Whatever happened to the made-up profanity? Options

[Cain]

I didn't say it oppresses my rights. I have a J.D., and I know a lot more about free speech than that (and not to give offense, probably a lot more than you)

You may know more about free speech, but your sarcasm meter was clearly broken when you read that statement. The point is, fake swear words have nothing to do with free speech or censorship. They have to do with artistic expression, something I'd wager I know a bit about. When someone in a fantasy game swears "By Odin's left eye!", he's not showing self-censorship or watering down the language. If anything, he's making things more colorful.

The only place it isn't watered down in the slightest is in Germany... maybe.

You're looking in the wrong place. Try googling in Yiddish.

Anyway, this whole issue is a side issue, whether "the fans" wanted it or not. We have no way of knowing what Fanpro based their decision on, how much feedback they got either way, what its source was, whatever. It's not a question with an answer we can find out.

Actually, that question has a more concrete answer. And IIRC, the answer is: "Zero fan feedback whatsoever". That decision was made, along with the new mechanic, at a back-room meeting at GenCon, two years before the release. I might have my dates wrong, since this is pure memory; but Rob Boyle basically pulled a bunch of people aside at a major con, and created the core of SR4. Several people on Dumpshock were at that meeting, so I'll let them tell the story. All I remember for sure was Steve Kenson coming up with the new mechanic.

[Telion]

I kinda wish they'd have included the old shadowslang. It helped create the setting and break it apart from the now. Sure some of it can be silly but the majority of it I liked. My group never used it extensively but it'd come up a dozen times or so every session. Though when someone tried to use a dozen times in a sentence, they'd get slapped.

[IceKatze]

hi hi

'Sconnie, that word isn't "made up."

Anyway, you can have fun with euphemisms in my opinion. Sometimes the restrictions on more crass versions can promote some creative workarounds.

[MYST1C]

Whatever happened to the cool made-up profanity like drek, slot, and hoop that was commonly found the the SR3 books?

Didn't you mean "the childish made-up fake profanity"? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Anyway, here in Germany the only SR slang word I've heard being used to some extend in over 15 years of playing is "chummer".

[MYST1C]

Oh and, re: German cultural use of Drek? I just got back from 5 years in Germany, and the only place I heard it was from German SR players.

Actually, Dreck (that's how we spell it) is a pretty common German word. But it's not a swear word! It simply means "dirt" or "filth" in English...
BTW, it's pronounced like English "drag" just with a sharp K sound at the end.

[knasser]

The point is, fake swear words have nothing to do with free speech or censorship.

You may not see the connection, but it is there, nonetheless. If someone is pressured to omit a part of their language by others in a position to do so, then that is a degree of censorship and a hindrance to free speech. If the existence of fake swear words is the result of needing to avoid language that others have deemed offensive, then they have plenty to do with free speech and censorship. I see exactly where Larme is coming from. We feel differently for the simple reason that, when my friends and I played Shadowrun as children, it didn't occur to us that fear of causing offence was a reason for the frag's and the drek's. We just assumed it was scene-setting and we liked it. As a GM, I still toss such vocabulary into my game now.

It made little sense from one point of view to censor the language in the Shadowrun books back in the day. That first edition book had a picture of a group of wild shadowrunners driving a hijacked Lone Star (police) van with the hapless and terrified officer himself strapped upside down over the front of the vehicle as they raced along. Obviously, the players are cast in the role of the Shadowrunners so what logical sense does it make to avoid words like fuck or shit when the game is glorifying and humourising violence to and disregard of Authority? Well none from the point of view of actual effect.

But it makes a lot of sense from a Class perspective. And don't tell me that the USA doesn't have a class system - that's a bit of self-delusion that the USA is finally waking up from, I think. Many of our modern day swear words in the English language were just common enough words in Anglo-Saxon. Until they finally changed it, London used to have a "Gropecunt Lane" (used to be the area where prostitutes worked - very simple people, the English (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif) ). Now the words were sexual or scatological so they always had a slight edge, but they were ordinary enough words. Then came the Norman invasion and with it, Old French. The language of the new ruling class became the language of the court and all the well to do of England adopted it. Words like Fuck or Cunt were frowned upon, not because of their inherent meaning so much as because they were vulgar. Vulgar itself is a Latin word merely meaning common (as in the unwashed masses). The process of these words becoming "bad" words, has its cause quite clearly in class division and snobbery. As England developed a burgeoning middle class, so many took it upon themselves to emulate and ingratiate their "betters". Even today, you can quite clearly see use of "obscenities" breaking down along class lines. Not invariably, but generally. And the use of such language toward your "betters" was a sign of challenge and rebelliousness. So of course the FCC doesn't want Hoi Polloi making the airwaves their own: it's the preserve of "better" people. Similar for other media. When your mother hears you as a little kid saying "fuck" or "shit" and tells you off, she's not thinking: "my child is expressing anger and I don't want her to". She's thinking "Horror - my child doesn't sound nice!" And nice, of course, means not common, means being a better class of person, means not being low class. She wants you to grow up belonging to the "better" people.

