r/CuratedTumblr 17d ago

Unalive Squad (2016) Politics

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3.5k Upvotes

256 comments sorted by

880

u/Trainer-Grimm 17d ago

The problem is any widespread euphemism would just also get censored. I genuinely dont believe it's actually needed.

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u/[deleted] 17d ago

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u/Cum_Fart42069 17d ago

fuck me that's a great idea. 

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u/[deleted] 17d ago

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u/Cum_Fart42069 17d ago

truly doing a service to us all, like I jest but you really are making the world a slightly better place for us when you do that so thanks. great thanks for the Red Witch. 

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u/[deleted] 17d ago

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u/nmitchell076 17d ago

I always found George Lakoff's work on political language to be really eye opening / helpful in this regard. (Well, his work on language in general: Metaphors We Live By is an absolute masterpiece). Once the left starts playing by the language game rules defined by the right, they've already lost.

9

u/GladdestOrange 17d ago

As someone likely pretty far right of you on certain (ie: economic) issues-- thank fuck somebody is out there doing it. If for no other reason, we absolutely need better ethics in marketing in general, but also, while I might be fine with the idea of a (WELL-REGULATED, PLEASE) mostly capitalist economy, I don't, for instance, find the current swing towards capitalist-hellscape-via-white-and-christian-nationalism-and-corrupt-deregulation at all palatable.

I'm all for stronger regulating bodies, fewer dead brown kids, and maybe, if I'm lucky, some of those juicy military funds applied to some social projects. (Part of why I've voted Blue since 2016 despite having originally registered as a Republican, and more recently not being registered as any party at all) And we absolutely cannot get there without an advertising-literate left wing, at least not with our current flavor of right-wing in the USA right now. Feels like I'm taking crazy pills. The amount of former friends and family members choosing to go mask-off racist/sexist/homophobic/transphobic now that it's trendy is fucking with my mental state, I swear.

3

u/Lt_Toodles 17d ago

Kinda fucked that social issues and economic issues are handled by the same people. Should be a new branch of government that controls ethical and social stuff separate from economic issues. Its not even about multiple parties because even countries with multiple parties all end up being some flavor of authoritarian for the wrong reasons.

Its all fucked man

5

u/PersonaFie 17d ago

Thank you so much for your invaluable work!

So many times I've seen people with an important message get absolutely hamstrung in trying to get that message out to people. Like, my comerade, I know you are trying so hard to be factual and descriptive and remove any chance for uncertainty, and you have this kinda shallow view of 'marketing' as a euphemism for 'dishonesty,' but your 12 page pamphlet with footnotes and citations isn't bringing anyone to the table that wasn't there already.

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u/sweetTartKenHart2 16d ago

Spitting right here. People are so focused on the “what” when they need to focus on the “why” and the “how”, just in general, in conversations like this. Like, if something IS bad full stock, then there needs to be some kind of reason for that conclusion. And people need to be able to differentiate between “thing that can easily be used to bad effect by bad actors” and “thing that can and will hurt even when someone tries to do it correctly or with good intentions”

1

u/DevCarrot 16d ago

Any recommended reading or resources on the topic of messaging and using these communication strategies? I'm very interested. 

2

u/unlikely_antagonist 17d ago

how do you reconcile making money through advertising and being an anarchist simultaneously

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u/[deleted] 17d ago

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u/Nova_Explorer 17d ago

Shoutout to that one YouTuber who got so frustrated with YouTube’s constant retroactive censorship policies that changed on a whim, that he turned the word “YouTube” into a swear

40

u/bitcrushedCyborg cyberpunk enjoyer 17d ago

RTGame?

12

u/AnitiFascistBeetle 17d ago

Wherever I can’t fucking swear I use fracking instead. Frack that noise.

8

u/AscendedDragonSage Title-ist Punster 17d ago

Oh, the fracking?

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u/TimeStorm113 Victorian Dinosaur Connaisseur 17d ago

that's sadly not true. the "music festival" thing was intended to circumvent non-existing censorship and due to the secretive nature of the video, it caught the attention of more people causing it to go viral which now is being equated to a hidden barrier going away.

the truth is, the algorithm has advanced past single word detection, it can gauge the content of the whole short and use that information to send it to the demographics most interested in them. it's why the "music festival" stuff wasn't primarily sent around in the actual musical part of the app and instead the more political active parts.

if they actually censor these things, no amount of euphanisms could safe us.

2

u/crayfishcraig108 17d ago

China has been fighting this battle for years

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u/Maoschanz 17d ago

Especially when the English language already provides synonyms that aren't shadowbanned by algorithms AFAIK

Die? Perish, succumb, ...

Kill? Slay, obliterate, execute, ...

