Jump to content

The "F" word in a log


Recommended Posts

I had a log on one of my caches using the "f" word twice. The username also had "bitchez" in it. Anyway, I deleted the log and sent a PM to the person explaining that geocaching is family friendly and to please relog the find using language appropriate for all ages,I was polite. I'm just hoping they don't go sabotaging my caches now :( Isn't there a filter that could catch offensive language and make it say "flower" or something?

Link to comment

I had a log on one of my caches using the "f" word twice. The username also had "bitchez" in it. Anyway, I deleted the log and sent a PM to the person explaining that geocaching is family friendly and to please relog the find using language appropriate for all ages,I was polite. I'm just hoping they don't go sabotaging my caches now :( Isn't there a filter that could catch offensive language and make it say "flower" or something?

We agree that we'll do maintenance when we send a cache out.

"Fixing" logs is part of it. :)

If the "f" word or similar vulgarities are in a log, I wouldn't email 'em at all.

They know what they're doing is wrong.

Delete and forgetaboutit.

 

Or, if the kids parents are cachers too, you could email 'em, and ask if they've noticed the kind words left on your (and probably others) cache. :laughing:

Link to comment

You are the filter. Reporting the TOU violation allows the staff to track the behavior and take appropriate action if it continues.

 

Well, shoot. Now I wish I had just deleted it and not sent a message. I was trying to be nice but sometimes it's best to just be a ninja.

Link to comment

You are the filter. Reporting the TOU violation allows the staff to track the behavior and take appropriate action if it continues.

 

Well, shoot. Now I wish I had just deleted it and not sent a message. I was trying to be nice but sometimes it's best to just be a ninja.

 

You can still report it. Logs are never totally deleted, just archived.

Link to comment

Always funny to read this stuff.

There was an interview with a Belgian student on US TV a few days ago. The guy went to UCLAon his first day when there was a shooting and the reporter asked what he thought. He started with "I was thinking, what the... is happening" which made the reporter jump up and quickly say "you can't say that on television". Thing is, no one makes an issue about that on our local radio/TV...

Link to comment

You are the filter. Reporting the TOU violation allows the staff to track the behavior and take appropriate action if it continues.

Well, shoot. Now I wish I had just deleted it and not sent a message. I was trying to be nice but sometimes it's best to just be a ninja.

Meh. I think you did just the right thing. Don't let them convince you all other geocachers are jerks that you shouldn't talk to. There's no reason to think your polite explanation for why you were forced to delete his log won't be the learning moment he needs. Him making a mistake is no excuse for not being friendly. Don't call the cops unless you have some reason to think something's wrong.

Link to comment

The username also had "bitchez" in it.

Groundspeak has been known to unilaterally change usernames that have been objectionable in some way, and they have a sense of humour about doing it. For example, I could see a username like "bitchez" being changed to something like "I_like_female_dogs". :laughing:

Link to comment

The username also had "bitchez" in it.

Groundspeak has been known to unilaterally change usernames that have been objectionable in some way, and they have a sense of humour about doing it. For example, I could see a username like "bitchez" being changed to something like "I_like_female_dogs". :laughing:

 

"b_scratchez" :laughing:

Link to comment

Thing is, no one makes an issue about that on our local radio/TV...

 

That does not surprise me. North America is quite different however in many aspects and that of course also influences geocaching.

 

I know but it's funny/awkward that the country that produces such a large amount of series/movies (not forgetting music videos)with all kinds of language and violence issues reacts that way when "the F word" :o is used.

Link to comment

Thing is, no one makes an issue about that on our local radio/TV...

 

That does not surprise me. North America is quite different however in many aspects and that of course also influences geocaching.

 

I know but it's funny/awkward that the country that produces such a large amount of series/movies (not forgetting music videos)with all kinds of language and violence issues reacts that way when "the F word" :o is used.

 

We are discussing geocaching and geocachers. Seems they are easily offended over anything. But, we all did agree to the TOU of this site.

Link to comment

Thing is, no one makes an issue about that on our local radio/TV...

 

That does not surprise me. North America is quite different however in many aspects and that of course also influences geocaching.

 

I know but it's funny/awkward that the country that produces such a large amount of series/movies (not forgetting music videos)with all kinds of language and violence issues reacts that way when "the F word" :o is used.