Now there are other reasons to dislike certain uses of language. Fuck is not something you do with someone, it's something you do to someone. It's not exactly romantic. Calling someone a "cunt" is a bit silly given that the literal meaning is something so vital to us all and so desired by so many. But I don't think anyone here will argue that Battlestar Gallactica or Shadowrun 1st Edition or whatever, is avoiding certain words for these reasons. Most people rarely think about the literal meaning of such words in other contexts for the simple reason that they're not meaning them literally.

Now there is a separate category of "bad" words which are those that are sacrilegious, but vernacular heresy is not a big deal in the West. It's a long, long time since anyone in England was scandalised by the use of the word "Bloody" (used to be a shortform of "Blood and Bones of Christ!" - an oath). So this area hasn't come up in Shadowrun.

Now whether Shadowrun 1st edition introduced the Dreks and the Frags and the Slitches as a means of self-censorship or not I don't know. I can certainly see it being the case and my just not realising it. But as things stand today, I don't think they remain self-censorship. "Obscenity" is prevalent enough now, in gaming groups and in literature, that any use of Frag or Drek just has to be for purposes of flavour, rather than to sound more parent-friendly. Also, the devs today are people who were those kids and whilst they may want their kids growing up sounding middle class (maybe (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) ), I seriously doubt they'll be censoring their Shadowrun writing. Nor would they need to as intelligent people seldom use a lot of obscenities simply because their are clearer ways of expressing themselves and the naughty words hold no particular rebellious quality for them (I mean, when you're an educated adult, there simply isn't an adult authority that you feel a need to rebel against anymore). I imagine that like Larme, a lot of the devs saw the Drek and the Frag as imposed censorship and, now that they're running the asylum, find themselves free to discard it. Others of us see the words as flavoursome parts of Shadowrun history and like them. We never thought of them as a dodge to avoid American prurience.

So ironically, I'd point out the Larme that as the social pressures to avoid certain language have long since vanished (Shadowrun is now established as a more adult game) it is, very strangely, our removal of certain traditional words in the Shadowrun setting that is closest to self-censorship. The objection to the words - that they are imposed upon us by parents and marketers - is no longer true. To throw the words out now is to strike a blow against an enemy long since dead. So personally I say keep the words and frag those drekheads, omae. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Khadim.

[Psikerlord]

Echo Chibu and AJ. I loves me old school SR swearing slang. It adds an extra layer to the game world, keeping it different from any other. I do recall thinking at first that it was a bit kiddy, and I'm pretty sure taking it out helps attract new players... But, they could've kept it in the slang list just for fun, and hold onto a piece of the genuine SR lingo. Me and mine still use it, though these days we also mix in real world profanities (in fact, I think we always did, but moreso now). The old school words are just another variance of what's hip in certain parts of town. Nullsheen, chummer.

[Larme]

You may know more about free speech, but your sarcasm meter was clearly broken when you read that statement. The point is, fake swear words have nothing to do with free speech or censorship. They have to do with artistic expression, something I'd wager I know a bit about. When someone in a fantasy game swears "By Odin's left eye!", he's not showing self-censorship or watering down the language. If anything, he's making things more colorful.

Shit, my sarcasm meter broke! Touche.

But really, I said what I honestly think, that censorship, and the need for self-censoship, is bad. I support the eradication of its vestiges. My argument is that self censorship explains the entirety of drek and frag. A game developed in the 1980s primarily for kids living at home would have the immediate need to tone down language. Parents would never read the whole thing and object to the rebelling against authority part, but they'd see one 'fuck' and the books are banned under their roof. Maybe, after the decision to self-censor, it became part of the game world and was incorporated into artistic expression. But I think you're getting first causes confused. Your argument is the equivalent of saying that replacing damn with darn is primarily an artistic move. Neither of us can be proven right, but I just don't buy it.

