Utilizing soft filters for slurs (Slur Filter 2 Electric Boogaloo)

[NamelessFairy]

Bottom post of the previous page:

Recently we've gained the ability to soft filter words and phrases, this allows players to use a term but only after passing a warning, admins are also warned when done so. At present the filter is used for two mostly OOC in IC terms with occasional IC usecases (ERP and Antag). The other headmins and I would now like to open a discussion on expanding the soft filter list to include slurs. This will allow slurs to still be used in acceptable usecases as defined by MSO but will show a warning that will hopfully deter player from using slurs in a way that breaks rule 11. And if slurs are used in a way that does violate rule 11, admins are notified of its usage and will find it easier to catch.

This thread is to allow people to discuss the idea as well as suggest words that should/should not be included.

[Farquaar]

Honestly, the more I think about it, the more I find myself in favour of hardfilters. Setting up a jury trial to identify whether somebody's use of a slur is bigoted or not is a recipe for disaster. Hardfilter is simpler, causes less headaches, and clearly conveys expectations to players so they can conduct themselves accordingly.

[RaveRadbury]

Alright here's what we've got for the soft filter

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We would like to allow some time for the community to respond before these are put on the filters.

[cacogen]

You should just autoban the type of retard who uses the word tranny and that'll clean up the servers nicely.

[carshalash]

Please filter coon to cheer.

[Alphanerdd]

Hardfilter is simpler, causes less headaches, and clearly conveys expectations to players so they can conduct themselves accordingly.

Yeah this basically. Being hit by the hard filter is pretty much an automatic first warning. If someone then eats a ban for evading the filter, or otherwise being a shithead, they can't scream 1984.
(They will still scream 1984)

[Shellton(Mario)]

Words like faggot and tranny should just be hard filtered just like the n word. Their soul purpose is to insult someone's identity and someone using those words shows you have a clear disdain for those groups of people beyond just that one person. Soft filtering just creates more work for admins and the possibility it might not get resolved if theres an limited amount of admins online and they are dealing with other issues. Best just to stop it before it even happens if the word only has one clear meaning.

For less black and white words like cracker I think if a player feels like a player is using it in a way that is undermining them because of their identity they should ahelp it. At worse the admin may not understand why and do nothing. At best dumbass gets the boot. Same goes for words that players may use to replace slurs on the hard filter. Soft filtering something just makes it harder for admins to discern if the word is being used in a harmful way or not without someone saying "HEY THIS GUY IS BEING RACIST" if the line is that thin.

But I think words should only be hard filtered if they are undermining someone because of their identity to a group if that is that primary purpose. and besides if someone is using being jackass in one way then they are most likely a jackass in many others. Just ban them for something else.

[Archie700]

I fear that the racists will start using the soft filters as a dogwhistle and spam them endlessly
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_whistle_(politics)

[Shellton(Mario)]

I just saw Rave's soft filter list, the only word I don't think should be hard filtered is Transvestite, rest should be hard filtered regardless of OOC or IC. Negro is the N word before the N word. Chink is an obvious slur that has been used has one for many years. Shemale just the word is calling someone a fake male. I fail to see any positive use for anything on the list that would cause an admin to be like HEY STOP BEING (insert ism here) for using them. The only reason to have them on the soft filter and not the hard one is to ban them before they do something griefy but I think this worse then anything a player can do in the round because it may cause new players to think someone even using one of those words to think that is a reflection as the community as a whole because they won't see the person getting banned for using it since they may not even ahelp and just leave the server thinking "This place allows racists here." If its bad for the community to where you can justify putting it on a filter might as well go all in.

Anyways am going to bed

[Mothblocks]

I fear that the racists will start using the soft filters as a dogwhistle and spam them endlessly
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_whistle_(politics)

Not sure what you mean. The soft filter doesn't replace the words or anything, the soft filter just gives you a warning to make sure you really want to say what you want to say before you press enter.

[Farquaar]

Chink is an obvious slur that has been used has one for many years.