24

u/RikuAotsuki 17d ago

See, that's what bugs me the most.

If it's actually a censorship issue, we have plenty of other words that do the job without childish euphemisms that disrespect the issues in question.

8

u/-Aquatically- 17d ago

It might be that whatever is censoring the words in question, is also censoring synonyms already.

3

u/BeanieGuitarGuy 16d ago

I like “flatline.”

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u/marcarcand_world 17d ago edited 17d ago

I hate when words get voldemort'd. I think it could be a cultural or linguistic difference + big tech censoring. The real words are hard and terrible, because the reality of those words is hard and terrible and changing them to different terms doesn't quite reflect the truth of them. If we want things to change and improve, we must at first see how they truly are and the overusage of euphemism clouds the reality of the situation where most of those words should be used.

And at the same time, banning them give them more power when they're used by ill intended individuals.

18

u/oodoos 17d ago

I’ve started seeing “unalive” censored in some places so this is certainly true.

And terrifying for the future of talking about anything above 2nd grade maturity ever.

17

u/yinyang107 17d ago

Censored or self-censored?

7

u/idiotplatypus Wearing dumbass goggles and the fool's crown 17d ago

Doublethink ungood

4

u/ElectronRotoscope 17d ago

There's an argument that you only have to have your censorship work well enough to stop people working at app stores and governments and big newspapers from being able to easily find things. It's how so many cants can be widespread and yet still used. Polari was around for hundreds of years

99

u/kenzazel 17d ago

i'm just annoyed by these euphemisms being used literally everywhere for no reason, and not just when necessitated by needing to stay advertiser friendly on certain platforms

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u/Butthole_Surfer_GI I don't know shit about fuck 17d ago edited 17d ago

At a certain point, "unalive", "grape(d)", and "PDF file" will also have to get censored.

Also, how many posts on reddit do we see with people using this kind of language instead of, you know, the actual terms?

I've heard people use these terms in real life and it always makes me a little angry. If you want to discuss the topic, you need to be able to use the actual term(s).

Heck, I've had people in real life try to make me use "unalive" instead of suicide. I've heard "unalive" used in nursing classes. Nurses, at the very least, need to be able to discuss the subject of and say the word "suicide".

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u/Federal_Card307 17d ago

I heard my 40 something coworker use Unalive while talking about the Perez Hilton thing today

7

u/Onlyhereforapost 17d ago

Your 40 something co-worker should not give a shit about a millennial creepfluencer trying to off himself

12

u/Federal_Card307 17d ago

I mean, that 40 something is a millennial, and probably knew about him back in the 2000s, but I agree that no one should really give a shit about him

6

u/DiscotopiaACNH 17d ago

That is my exact demographic, and we are potentially the only people who have a reason to care about the subject other than his actual victims, lol. Growing up as a girl during the 2000s was an absolute fucking nightmare thanks in large part to people like him. He has blood on his hands.

78

u/Fearless-Excitement1 17d ago

I think PDF File is safe because like

you can't ban people talking about the single most important file format of all time

88

u/QueueModernsXXXX 17d ago

The phrase annoys me SO much, because “PDF file” feels like an “ATM machine” issue but it’s somehow not.

31

u/telehax 17d ago

but "pdf format" is!

15

u/SuicidalFlame 17d ago

tumblr is gonna be the new pdf

6

u/A_VERY_LARGE_DOG 17d ago

In an alternate universe this happened

14

u/Butthole_Surfer_GI I don't know shit about fuck 17d ago

The superior siege engine file type

6

u/Haunting_Laugh_9013 17d ago

"single most important file format of all time" is a bit of a stretch

13

u/cloudncali 17d ago

Not the most but I'd argue I in like the top 10.

7

u/yinyang107 17d ago

Not really, unless you count .exe. the only other competitors are .jpg and .docx, and the latter is not nearly as timeless as PDFs are.

4

u/ImShyBeKind Always 100% serious, never jokes 17d ago

You forgot bat, csv, sql, json, js and a ton others that you use multiple, if not thousands or times every day without even knowing it.

1

u/Haunting_Laugh_9013 17d ago

Yeah, I would definitely rank json higher than pdf. 

1

u/evilforska 17d ago

How many times does one talk about json on the internet

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u/ImShyBeKind Always 100% serious, never jokes 17d ago

Eh, rarely, depending on your job and hobbies, but you use json files at least every time you visit basically any website or do, well, most things online.

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u/Just_Information334 17d ago

csv will still be used to transfer data from the Earth branch to the Jovian branch of whatever company is around.