You're looking in the wrong place. Try googling in Yiddish.

Again, even if you're 100% right about the meaning of the word, you're wrong about it being an equivalent of shit in English. In English, drek does not have the emotional impact of shit, and therefore they will never be the same, regardless of what the word means in Yiddish or German.

Actually, that question has a more concrete answer. And IIRC, the answer is: "Zero fan feedback whatsoever". That decision was made, along with the new mechanic, at a back-room meeting at GenCon, two years before the release. I might have my dates wrong, since this is pure memory; but Rob Boyle basically pulled a bunch of people aside at a major con, and created the core of SR4. Several people on Dumpshock were at that meeting, so I'll let them tell the story. All I remember for sure was Steve Kenson coming up with the new mechanic.

Huh, interesting stuff. Again, it doesn't much matter. All we can say is if we like the change or not. Who made it and why doesn't make it intrinsically any more good or bad. What decides that is how much we like or dislike it. And I'm prepared to say that the positions have been stated, there will be no reconciliation between them, so we should agree to disagree.

Here lies this thread, R.I.P. hopefully.

[Warlordtheft]

Larme-for some of us it is not censorship, but a part of the feel of SR and way to get in character. I do agree with you that the slang was probably invented to get a younger crowd into the game, by eliminating the four letter words (thus potential parent objections).

[Draco18s]

Larme, Knasser, have you ever watched the tv show Recess?

This thread whomps.

[IceKatze]

hi hi

Even the commonly used profanities are just stand-ins for more technical terms. Besides, there's no real consensus on what constitutes the correct swear word in the first place. Did anyone see the scene in Austin Powers where the suggestive looking spacecraft flies by and we hear all the different euphemisms in context? Its kind of like that.

[Cain]

Larme, Knasser, do you stand up and scream "Censorship! Evil!" whenever you watch Red Dwarf? They use the made-up terms "Smeg" and "Gimboid" practically every episode.

Just because it's a made-up stand-in for a swear word doesn't mean it's censorship. It's artistic expression. It's a way of providing colorful language and atmosphere. This is common in sci-fi and fantasy, not an attempt to trample on your civil rights. It's a well-established convention, not some evil Commie mutant plot.

[Draco18s]

Larme, Knasser, do you stand up and scream "Censorship! Evil!" whenever you watch Red Dwarf? They use the made-up terms "Smeg" and "Gimboid" practically every episode.

Just because it's a made-up stand-in for a swear word doesn't mean it's censorship. It's artistic expression. It's a way of providing colorful language and atmosphere. This is common in sci-fi and fantasy, not an attempt to trample on your civil rights. It's a well-established convention, not some evil Commie mutant plot.

Commies!? Where! I wanna do some trouble shooting!

[Larme]

Larme, Knasser, do you stand up and scream "Censorship! Evil!" whenever you watch Red Dwarf? They use the made-up terms "Smeg" and "Gimboid" practically every episode.

Just because it's a made-up stand-in for a swear word doesn't mean it's censorship. It's artistic expression. It's a way of providing colorful language and atmosphere. This is common in sci-fi and fantasy, not an attempt to trample on your civil rights. It's a well-established convention, not some evil Commie mutant plot.

Potato, potahto. I know you love to bicker endlessly, but I'm going to let it rest here. You're just rehashing what you've already said because you can't agree to disagree. So whether you agree to or not, that's what I'm doing. I've stated my position, and you have stated and restated yours, as usual not engaging in real argument, but merely a marathon of redundancy. Your modus operandi is transparent enough to me at this point that I don't have to play the game anymore. Not to mention that the admins have warned me against getting sucked in by your interminably circular debate style.

[Demon_Bob]

Frag! by any Shadow Runner should invlove a grenade somehow. Using it for the horrible Battlestar Galactica meaning just grates on my ears. Unless your holding a "Pineapple".

[Draco18s]

Potato, potahto. I know you love to bicker endlessly, but I'm going to let it rest here. You're just rehashing what you've already said because you can't agree to disagree. So whether you agree to or not, that's what I'm doing. I've stated my position, and you have stated and restated yours, as usual not engaging in real argument, but merely a marathon of redundancy. Your modus operandi is transparent enough to me at this point that I don't have to play the game anymore. Not to mention that the admins have warned me against getting sucked in by your interminably circular debate style.