"A chink in one's armor" is a perfectly common turn of phrase with no racist connotations.

[Pandarsenic]

Chink is an obvious slur that has been used has one for many years.

"A chink in one's armor" is a perfectly common turn of phrase with no racist connotations.

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That aside, just hard filter stuff like tranny that doesn't have a legitimate other use (chink in armor)

The goal is, as mentioned, to clean up the server, not to get valids in ban form

[Rohen_Tahir]

I just saw Rave's soft filter list, the only word I don't think should be hard filtered is Transvestite, rest should be hard filtered regardless of OOC or IC. Negro is the N word before the N word.

The racism country.
The racism mountain.

[MrStonedOne]

The headmins didn't propose any of these for hard filters because I didn't let them.

I'm not interested in preventing players from doing things that will get them ban without a very strong and compelling reason to do so to remove disruption.

And I very strongly hate false positives.

Nigger was hard filtered for a few reasons that other slurs getting hard filtered would have to reach:

• it's 99% likely to be against the ooc in ic rule, and 99% likely to be against the bigotry rule, making it 99.99% likely to against the rules compounded.
• it was used so often that admins were having a hard time cracking down on usage, and leading to suboptimal situations like players assuming its allowed because other players were doing it, indicating a massive need to cut down on its usage and educate players.
• soft filters as an educational tool wasn't around at the time.
• these concerns outweigh the concern that players who get hard filtered can't get banned because their bad behavior was hidden. Not everybody who was using it needed to be removed the community, monkey see monkey do is cancerous, but ultimately redeemable in the long term.

At the end of the day, my goal with the soft filter for slurs is:

Educate players on the rules and that they might be doing something that will get them ban.
Avoid inconventing good faith players to own the racists. (chink in one's armor type shit)
Balance allowing letting bad faith players break the rules so they can get removed with enabling good faith players to enjoy their time here. (Somebody putting in the good faith effort towards trying to follow the rules getting told off by admins for breaking the rules is a ultimately a failure on our part, not theirs).

[Shellton(Mario)]

I disagree, just because theres a few use cases outside of the racist doesn't 99% time people are not just going to use it to be racist. The chink in one's armor is from medieval times I don't think people are using that in 2022 let alone in the time period the game is based in. Someone not being able to use a phrase from centuries ago is a small price to pay to save time for admins to move on to other issues that maybe happening and possible new players. It shouldn't be an admins job to educate the player base seeing as one of the rules is needing to be 18+. We should expect some common sense on players to know what is racist/sexist/homophobic and what isn't and if we just put it on the hard filter *poof* the monkey can't see the monkey won't do which removes the need to educate all together. If people wanna know why a word is hard filtered they can just do a small google search and educate themselves. I don't expect players to know every word but you can tell if its bad or good just by the way they are wording it. If someone says tranny after being robust or says "FUCK TRANNIES" I don't think people are going think "That guy is a real nice guy." I do think in a way this can be a disruption to a new player because they only see the guy saying it not him getting punished for doing so and they may see that as a reflection as the community as a whole and that may turn them away.

[CMDR_Gungnir]

I disagree, just because theres a few use cases outside of the racist doesn't 99% time people are not just going to use it to be racist. The chink in one's armor is from medieval times I don't think people are using that in 2022 let alone in the time period the game is based in. Someone not being able to use a phrase from centuries ago is a small price to pay to save time for admins to move on to other issues that maybe happening and possible new players. It shouldn't be an admins job to educate the player base seeing as one of the rules is needing to be 18+. We should expect some common sense on players to know what is racist/sexist/homophobic and what isn't and if we just put it on the hard filter *poof* the monkey can't see the monkey won't do which removes the need to educate all together. If people wanna know why a word is hard filtered they can just do a small google search and educate themselves. I don't expect players to know every word but you can tell if its bad or good just by the way they are wording it. If someone says tranny after being robust or says "FUCK TRANNIES" I don't think people are going think "That guy is a real nice guy." I do think in a way this can be a disruption to a new player because they only see the guy saying it not him getting punished for doing so and they may see that as a reflection as the community as a whole and that may turn them away.