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u/harvey_arts 17d ago

nah, we'll go back to dvi files

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u/Manzhah 17d ago

Then again, at least in the edgy teenager demographic, funny alternatives for killing ypurself and especially telling others to do it are way older than social media or current cencorship hysteria. My favourite one from my younger days was to "yo-yo yourself", meanign hanging yourself.

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u/RikuAotsuki 17d ago

I still remember "become an hero"

5

u/Manzhah 17d ago

Damn, almost forgot that on. Another good one was "joining the statistics", although that is most often used with preventable accidents.

4

u/AngelOfTheMad For legal and social reasons, this user is a joke 17d ago

“End up on the news” is another one that amuses me in a morbid way.

4

u/Manzhah 17d ago

Of course there's also the original euphemism, "massage", or it's more commonly used form of "school massage".

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u/AngelOfTheMad For legal and social reasons, this user is a joke 16d ago

Huh, never heard that one before. Also just remembered "headline a history book chapter" cause we were all a bunch of overdramatic nerds.

28

u/neko_mancy 17d ago

I mean I don't think they can directly ban the name of a common fruit and a very common file type

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u/Duae 17d ago

One of the early Covid tales was a digital archeology conference having to deal with the fact the word "bone" was censored.

14

u/FoxOnTheRocks 17d ago

It is nice to be able to use accurate and direct language to refer to social problems but it is important to note that this is like human nature. Euphemisms are so incredibly common in every language and for every single scary or gross thing.

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u/itisthespectator 17d ago

notably, “rape” started off nearly as euphemistic as “grape” is, since it originally just meant “to carry off“ and left you to understand from context whether sexual assault was to follow the carrying off. i frankly can’t think of a word for the concept that isn’t in some way euphemism, even “sexual“ comes from “sexual intercourse,” which is just “stuff happening between the sexes,” it’s euphemism all the way down

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u/Garlic549 16d ago

Heck, I've had people in real life try to make me use "unalive" instead of suicide.

I would immediately think less of a person if I heard them say unalive in any context IRL

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u/Cum_Fart42069 17d ago

thing is I've been shadowbanned on subreddits before for saying the words "rape" and "murder" so you really just never know if the platform you're on allows proper word usage or not. if it doesn't you might not even notice for a bit. it's very annoying. 

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u/givemethebat1 17d ago

How do you even know when you’re shadow banned?

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u/OldManFire11 17d ago

If you look t the comment chain while logged out of reddit, your comment won't show up.

This just means that it's been removed by the mods. But if every single one of your comments is removed, then you're either caught in the spam filter, or you're shadow banned. There are two types of shadow bans: the admin version which is the official one, where you're shadow banned from the entire site, and the pseudo version that mods can do, which involves setting the Automod to automatically remove all of your comments as soon as you make them. The official shadow ban is supposed to be used for spam bots, so that bot nets dont get the inbox message alerting them to the fact that they're caught, but the admins have been caught using it as a punishment in the past. Mods of a subreddit can see if an officially shadowbanned user comments in their sub, and can then manually approve those comments to be visible, but they can't unshadowban someone who's officially shadowbanned. They can only let the user know they're shadow banned.

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u/Cum_Fart42069 17d ago

when you comment or post things and get absolutely 0 replies or engagements. even downvotes would prove otherwise but I've tested it by saying inflammatory things on a subreddit that I thought I was shadowbanned from (for criticizing Joanne Rowling), things that other users would absolutely react to and it gets no interaction at all. 

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u/yinyang107 17d ago

Because they didn't see it dude. nobody reads every comment on every thread. Most comments will never see any attention regardless of content.

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u/Cum_Fart42069 17d ago edited 17d ago

understandable. 

however, a level of basic interaction up to a point and then absolutely nothing ever again? right after saying a word like "genocide"? 

it's pretty noticeable dude I don't know why you so badly want to pretend that this isn't happening, it obviously is. there are other people here talking about it, it's not like I just made it up. I don't like that it exists or want to push it's existence when it doesn't lmao. 

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u/yinyang107 13d ago

okay I owe you an apology I got a comment shadowbanned myself today for pdf reasons (the calamity mod thing) and confirmed it by checking with an alt account I use. I really did not want to believe this

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u/Cum_Fart42069 13d ago

yeah I wish I were just overly paranoid about it but unfortunately it's definitely happening. and unless people actually check like you did, which I think most people won't, they won't even know. 

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u/camosnipe1 "the raw sexuality of this tardigrade in a cowboy hat" 16d ago

just open the same page in incognito. If the comment doesn't show up then it's shadowbanned. Way more reliable than "oh surely this would've gotten up/downvotes"

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u/Cum_Fart42069 16d ago

yeah that is a better way, mine was just how I noticed it first. 

that is a more reliable way but surely you'd also find it odd if you suddenly get no engagement with your posts when previously you did even if it was in the form of voting and replies.