Bloody 'el, it's just language. Your argument is poppycock. Clinkers and Curses, what a ruse.

[knasser]

Larme, Knasser, do you stand up and scream "Censorship! Evil!" whenever you watch Red Dwarf? They use the made-up terms "Smeg" and "Gimboid" practically every episode.

Just because it's a made-up stand-in for a swear word doesn't mean it's censorship. It's artistic expression. It's a way of providing colorful language and atmosphere. This is common in sci-fi and fantasy, not an attempt to trample on your civil rights. It's a well-established convention, not some evil Commie mutant plot.

Smeg isn't a made-up word (well, except in the sense that all words are at some point). Smeg is the, how shall I put this, build up that a man may acquire under his foreskin if he never washes. "Tube cheese" as I heard some girls refer to it as once.

"Gimboid" is just comedy wording. I'm not a big Red Dwarf fan, but I seem to remember the term being used by Lister in a comedy manner. It's a funny sounding word and it gets a laugh. Now if you have a serious moment of realistic anger in a TV drama and suddenly the word gimboid was used instead of, say, "motherfucker", then you'd probably have a case that this was censorship. And incidentally, you'd have provided me with a perfect example of censorship harming the immersion. But that's not Red Dwarf. I never got the feeling that the Cat really wanted to say "Fuck you, you piece of shit" to another character. That would very much not fit the tone of the show. So you can hardly make the case that other words have had to be substituted in to replace those words. "Gimboid", as in "Oh you complete and utter gimboid" (in a Liverpool accent) sounds like a substitute for "complete and utter idiot" to me, not "complete and utter motherfucker" or whatever "obscenity" you think it is censoring.

All of this is not only wrong, anyway, but irrelevant. Firstly, whether or not I object to censorship is not a logical argument that you can pick apart. I simply do object to censorship and am fine with doing so. Secondly, you seem hung up on introducing other media in the belief that it affects the case with Shadowrun. They have nothing to do with each other. You are simply trying to find ways of invalidating someone's dislike of self-censorship in one case by introducing your own exaggerated cases found elsewhere and saying that it would be silly to object in these other cases. Your principle is that the cases should become one mashed-together argument and you can then "be right". But you introduced other silly (and bogus) cases so that you can shoot them down. We are talking about Shadowrun. If you wanted to introduce other arguments, there are plenty of other examples you could have used of alternative words being used such as Robocop's spectacularly dumb-sounding uses of "airhole". But of course such cases would serve to illustrate that censorship of words can harm the end-product, rather than bolster your cause of the day that it's fine.

It's these sorts of tactics, focused on misdirection and undermining the person you are corresponding with rather than attempting to debate with an aim of reaching a correct conclusion, that make arguing with you so very boring. Like Larme, I find the prospect of getting sucked into another of your interminable arguments rather dull. I argue with you for as long as I think it is necessary to prevent other people being misled by one of your false arguments about Shadowrun rules. Outside of those parameters, I have no interest in discussing anything with you. And whether or not I stand up and shout "EVIL! CENSORSHIP!" at Red Dwarf as you rhetorically ask is not something I think many Dumpshocker's care about.

So like Larme, I'm similarly done with you. I have never seen another poster that has been as destructive to the community on Dumpshock as you have been. You might want to think about how formerly reasonable people have been driven to make such statements, that it might actually be true and whether you really want this to be your role on these forums.

Peace,

K.

[IceKatze]

hi hi

I never read Neuromancer, but I seem to recall there being similar made up swear words used in The Difference Engine, by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. It might shed some light at least on where some of the terms were picked up, if not why.

[Cain]

IceKazte illustrates my point. Shadowrun is derived from other media, and made-up words are part of their artistic direction. It's not about your precious right to free speech, it's about art.

Smeg isn't a made-up word (well, except in the sense that all words are at some point). Smeg is the, how shall I put this, build up that a man may acquire under his foreskin if he never washes. "Tube cheese" as I heard some girls refer to it as once.

"Smeg" is made-up. "Smegma" is the word you're referring to. But that's beside the point.

Secondly, you seem hung up on introducing other media in the belief that it affects the case with Shadowrun. They have nothing to do with each other. You are simply trying to find ways of invalidating someone's dislike of self-censorship in one case by introducing your own exaggerated cases found elsewhere and saying that it would be silly to object in these other cases.