 

The reaction to it makes it seem provocative.

Link to comment

 

We are discussing geocaching and geocachers. Seems they are easily offended over anything. But, we all did agree to the TOU of this site.

 

Yes, but it depends on the region whether e.g. something like "what the f..." is regarded to fall under the formulation in the TOU. Geocachers are not a special group of people - they have a normal life too. There are countries where cursing and using swear words in colloquial language is much more common and accepted if it does not go beyond certain limits.

 

The frequently used notion of family-friendliness has no real equivalent in many European countries. The direct translation has a completly different meaning and I have encountered caches which I could not bear emotionally while being not even close to a child's age and not having children myself.

 

If a cacher logged a cache of mine containing a formulation like "what the f... was this", I would not react at all. Of course there are situations where I would react. What I tried to stress is that my personal feeling what's insulting, rude, foul language etc differs from the the judgement of an average person from the US.

Edited by cezanne
Link to comment

It's interesting with such a wide cultural and language difference, geocaching being a worldwide game. Offensive language and vulgarity in one region may not be in another. How does one determine what is a TOU violation or not? Being worldwide, someone offended could report content in an entirely different country where it's every-day language.

 

I think Touchstone's description is about as flexible and relative as it can get - "You are the filter. Reporting the TOU violation allows the staff to track the behavior and take appropriate action if it continues." Even so, I think that's bound to end up with a lowest-common-denominator for acceptable language. No one reports good language, and no one sends in praise of bad language :laughing:. So only reported bad language (theoretically by anyone in the world) gets filtered.

Link to comment

It's interesting with such a wide cultural and language difference, geocaching being a worldwide game. Offensive language and vulgarity in one region may not be in another. How does one determine what is a TOU violation or not? Being worldwide, someone offended could report content in an entirely different country where it's every-day language.

 

Of course that could happen though it's probably not very likely to actually happen often.

 

If one of my caches were involved a lot would have to happen in order to make me report it to GS. If I thought that an action really were necessary, I'd try to sort it out myself. I do not feel any obligation towards GS.

Edited by cezanne
Link to comment

It's interesting with such a wide cultural and language difference, geocaching being a worldwide game. Offensive language and vulgarity in one region may not be in another. How does one determine what is a TOU violation or not? Being worldwide, someone offended could report content in an entirely different country where it's every-day language.

 

Of course that could happen though it's probably not very likely to actually happen often.

 

If one of my caches were involved a lot would have to happen in order to make me report it to GS. If I thought that an action really were necessary, I'd try to sort it out myself. I do not feel any obligation towards GS.

 

I feel that I have an obligation to Groundspeak by keeping my cache pages clean and family friendly.

Link to comment

I feel that I have an obligation to Groundspeak by keeping my cache pages clean and family friendly.

 

As I have explained family friendly is not a term which applies in the area I live in in the sense it is used here.

 

I only feel an obligation towards my local caching community and not towards a company and even less their TOU - that's their own business and not mine.

They provide an option to list caches - that's all for me.

 

I will continue to make my own judgements and will base them on what is common in my area and will not care about other parts of the world in this respect.

Link to comment

even less their TOU - that's their own business and not mine.

 

Well if you feel like that then you shouldn't have agreed to abide by their TOU when you signed up, and then you wouldn't be here now.

 

GS's TOU is definitely not requiring me to report language that someone might regard as foul to them. If I regard the language as foul and it regards one of my caches, I take care of the issue myself.

If I do not regard the language as foul, it's not my business to act.

 

I'm also sure that the average geocacher does not have the knowledge to judge whether a certain formulation can be interpreted as foul language somewhere in the world. Even people who travel a bit are often not aware of the many often subtle differences that exist. GS will not pay for intercultural competence courses for all geocachers worldwide.

 

Let's not forget the context out of which this has started. Again, if one would write "What the f...." in a log for a cache of mine, I would not set any action at all.

 

Let's also not forget that GS's TOU does not come along with a definition of what family friendly means for them. It will be understood in different ways in different areas of the world, regardless of whether signs up or not.

That's not the same as rules like no buried cache (where even that does not hold everywhere around the world as there are well known exceptions granted by the local reviewers).