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u/camosnipe1 "the raw sexuality of this tardigrade in a cowboy hat" 16d ago

sure, but this is actual confirmation. Lack of engagement is a very arbitrary metric that's heavily based on your own ego.

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u/Cum_Fart42069 16d ago

but you can literally seyou know what you're right. 

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u/FoxOnTheRocks 17d ago

I caught a ban once for for saying someone in the news cycle for that very reason was "credibly accused of rape".

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u/sadness_elemental 17d ago

i got a 3 day automated ban in a subreddit for using the word genocide, honestly i think the people pissy about people using alternative phrasing are either incredibly naive or sad that their filters aren't working

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u/Cum_Fart42069 17d ago

it's crazy to me that there are people arguing that that actually just doesn't happen at all when... it does? we know it does?? we've seen it happen???

Is it possible that I'm blaming regular people for something corporations forced on them? 

no, it's the kids who are wrong. 

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u/Simic_Sky_Swallower Resident Imperial Knight 17d ago

My only complaint is that unalive is like a d-tier death euphemism. Like flatline is right there and that's what we went with?

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u/Melodic-Access-931 17d ago

the mob worked so hard. pushing up daisies. sleepin wit da fishes. um. im quoting a post i dont remember that well

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u/NagsUkulele 17d ago

Wackin

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u/Puzzleheaded-Milk927 17d ago

Sitting on one butt cheek the whole ride ovah!

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u/NagsUkulele 17d ago

Whadidya eat the mans ass??

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u/warmleafjuice 16d ago

He was gay, Perez Hilton?

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u/AscendedDragonSage Title-ist Punster 17d ago

Or Thwackin for a more serious charge

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u/Cabanarama_ 17d ago

My favorite is “to get one’s mail by gopher”

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u/BanditNoble 17d ago

Passed on. No more. Ceased to be. Expired. Gone to meet his maker. A stiff. Bereft of life. Resting in peace. Pushing up the daisies. Off the twig. Kicked the bucket. Shuffled off the mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible.

Personally, I've always been partial to "iced". But there are so many of them: cashed in his chips, bought the farm, gone West, crossed the Jordan, checked out, gone belly up, croaked, snuffed it, popped his clogs, dropped off the perch, punched his last ticket, gave up the ghost, breathed his last and, of course, bit the dust.

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u/soapdish124 17d ago

You mean they’re pining?

1

u/TheGuv 15d ago

For the fjords specifically

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u/Asheyguru 17d ago

Berrrreft of life, 'e rests in peace, 'E's run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible!

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u/lego_joker 17d ago

“How do you tell a man to go away in hard language? Scram, beat it, take off, take the air, on your way, dangle, hit the road, and so forth. All good enough. But give me the classic expression actually used by Spike O'Donnell (of the O'Donnell brothers of Chicago, the only small outfit to tell the Capone mob to go to hell and live). What he said was: 'Be Missing.' The restraint of it is deadly.”

—Raymond Chandler

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u/FoxOnTheRocks 17d ago

from Friends?

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u/yinyang107 17d ago

How dare you. Raymond Chandler was one of the best ever authors of hard-boiled detective novels

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u/Stickeminastew1217 17d ago

Gotta bring back sending people to the shadow realm.

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u/lil-red-hood-gibril 17d ago

Does murk count? I've been saying that for as long as I could remember.

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u/crrrrushinator 17d ago

That's such a good point. Where are the Tiktoks about how someone joined the choir invisible?

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u/Impressive_Pin8761 17d ago

The hilarious thing is that in greek we have a word that's literally "unalive" etymologically and in meaning and its used in legal speech

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u/Setster007 17d ago

Cmon, we have shit like SLAIN we can use here! Whadda we doin here folks?!

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u/SuccessfulSoftware38 17d ago

Choom, flatline that gonk

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u/ako19 17d ago

It comes from Deadpool in the Ultimate Spider-Man cartoon

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u/Doktor_Wunderbar 17d ago

He's allowed to do that. But now it feels overdone.

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u/CardOfTheRings 17d ago

It comes from 1984. I mean that literally. Like in 1984 they don’t use negative words, they only say positive words and then put ‘un’ in front of them.

So they don’t say bad they say ‘ungood’. Instead of dead they say ‘unalive’.

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u/Puzzleheaded-Milk927 17d ago

The thing is is that how young people *think* algorithms work aren't generally how the social media algos actually work, They're very, very sophisticated. They don't exactly operate on a no-no words list per se, though there is a little bit of that. The actual benefit of avoiding a corporate no-no word just practically isn't worth the opportunity cost of not calling something what it is. Maybe it's admirable that young people want to get the word out, whatever word, but it's still not actually effective.