Once again, Shadowrun owes its existence to works like Neuromancer and Robocop. In fact, Robocop makes for a good example. I don't know if you're familiar with the American Movie Rating system, but Robocop was a rated-R movie. That meant you could swear all you like; it wasn't going to give you a more adult rating. The decision to use "airhole" instead of a modern swear word was an artistic choice, and not one pushed by censorship for the kiddies.

[Larme]

IceKazte illustrates my point. Shadowrun is derived from other media, and made-up words are part of their artistic direction. It's not about your precious right to free speech, it's about art.

I'm done arguing, but for everyone else's sake, I would like to clarify my position again. Nobody has made this about the right to free speech except Cain, who created this straw man. That he attaches the pejorative "precious" to it is disturbing, but irrelevant. Nobody thinks that frag or drek infringes anyone's rights. Those of us who dislike censorship do so not because censorship infringes our rights, but because we think it impoverishes public discourse. If people can't say and write what they really want to, we all suffer. I'm done arguing with Cain because this quote, more than anything, proves he's got no intention except to troll. But I just want to make it clear to everyone else -- the only one who brought up rights infringement is Cain. This is his obsession, and his straw man. Not mine. That he would continue to attack it after I and Knasser both disavowed it shows just how little he has in the way of intellectual integrity.

[Cain]

If people can't say and write what they really want to, we all suffer.

Who gets to determine what an artist really wants to say and write?

Despite your protestations, you were the one who brought free speech into this debate. Choosing rather or not to use a word substitute doesn't automatically prevent adult discourse. Calling me a troll, especially when you haven't responded logically to any of my arguments, *does*. All I've done is point out that free speech has nothing to do with shadowslang, especially since no one's censoring anything. Artificial slang has a long and illustrious part in literary history, particularly in sci-fi and fantasy.

[Larme]

Despite your protestations, you were the one who brought free speech into this debate.

I brought the words into it, but you created the straw man. If you can't back off of your straw man, I refuse to have a debate with you. Reasonable debates require concession when you make a false or inaccurate statement. When you mischaracterize the opponent's argument, and then ignore them when they correct you, you prove your intentions. You don't want to debate what's true or false, right or wrong. You want to win and/or troll. Be reasonable, show some intellectual honesty and integrity, and I might engage you on this issue again.

[Cain]

You call me a troll, accuse me of having no intellectual integrity, and want *me* to back off and concede?

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/sarcastic.gif)

At any event, you haven't debated my actual point, preferring to pull a straw man yourself and attack the rhetorical questions. The point is that artificial slang adds to fictional works, especially in the case of Shadowrun. Do you have anything to comment on this point, or are you going to keep attacking?

[Critias]

The point is that in my opinion artificial slang adds to fictional works, especially in the case of Shadowrun.

Fixed it for you.

To me, it's one thing for a fantasy setting taking place in a make-believe world to use fake slang. It's not terribly dissimilar when a galaxy-hopping sci-fi tale that spans dozens, hundreds, or thousands of alien species (or is set wholly in an alternate universe, or in the far future, or what-have-you) does the same thing.

But when a game ostensibly set in the real world, a mere 50-60 years from now, has completely done away with real-world curse words, you really need to ask yourself why they did that. Was it to keep a relatively PG rating, or was it really just to add to the flavor of the game world? Why wasn't the rest of their shadow slang lexicon enough to make the game world characterful? Why didn't traditional curse words still exist alongside the fantastic ones?

The truth -- like so many other things hair-split on the internet -- is that their decision was probably a little of both. They wanted the game world to have its own feel, but they very probably also wanted parents to buy it for their kids without coming across Mr Carlin's seven words if they casually flipped through it.

[Draco18s]

But when a game ostensibly set in the real world, a mere 50-60 years from now, has completely done away with real-world curse words, you really need to ask yourself why they did that. Was it to keep a relatively PG rating, or was it really just to add to the flavor of the game world? Why wasn't the rest of their shadow slang lexicon enough to make the game world characterful? Why didn't traditional curse words still exist alongside the fantastic ones?

*Cough*

Let me quote myself here for a second

Bloody 'el, it's just language. Your argument is poppycock. Clinkers and Curses, what a ruse.

How old are those words? Poppycock is from my Grandmother's era....50 or 60 years ago. Means "chicken shit."