Edited by cezanne
Link to comment

I feel that I have an obligation to Groundspeak by keeping my cache pages clean and family friendly.

 

As I have explained family friendly is not a term which applies in the area I live in in the sense it is used here.

 

I only feel an obligation towards my local caching community and not towards a company and even less their TOU - that's their own business and not mine.

They provide an option to list caches - that's all for me.

 

I will continue to make my own judgements and will base them on what is common in my area and will not care about other parts of the world in this respect.

 

Yes, Groundspeak provides an option for you to list geocaches, as long as they meet their guidelines. Geocaching is their business, and they say what you can list or not on their service.

Link to comment

I feel that I have an obligation to Groundspeak by keeping my cache pages clean and family friendly.

 

As I have explained family friendly is not a term which applies in the area I live in in the sense it is used here.

 

I only feel an obligation towards my local caching community and not towards a company and even less their TOU - that's their own business and not mine.

They provide an option to list caches - that's all for me.

 

I will continue to make my own judgements and will base them on what is common in my area and will not care about other parts of the world in this respect.

 

I am not in your local community but some day I hope to have the opportunity do do some geocaching in Austria. I won't be using a web site developed for the community to discover caches that I may want to find, which most likely will include reading cache listings and logs posted by those that have previous found (or not) caches in the area. I'll be looking for that information on the globally accessible website that GS has created. If you want to list caches on that site, or contribute to it's content via on line logs it had better adhere to their TOU or GS has every right (because you agreed to the TOU when you created an account) to remove anything that they deem to be in violation of their TOU.

Link to comment

I think the distinction is that clearly as the CO we have been given the right to remove/report language we deem vulgar ("you are the filter").

 

But can someone else (theoretically anywhere in the world) reading your cache page report what they feel is vulgarity in someone else's log? If you as the CO decide to keep it, can they report it to GS and have them make an executive decision?

Link to comment

I think the distinction is that clearly as the CO we have been given the right to remove/report language we deem vulgar ("you are the filter").

 

But can someone else (theoretically anywhere in the world) reading your cache page report what they feel is vulgarity in someone else's log? If you as the CO decide to keep it, can they report it to GS and have them make an executive decision?

 

Yes, it could be reported and I'm sure someone would take offense and report it.

Link to comment

I think the distinction is that clearly as the CO we have been given the right to remove/report language we deem vulgar ("you are the filter").

 

But can someone else (theoretically anywhere in the world) reading your cache page report what they feel is vulgarity in someone else's log? If you as the CO decide to keep it, can they report it to GS and have them make an executive decision?

 

Cache owners do have an obligation to maintain their cache pages, so I think someone could complain to Groundspeak on those grounds and there would be action if GS agreed.

Link to comment

Yes, it could be reported and I'm sure someone would take offense and report it.

 

I'm sure you'll find someone who's offended by just anything. As this thread has shown there are cultural and regional differences so again, no "one size fits all".

Link to comment

Yes, it could be reported and I'm sure someone would take offense and report it.

 

I'm sure you'll find someone who's offended by just anything. As this thread has shown there are cultural and regional differences so again, no "one size fits all".

 

True, but don't all complaints directed to contact at Groundspeak go to Seattle, Washington? :unsure:

Link to comment

GS has every right (because you agreed to the TOU when you created an account) to remove anything that they deem to be in violation of their TOU.

 

GS has of course this right. I never denied that. GS's TOU does not require me however to report someone using language that GS might regard as foul and it does not require me to know what GS or someone somewhere on this globe might see as inappropriate language.

 

There is also no requirement in the TOU that I need to report a guideline violation if it concerns someone's else cache. There is no requirement in the TOU or somewhere else on that page that

I'm not free to accept a formulation like "what the f... is this?". You are certainly free to not accept such a formulation if someone uses it in a log for one of your caches and you can also notify Groundspeak if you come across such a formulation. But that's up to you and not enforced by the guidelines. The example on4bam provided does not come from geocaching and illustrates the point quite well. The Belgian student definitely did not intend to insult someone when he was interviewed about the incident he just became witness of.

 

Believe me or not that the children of age 10+ I come across can bear much more violent scenes and language than I feel comfortable with. Most of them do not feel uncomfortable when they e.g. encounter a cache construction where the belly of a puppet gets pierced through with a cache container decorated in a suitable manner (red colour to remind of blood, container camouflaged as kind of alien conquest of the puppet) while I do not feel comfortable when I encounter something like that.