But the thing is, any situation in which you punish players doing nothing wrong (chink in one's armour) in order to punish someone else (racists) is a failure. It's never something you should just accept unless there isn't any other way. And there is. The way that we're doing it. From my understanding, the Soft Filter pings admins when someone says something on it. It probably won't go unnoticed unless they're FLOODED by tickets, but if that's the case, then the type of player who is doing that is going to do it again inevitably anyway. They'll wind up being caught about it.

[cacogen]

I always use the phrase ‘chink in my armour’ when I want to make the same tired joke about my armour having been stolen by someone too small to wear it.

[Rohen_Tahir]

I always use the phrase ‘chink in my armour’ when I want to make the same tired joke about my armour having been stolen by someone too small to wear it.

[nianjiilical]

Nigger was hard filtered for a few reasons that other slurs getting hard filtered would have to reach:

• it's 99% likely to be against the ooc in ic rule, and 99% likely to be against the bigotry rule, making it 99.99% likely to against the rules compounded.

i understand not wanting to hard filter words that might have other uses like chink but by this logic we should at *least* hard filter tranny because there is legitimately no reason to say it besides being transphobic, and i would argue you could at the very least tempban people who ignore the soft filter to say it 99% of the time under rule 11

[Boot]

The issue with adding in slurs is that what is a slur is such a grey issue. It sounds easy when you start with shit like Nigger or Kike, but when we get into stuff like Kraut, Yankee or Jap its gets abit more murky imo. Like the first two for our Western population have a gut visceral reaction but that doesn't make a slur a slur. Just the same as most people in America probably aren't gonna care if they are called a Cracker but the slur is still there. I imagine that the reasons why the list is what it is now has something to do with the amount used. To that I'll just say that I haven't seen anyone use the words on the proposed ic soft filter list with the exception of tranny but I play on Sybil so it might just be a eu thing.

• soft filters as an educational tool wasn't around at the time.

Do you think that Nigger should be moved from the hard filter to the soft as it does exist as a tool now? What has been your view on the general discourse since its addition?

[thgvr]

Will any of this include or entail changing single letters on the n word? Word filter evasion should be against the rules.

[Mothblocks]

If you're referring to the L-one, that's not considered evasion.

[Pandarsenic]

Nigger was hard filtered for a few reasons that other slurs getting hard filtered would have to reach:

• it's 99% likely to be against the ooc in ic rule, and 99% likely to be against the bigotry rule, making it 99.99% likely to against the rules compounded.

i understand not wanting to hard filter words that might have other uses like chink but by this logic we should at *least* hard filter tranny because there is legitimately no reason to say it besides being transphobic, and i would argue you could at the very least tempban people who ignore the soft filter to say it 99% of the time under rule 11

Agreed entirely; "tranny" was the example I gave, but tbh I can't see any even REMOTELY legit use for that or for shemale, coon, or kike.

[nianjiilical]

The issue with adding in slurs is that what is a slur is such a grey issue. It sounds easy when you start with shit like Nigger or Kike, but when we get into stuff like Kraut, Yankee or Jap its gets abit more murky imo. Like the first two for our Western population have a gut visceral reaction but that doesn't make a slur a slur. Just the same as most people in America probably aren't gonna care if they are called a Cracker but the slur is still there. I imagine that the reasons why the list is what it is now has something to do with the amount used. To that I'll just say that I haven't seen anyone use the words on the proposed ic soft filter list with the exception of tranny but I play on Sybil so it might just be a eu thing.

yeah, i think it's fine to soft filter these ones

i just dont think we should be afraid to hard filter words that have zero socially acceptable use in 99% of situations

[RaveRadbury]

Alright here's what we've got for the soft filter

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We would like to allow some time for the community to respond before these are put on the filters.

We're adding these to the filters.

Headmin Votes:
RaveRadbury: Agree
NamelessFairy: Agree
Dragomagol: Agree