and not swear words at all but some people might.

[Coalchaser]

Crap is not a curse word so it's acceptable (as long as you aren't using it in an offensive way, of course). Using damn is kind of pushing it, though. I consider it to be on the same level as "ass," so it might be permissible if used in a decent context in a fairly private thread (and obviously GD-it would never be okay for use on CS).

[.kestral]

Ok, I will restrict use of Damn then.

[dasniu]

I don't count 'damn' as a bad word really. C:

You could say 'dam'. Like a beaver dam XD

[Coalchaser]

I don't consider any curse words to be bad words (dirty slang words, on the other hand, are pretty bad... x3). However, they are still considered to be bad by society, so since we have children here, we need to respect that even relatively harmless words like "damn" and "ass" may offend them. C;

[Tess]

I allow 'crap' and 'damn' on CS as long as they're not used to purposefully offend someone else

I have noticed there is a difference in attitudes towards swearwords in the US compared to NZ where I grew up, so I'm often surprised to hear that stuff like 'crap' or 'damn' would offend anyone - even 'hell' sometimes gets reported here. For the record, 'hell' is also an acceptable word here.

I censor people to some degree, but there comes a point where it just gets ridiculous, I'm a 20 year old woman and I'm not going to start saying 'heck' at this age I change my language a lot for CS as it is, but there are some 'swearwords' which I just don't accept as even being swearwords.