Edited by cezanne
Link to comment

a cache construction where the belly of a puppet gets pierced through with a cache container decorated in a suitable manner (red colour to remind of blood, container camouflaged as kind of alien conquest of the puppet) while I do not feel comfortable when I encounter something like that.

 

Am I allowed to make such a cache? Breaking the family friendly rule?

Link to comment

a cache construction where the belly of a puppet gets pierced through with a cache container decorated in a suitable manner (red colour to remind of blood, container camouflaged as kind of alien conquest of the puppet) while I do not feel comfortable when I encounter something like that.

 

Am I allowed to make such a cache? Breaking the family friendly rule?

 

In my experience you will end up with many positive logs and many favourite points if you do it in the right way in the area where you cache.

If it concerns me as a person, I would try to ignore such a cache if I happened to realize it early enough.

Link to comment

Personally, I wouldn't be worried about being a little rude by deleting such a log if someone was VERY rude by placing it. Along the same lines, I recently tore a page off of a paper log where someone had drawn the male sexual organs. I was careful to leave intact previous signatures though.

Link to comment

The username also had "bitchez" in it.

Groundspeak has been known to unilaterally change usernames that have been objectionable in some way, and they have a sense of humour about doing it. For example, I could see a username like "bitchez" being changed to something like "I_like_female_dogs". :laughing:

 

There's a semi-local cacher whose handle translates into WTF. He's been using that for quite a while.

Link to comment

The username also had "bitchez" in it.

Groundspeak has been known to unilaterally change usernames that have been objectionable in some way, and they have a sense of humour about doing it. For example, I could see a username like "bitchez" being changed to something like "I_like_female_dogs". :laughing:

There's a semi-local cacher whose handle translates into WTF. He's been using that for quite a while.

Unless the name contains one of the obvious ones (like George Carlin's 7) - which I'm assuming would be automatically rejected - I don't think they go looking for objectionable names. They just deal with them as they get reported or when a Lackey or reviewer notices one.

 

FWIW, there are 7 caches that use "whiskey tango foxtrot", 168 that use "WTF", and lots of members with "WTF" in their name.

Link to comment

And you do have to remember that vulgarity sometimes isn't when in context. I remember one cache I found near a donkey pen entitled something like "a**-inine". There's no vulgarity there...

 

(I'm too lazy to look it up right now so don't ask me :) )

Link to comment

Pretty disappointing to see this cache https://coord.info/GC1V08E has had to have its name changed. PC police at work? Looks pretty recent from the logs that still refer to the original name. Yes that is the name of the village.

 

As Einstein said, "Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."

 

Wonder what "Welkom in ons Reet" means? And yes, it's the name of a village (for more than 700 years).

Edited by on4bam
Link to comment

Pretty disappointing to see this cache https://coord.info/GC1V08E has had to have its name changed. PC police at work? Looks pretty recent from the logs that still refer to the original name. Yes that is the name of the village.

 

It is not only the name of the village. One also should add that the name is pronounced differently than the English word and the background of the name is not at all related to the f* word in the English language.

 

It's a pretty disappointing decision and quite English-language centric. I typically write my logs in English, offer English cache descriptions and try to convince others to do the same whenever possible. If cache names that are completely harmless in the local setting have to be changed because as English names they might be inappropriate, it goes however much beyond what I find acceptable.

 

I wonder when GS will start to scan for cache names in all languages of the world and forbid all cache names which might have a problematic meaning in some language around the world (though most probably the problem will not arise as I think the majority of those who take an issue with a harmless cache name might have English as native language).

Link to comment

I wonder when GS will start to scan for cache names in all languages of the world and forbid all cache names which might have a problematic meaning in some language around the world (though most probably the problem will not arise as I think the majority of those who take an issue with a harmless cache name might have English as native language).

 

:blink:

Since some even are offended by a coin that refers to marijuana it will only get worse. It seems there's a global trend of narrowing minds in many places.

Link to comment

Since some even are offended by a coin that refers to marijuana it will only get worse. It seems there's a global trend of narrowing minds in many places.