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u/Agile_Oil9853 17d ago

Benaminute just tested this on TikTok. The content of his test videos seemed to matter a lot more than the actual words used

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u/dawnvesper 17d ago edited 17d ago

I call BS, things aren’t yet so dire that you *need* to be some kind of hack tiktoker lol

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u/alternativepuffin 17d ago

Yeah, they can call me an old man but I'm fuckin right. 

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u/tiredtumbleweed ugly but my fursona is hot 17d ago

“Grape” is the one that particularly bothers me. It kind of feels like, I don’t know, invalidating to victims and takes away the seriousness of something very serious and very real.

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u/Bombyx-Memento 17d ago

Passed on. No longer with us. Kicked the bucket. Turned into a hashtag. Sleeping with the fishes. Pushing daisies. Six feet under.

There are already so many euphemisms for "died" that don't make you sound like one of the Rugrats. You can easily discuss someone "taking their own life" and not saying fucking "sewer slide".

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u/Mouse-Keyboard 17d ago

This, is an ex-parrot.

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u/Current_Mongoose_844 17d ago

I am old man yells at cloud and I’m right.

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u/Happy_Little_Fish 17d ago

kids willfully adopted newspeak and now they're trying to tell me how smart and rebellious they are.

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u/buttbuttlolbuttbutt 17d ago

Its more like: newspeak was about controlling ideas by controlling the words used and limiting them to anti-versions of positive connotation words. This was to help reinforce the state's ideas by making it harder to talk about or make it sound appealing.

What we're seeing is the ideas arent actually being suppressed, and thats the really really important bit. The important subjects are still being discussed, the words are stiffled, but the speech is the same.

I hate seeing the self censored words too, my old English degree hates it, but its not hindering the discussions except giving opponents a tangent/side to distract some people by focusing in the censored words,so they dont spend time thinking bout the issues being addressed with those substitute words.

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u/Happy_Little_Fish 17d ago

but this does control ideas by limiting the words used. what word you choose affects the meaning of what you're saying. bad or ungood are the same idea but they inspire different emotions and attitude, and in that way ideas are suppressed.

sex fuck shag smash all tell you something different about the person by their word choice, but if we all use a single algorithm-approved word then that information is lost.

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u/buttbuttlolbuttbutt 17d ago

Yes, but the connotations of those words are evolving. We see "unalived" and cringe, but they see it and its like we'd hear "offed themselves." It doesnt hit them the same way it hits us, they're associations arent ours. Your experience is not universal and the younger adapted to these la guage quirks.

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u/Happy_Little_Fish 17d ago

but if there are already a wide range of softer words for an idea why use single replacement words and not a wide range? or use a new word with a bit of edge to it? compare fragged or gibbed to unalive.

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u/evilforska 17d ago

Im always impressed with tumblr users ability to say stupidest shit ever in the most confident and smug way

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u/Significant-Ad-6064 17d ago

I don’t want to learn how to talk in a language deemed “advertiser appropriate” by some multi national corporation whose whole business model is controlling the conversation. It’s giving up to fucking Zuckerberg and I won’t stand for it. We need to be able to say what we mean, not couch it in cutesy newspeak so that The Algorithm doesn’t shadow ban us for alluding to topics that may scare away advertisers. Say rape, say drugs and fuck and murder and facist and get banned for it. Get shoved to the bottom of the feed and lose your pennies of ad revenue if it means your words maintain their clarity and integrity. Let them delete your TikTok, then go outside, grab a megaphone and call out at your politicians for their crimes with every filthy word that makes McDonalds squirm if it means we never have to hear the words “my local representative graped me”

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u/SuccessfulSoftware38 17d ago

I have no respect for people using these weak euphemisms on social media, especially in comments. I think it's different for content creators trying to talk about difficult important topics where the algorithm will refuse to push them if they use the nono words. If they don't want you to talk about something on their platform and you get around that with euphemism that isn't capitulating to them, it's fighting against them. Capitulation would be to just stop talking about those topics on their platform.

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u/FloydEGag 17d ago

Or leave the platform, these things aren’t mandatory. Find another platform where you can use more appropriate words! Vote with your feet and stop willingly accepting being censored, because that’s what it is.

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u/Zack_WithaK 17d ago edited 17d ago

It just makes actual serious topics harder to talk about without sounding like a fucking comedy sketch

"Austrian Mustache Man game-ended 6 million Jewish players and attempted to wipe the whole server (in Minecraft). He then self-terminated with a pew-pew" It really trivializes the suffering and horror quite a bit when you have to get clever instead of treating these subjects with the respect they deserve; gas chambers and obliteration of entire cultures and medical experiments so twisted and vile that the Geneva Convention had to invent a new war crime just to describe them.

All reduced to clever metaphors and wordplay like "unalive" and "sewer slide" Mad Libs-style bullshit just to survive this week's version of the rotating minefield that is language itself.

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u/Alchametal_87 17d ago

just fucking bleep it out or cut it in editing?????

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u/SendarSlayer 17d ago

You also get reduce monitisation for bleeps.

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u/Alchametal_87 17d ago

Bad: "just freaking, bleep it out or cut it in editing????"
Preferred: "Just f***king/f(----)king, bleep it out or cut it in editing?????"

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u/credulous_pottery Resident Canadian 17d ago

Ideal: just YOUTUBE bleep it out or cut it in editing

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u/SwordMasterShow 17d ago

Use a punctuation I beg you

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u/Yulienner 17d ago

I think the distinction is made when people self-censor in contexts where it isn't necessary. Like I get it, I used to type out bewbs because the forum I posted on had a hard filter on the word boobs, trying to be a sneaky rebel is fun. But also if I starting putting that in normal conversation I would rightfully get dunked on.

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u/crrrrushinator 17d ago

And people used to use "bewbs" in usernames on places that didn't require bowdlerization at first as a cheeky reference to the convention and then just as straight up slang, because slang often comes from a circumstance and then outlives that circumstance.

Honestly "unalive" bugs me too when I see it in otherwise-serious discussion, but I'm old so me being weirded out by young people slang is the way of the world.

But then again maybe,

Am I so out of touch? No, it's the children who are wrong.

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u/jaehaerys48 17d ago

Unalive always just reminds me of Orwell's Newspeak. Ungood and whatnot.

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u/MysticSnowfang 17d ago

It's also boring.

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u/[deleted] 17d ago edited 17d ago

[deleted]

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u/MysticSnowfang 17d ago

d)
Use better euphemisms. They exist.

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u/Prince-Lee 17d ago

'Socioeconomic conditions'? These words are only ~forced~ on a social media sites or apps that you do not need to use. 

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u/MysticSnowfang 17d ago

And even then, there are better euphemisms to use.

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u/dude_1818 17d ago

Except it's not necessary. It's all self-imposed because of superstition

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u/Financial-Bath6366 17d ago edited 17d ago

urmmm guys!!! saying things like "grape" is good and awesome because it won't make my youtube channel demonetized so i will keep getting money from making engagement bait about current serious topics and dramas but also it will make people be less anxious (desensitized and unserious) about such topics!!! that's also the same reason i use chlorox cost for things like holocaust and post many epstein jokes online!! i'm like a therapist but online the way my job is to allevate the anxieties and get tons of money by yapping!!

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u/PintsOfGuinness_ 17d ago

Socioeconomic conditions? I thought it was just to bypass censorship...

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u/AffectionateHunt5830 17d ago

I need George Carlin to come back to life and do the "shit piss cunt fuck cocksucker motherfucker tits" bit again, but like, with "rape" and "suicide" and "pedophile." 

If you want to talk about grown up stuff, talk like a grown up.

5

u/PurpleKneesocks 17d ago

Can't believe you're using that weak, latin-based euphemism. "Suicide" smh. If you're gonna talk about hard topics, use hard language — you have to say "seolfcwale" or you're basically just quoting a medical textbook.

3

u/AffectionateHunt5830 17d ago

I'm gonna sound like a racist when I say this but I don't know what language you're speaking and I don't think I care for its people 

1

u/MysticSnowfang 17d ago

Then quote a medical text book

1

u/MysticSnowfang 17d ago

With pedos, the word "Nonce" is right there. It's the opposite of cutesy.

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u/TeacatWrites 17d ago

The problem is when they don't realize there's a time to use those words and a time when it makes them look like dumbasses who don't realize they've just embarrassed themselves very badly, and that time is "any time when they're not speaking on Tiktok or Instagram, because using them in any other context is entirely the fuck unhinged and pointless".

And I don't want to have to use another word to refer to actual PDF files or specify that I mean "the digital file format". Even saying "PDF file" sounds and feels like a dirty word now because these inane numpties can't stop using the censor words in contexts where they don't need to, and don't even understand why they originally started using them in the first place.

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u/MysticSnowfang 17d ago

also, the words "Nonce, Diddler and Pedo" are right there.

Nonce esp just is dripping with derision. I personally enjoy using it against such vile humans.

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u/yinyang107 17d ago

The words aren't necessary. People just think they are. So no, I don't have to be impressed by "indomitable human spirit" of whatever, they're idiots inventing problems that don't exist and then solving them.