 

By the way, the f* word really seems to be frequently used in a colloquial manner when people from your "city" ;) write in English and emotions are involved. I recently came across such a log (completely harmless) at a cache in my area.

Edited by cezanne
Link to comment

By the way, the f* word really seems to be frequently used in a colloquial manner when people from your "city" ;) write in English and emotions are involved. I recently came across such a log (completely harmless) at a cache in my area.

 

I had the "city" guy in mind when quoting Einstein :P

 

Nobody thinks anything about the "word" around here as I already wrote in an earlier (censored) post about a Prince hit that was played (uncensored) on national radio.

Link to comment

Nobody thinks anything about the "word" around here as I already wrote in an earlier (censored) post about a Prince hit that was played (uncensored) on national radio.

Unless I'm missing something culturally, that word's not much of an example since it's in a foreign language. If there are no words in your native language that you try to avoid saying in front of your parents, at least when you were a child, then I'm very impressed that your language has progressed that far. I wouldn't have thought it was possible, but live and learn.

 

But if your language doesn't have that concept, allow me to explain. English has a class of words which are designed to be offensive, and one uses them when one wants to shock. It's not really reasonable to pretend that Americans are prudes because they find offensive the words in their language that are intended to be offensive. Oh, it's true, that in some groups, typically young adults and the media, the attempt to shock becomes so frequent as to appear normal to them, but American society as a whole continues to recognize those terms as rude and unnecessary.

Link to comment

Unless I'm missing something culturally, that word's not much of an example since it's in a foreign language. If there are no words in your native language that you try to avoid saying in front of your parents, at least when you were a child, then I'm very impressed that your language has progressed that far. I wouldn't have thought it was possible, but live and learn.

 

But if your language doesn't have that concept, allow me to explain. English has a class of words which are designed to be offensive, and one uses them when one wants to shock. It's not really reasonable to pretend that Americans are prudes because they find offensive the words in their language that are intended to be offensive. Oh, it's true, that in some groups, typically young adults and the media, the attempt to shock becomes so frequent as to appear normal to them, but American society as a whole continues to recognize those terms as rude and unnecessary.

 

We have a lot of "foreign" words in our language. Many of them originate from the French language. Of course, languages evolve and new words are introduced and the last 50-60 years English influenced our language more and more the last decades some expressions are just taken over and used in daily speech. As seen in the clip I linked too WTF is as normal as whooaaaa... A phrase like s**t happens too. You won't get strange looks saying that. Just as the music references I made no offense is taken.

Link to comment

Nobody thinks anything about the "word" around here as I already wrote in an earlier (censored) post about a Prince hit that was played (uncensored) on national radio.

Unless I'm missing something culturally, that word's not much of an example since it's in a foreign language.

 

The example and the comments were made in connection with the observation that using the f* word when talking/writing English can be quite harmless when the word is used by people from for example Belgium.

The log I recently came across has been written by a young woman and certainly was not intended to be insulting in any way - she was just very unhappy that she overlooked a certain property of a cache in advance.

I'm also completely convinced that the Belgian student who experienced a shooting incident on his first day on a US campus had no insulting intention at all when using "what the f...."

 

 

English has a class of words which are designed to be offensive, and one uses them when one wants to shock.

 

May I ask you if you are aware of the fact that English as a foreign language and English as a native language is not the same?

English has found its way into the everyday language in many non English speaking countries but the usage is not always the same and the intention behind is certainly not the same.

The f* there is used also by people who have no intend at all to shock.

 

 

It's not really reasonable to pretend that Americans are prudes because they find offensive the words in their language that are intended to be offensive. Oh, it's true, that in some groups, typically young adults and the media, the attempt to shock becomes so frequent as to appear normal to them, but American society as a whole continues to recognize those terms as rude and unnecessary.

 

I respect that Americans recognize the f* word and its variations as rude when it used in an English language sentence.

 

It's however very questionable to enforce that a cache in a village or village part called f***ing has to get a different name. The name of the village derived from the name "Adalpert von Vucckingen" - there is no connection at all to the English word and it's also pronounced differently (it rhymes with booking). It's definitely not rude and unnecessary to refer to a village with its name.

 

Would you find it acceptable that from now on any English name that means something negative in some language of the world cannot be used for a cache in say the US?

Link to comment
Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...