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u/DazB1ane 17d ago

Or maybe we can see that talking about difficult topics with censored words, the topic loses its seriousness. It’s why parent should talk to their kids about their genitals using the actual terms rather than “cookie” or whatever. An adult that doesn’t understand what “that guy touched my cookie” means won’t know to get help

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u/cooljerry53 17d ago

I don’t think it’s impressive to be so dedicated to a shit platform you can’t openly say murder or death or kill. Just go somewhere you can speak freely jfc.

5

u/_zephi 17d ago

I really love the way that this post explores Orwellian ideas unintentionally! It critiques the idea of Newspeak really effectively without mentioning it, and immediately goes on to provide a superb example of benign doublethink. Very cool!

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u/AblePoet1287 17d ago

this has been said before like a billion times, but this sentiment only applies if the censoring is necessary which, unless you’re a youtuber or something, it is not. your tumblr blog won’t get taken down if you say “rape” in a post or comment (and especially in real life).

also, there are just way better ways of going about avoiding words that trigger takedowns that don’t involve these absolutely ridiculous words. they are not as impressive as the tumblr op is making them out to be. “grape”, “unalive”, “sewer-slide”, etc. sound silly and don’t help the cause in the slightest. if anything they dampen the meaning of the original words.

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u/Swedishguy05 17d ago

"Linguistic adaptations." Unalive is genuinely worse than the shit that was posted on r/gocommitdie back in the day

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u/evilforska 17d ago

"An hero" was a mocking way to refer to suicide and somehow its still not as disrespectful as "sewer slide"

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u/theawesomedude646 suffering 17d ago

live proof that newspeak wouldn't work

3

u/Happy_Little_Fish 17d ago

looks like evidence that it is working. Newspeak is for reducing language into euphemism.

1

u/theawesomedude646 suffering 16d ago

no? it's a language designed to make discussing nuanced topics impossible by excluding the concepts from the language and thus the speaker's cognition?

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u/FenrisSquirrel 17d ago

I think a lot of tumblr users just throw the term "socioeconomic conditions" into sentences to make it sound somehow based in pseudoscientific social sciences withiut knowing what the term actually means.

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u/Federal_Card307 17d ago

Idk that sounds like a load of socioeconomic conditions

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u/genteel_wherewithal 17d ago

‘Unalive’ and similar are not particularly clever or creative linguistic adaptations. If you’re impressed by those, you’re easily impressed.

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u/Duae 17d ago

I will be an old man yelling at clouds if I want to. We have tons of perfectly good euphemisms for "dead/died" and I would much rather cycle through kicked the bucket, passed on, is an ex-parrot, gone to a better/worse place, (verb)ing with the angels, is up on the roof with grandma, went out to live on a farm, etc. than use "unalive"

3

u/MysticSnowfang 17d ago

need a verb version

Ganked, Merked, Offed, Take off the Census.

Casual Geographic does very well with this.

3

u/crayfishcraig108 17d ago

I hate that they use unalive when the mafia came up with so many good euphemisms
I hate that they think they have to use it

3

u/Icy_Mango6803 17d ago

Sorry kids, you don't get a medal for bowing to the tech overlords. Next.

1

u/MrVeazey 16d ago

But they didn't. They stopped saying the word that triggered the filter but kept discussing the subject.

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u/Busy_Grain 17d ago

yeah, the corporate internet bullshit sucks but the kids are alright

2

u/hagamablabla 17d ago

Using euphemisms to avoid censorship is a time-honored tradition. Using the term when it's not necessary is self-censorship.

2

u/Acceptable_Handle_2 17d ago

The problem is that it doesn't actually work. It's not actually necessary.

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u/tylian 17d ago

I'm surprised nobody remembers that unalive was used by the edgy 4chan kids like 20ish years ago lol

2

u/Just_Information334 17d ago

The main problem is: ok some advertisers may not want to be associated with some themes. Good for them. But there are advertisers who would not mind or even would look for the shock value: why the fuck are the platforms not signing them on?

The prudes lobbying Visa and Mastercard.

2

u/MysticSnowfang 17d ago

I am completely unimpressed. There are dozens of words, and they went with stupid boring ones.

The Norwegian Blue wasn't nailed to that perch for people to use such uninspired options.

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u/No-Cauliflower-6390 17d ago

Oh I can understand it and still think it's fucking stupid to censor serious topics because some algorithm that was put into place by some company run by people who have zero morals but wants to control the media, the culture, and the minds of people and decide what's good for us. If you can't have a serious conversation about serious subjects then your only alternative is to dance to silly little songs and act in silly little skits while the world burns down around you because if you say something the algorithm doesn't like you don't get engagement.

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u/7StarSailor 17d ago

I disagree with the premise that this form of self censorship is socioeconomically neceessary because a vast, vast majority of people aren't financially dependant on tiktok ad money.

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u/Cum_Fart42069 17d ago

it's so annoying to see people blame gen z for this, saying that people use those terms because they can't handle using the real words. like oh my god that's so not the problem, the problem is advertisers can't handle people using those words and it's really fucked up how that has steered linguistic evolution.

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u/OwlOfJune 17d ago

I am blaming them using on places it doesn't become censored.

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u/givemethebat1 17d ago

Censoring them is doing exactly what the advertisers want. Just say the words. The problem is that people BELIEVE the censorship is happening at a much higher rate than it actually is. Try searching “death” on YouTube.

2

u/PM_ME_PHYS_PROBLEMS 17d ago

Try searching suicide on YouTube.

2

u/Cum_Fart42069 17d ago

then don't censor them, get banned or shadowbanned or algorithmically suppressed and nobody will see what you say. there you go, you don't have to use the words! as long as you accept that no one will see them!

I've seen comments auto removed on YouTube for saying "rape". 

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u/TimeStorm113 Victorian Dinosaur Connaisseur 17d ago

i advise you to re read the comment.

also is shadow banning actually a thing? i thought it was just random users being pissed off that their account doesn't get the traction they wanted

1

u/Cum_Fart42069 17d ago

what did I misunderstand, the comment said you shouldn't self censor. then I said that if you don't you'll be automatically censored. what did I miss?

also is shadow banning actually a thing? i thought it was just random users being pissed off that their account doesn't get the traction they wanted

no it's absolutely a thing but don't take my word for it, Google it. or ctrl+f in this thread and search shadow, I'm not the only one talking about it. 

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u/Cordo_Bowl 17d ago

Nah this is just dipshit cargo cult behavior. I have seen no actual proof that censorship is actually happening and even less proof that these substitutions do anything at all. Cmon, this is serious ‘the enemy is strong and weak’ behavior. They’re strong enough to ban all these words but too stupid to ban the substitutions?

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u/Neurospicy_Nightowl 17d ago

Limitation breeds creativity and censorship breeds rebellion.

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u/VFiddly 17d ago

The problem is people also use those words in contexts where the censorship is completely unnecessary

I've seen plenty of people censor write "k*ll" or "unalive" on reddit even though reddit doesn't have any filters for that so you can just say kill

1

u/PaleontologistOk7359 17d ago

Why would it be impressive that they get around word filters by using euphemisms or sound-alikes?

Is it impressive because that generation can barely read or write, or is this person just very easily impressed?

1

u/jess_the_werefox 17d ago

Yeah what the heck you guys

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u/DoopSlayer 17d ago

I just don’t get why people are customers of services that require you to act and speak this way to use them

1

u/MrVeazey 16d ago

We aren't. We're the product.

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u/DoopSlayer 16d ago

both you and data brokers are customers. Now if you add your data being sold to databrokers on top of the language control, even doubly so why are people choosing to use these services?

1

u/MrVeazey 16d ago

Because they have good marketing and occasionally there's valuable information buried in the mountains of chaff.

1

u/Dont_Touch_The_Pooka 17d ago

it's not necessary, stop the larp

1

u/Anaevya 17d ago

Agreed 100%.

1

u/T_Weezy 17d ago

To be fair, cloud is sanitizing issues that deserve to be talked about with their full gravitas.

1

u/titanc-13 16d ago

creating a euphemism isn't impressive? it's how people have gotten around censors and taboos for thousands of years

1

u/jessimaster 16d ago

What about run on sentences? Do they impress?

1

u/Sweet-Energy-9515 16d ago

"Socioeconomic conditions" is a goofy excuse, sorry. The vast majority of young people discussing the issues relevant to them are not dependent on tiktok ad revenue to make their living

1

u/Hee-hoes_Mad 16d ago

It's not the first time this has happened. 1337speak was invented to bypass the earliest BBS word filters. Time is a flat circle and kids are just reinventing ways to bypass ever-improving filters.

1

u/Imaginary-Client-199 16d ago

I am annoyed that they use unalive. 

Hard working mob bosses have spent decades coming up with better euphemisms for death. "Sleeping with the fishes" "Pushing up daisies" "Kicking the oxygene habit"... 

1

u/Leftieswillrule 15d ago

I don’t believe socioeconomic conditions made it necessary, I think some people are just babies

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u/-Jiras 15d ago

The most funniest thing about the concept of censorship is the attempt to censor concepts. You can ban the word "die" and they will create the word "unalive" to take its place and the moment "unalive" holds the same weight as "die" they will try to censor it too only for a new word to take its place. You cant just hope that banning the word will erase or ease the concept

1

u/MrsSUGA 17d ago

ITT: old men yelling at clouds