Naming Of Cache........

[+Johnnie Stalkers]

My comments on condoms where not intended to challenge the concensus. I have no intention of creating such a cache, just a vaque attempt at being funny. Hence my / . Sorry for any confusion or misdirection from our rather on topic, sterilized, kid tested, mother approved discussion.

[+Team GPSaxophone]

Edited December 6, 2003 by Team GPSaxophone

[+Sparky-Watts]

Snappin' could refer to quite a few things

Fore is a term used in golf and it also means in front

skins could be sports terms like 'skins game' 'shirts and skins' or hunting as in pelts (an animal's skin or fur)

 

Don't presume that YOUR definition is the only one people will think of when they see those words (although I agree that it is an inappropriate name for a cache if there is no explanation to offer for using it)

Your interpretation assumes that the word "foreskin" is broken down into parts. Much like the debate I had with the "Charter Throbbing Member" name. Correct, as broken down and explained, it is not quite so offensive, but as one word, there is only one definition.

[Jomarac5]

Come on Sax Man, the word "fore" and the word "skin" are both pretty innoculous, but the word in question is not either of those words -- it's "foreskin" -- which is very much defined no matter how you slice it (did I say that?).

 

*****

[+hedberg]

Now I know that using the "F-word" and complaining about censorship gives 10% warn

 

So everytime I write about that I will get warned, and guess what? I'm not afraid of doing it, so bring it on!

 

Some words in english can be offensive in for example Swedish. So everytime I find those words in the forum or cache pages, shall I report them for being offensive in swedish?

 

Offensive words can just be offensive when peoples mind are not open. It will be almost impossible to offend me, and as someone else said here, I will give 5 bucks to anyone that can offend me!

[+Team GPSaxophone]

Throbbing could be broken into 'Throb' and 'Bing'

Ever hear of Bing Crosby? He's popular this time of year.

 

Many words in the English language are two words put together. As one word the definition CAN change, but doesn't always. Since this thread is about using those types as a play on words, foreskin can mean more than one thing.

[+Johnnie Stalkers]

it's "foreskin" -- which is very much defined no matter how you slice it (did I say that?).

 

*****

ROFLMAO!

 

You know the 5 bucks just isn't worth saying what I would say. But I like the way you think.

[+Sparky-Watts]

Some words in english can be offensive in for example Swedish. So everytime I find those words in the forum or cache pages, shall I report them for being offensive in swedish? 

 

That's a very pertinent point, hedberg. I am very guilty of this myself. I know that in some Spanish dialects, to tell someone their story is "incredible" actually means it is a lie, that it is impossible to give credit (I found this out through personal experience and a rather large knot on my head). I would suggest that you ask one of the Mods about a list of "offensive" words for yourself. Thank you for bringing that up.

 

Edited for spelling.

Edited December 6, 2003 by Sparky-Watts

[+hedberg]

It happens a lot when Sweds go abroad to other countries, that they say the swedish name of something they don't know the english name for, and it might mean something totally different in other languages...

 

Now, we are getting a little bit off-topic. But my opinion is that some things might be offensive to some people, and not to other people. Either we make a really biiiig list of words that can have a different meaning in other languages, or we try to use everything with sense?

 

If I go as a tourist to, lets say Iran, and puts a cache their and names it something like "Death to Allah", of course will it be offensive to the people living there. But at the same time might not the cache be offensive in other countries. But if we instead calls it "Next to Allah", then it might not be offensive in Iran, but it might be offensive to Christians that we have a cache with the name of a different God.

So this is very difficult... As I mentioned in an earlier post, there a caches here in Sweden named God in various ways, like "Closest way to God" or "Calling God".

The last one is a cache that are next to a church and the name has a meaning when you see the cache, but of course it might be offensive to someone that not believe in God? But can we really take responsibility when we name a cache that NO-ONE will be upset by the name of the cache? If we try to keep the name of the cache as neutral as possible, that's okay, but still someone fanatic or something like that can be offended by the name, and what shall we do then?

Change the name of the cache just because of one person complaining?

It is just a name, all caches must have a name...

[Jomarac5]

hedberg, you've made some really good points. I don't think that the problem is exclusive to Swedes -- I'll bet there are similar situations for nearly every language. I think the best way to deal with this is look at the context and the source -- if one of my cache titles contains a word that is offensive in Swedish (but is fine in English), and my cache is located in Vancouver, Canada, then I would not feel obligated to change it as it is not directly intended for non-English speaking cachers.

 

If I were visiting Sweden and came across a cache name that when translated to English was something offensive, I may let the cache owner know of the translation, but I would probably look at it as a harmless cultural crossover and make a joke of it. I doubt that I would ask for it to be changed as the cache is not specifically intended for English speaking people so the word was not intentional.

 

With respect to the topic question -- my feeling is that we don't need a list of words that are unacceptable. Most of us should know what is or is not acceptable in public and we know when something crosses the line. Obviously, most words with deliberate sexual connotations are not going to be accepted. Yes, there are words used sexually that are absolutely benign when used in other settings, but the reality is that we are all smart enough to know when those words are being used in an offensive manner.

 

It can be a lot of fun to use words in clever ways that might be taken one way by an adult, and yet in a completely innocent way by a child -- the movie "Shrek" has some great examples of this. If it's done in good taste I'm OK with it (see my two previous posts).

 

Overall, there are definitely some words that should be avoided and 'foreskin' is certainly one of them.

 

*****

Edit: typo

Edited December 6, 2003 by Jomarac5

[+hedberg]

Jomarac5, I agree with you. And also the content on the cache page can sometimes get a little bit confused when it gets misspelled...

For example have I spelt the word 'lying' wrong on a lot of logs and/or cache pages, where I have written 'laying' instead. It might mean something totally different, I don't know, but I just discovered that I have written the word wrong for a long time. Example: 'The cache was lying fully visible on the ground.'

 

But as you say, we must overlook everything, not get stuck by a single small word that are wrong.

 

By the way, even between the countries of Sweden & Norway, that are neighbours and speaks the same language almost, are the differences in the language. The norwegians speaks a little bit older version of Swedish, to explain it easily. This means that some words in Swedish have a new meaning compared with what the word means in norwegian. I think we can find that kind of difference between the US, Canada & UK also. For example, I write that some one in sweet ('rar' in Swedish) does it mean in Norwegian that the person in stupid. That's the old meaning of the word....

 

These kind of things can also happen when we write the content on the cache page, that we use the wrong word or perhaps the wrong spelling of a word. But after overlooking the whole text can people normally think of what the correct word should be. I think that the most users on this board has seen the email that was spread all over Internet a couple of weeks ago, about a study showing that misspelling of words doesn't effect when we are reading a text. The most important was the first and last letter in each word, and that the 'small' words like 'at', 'and', 'in' etc was correct. The rest will our brain figure out - hopefully

 

Okay, I think that we will lose the connection with the topic soon, so I will finish my posts at this thread now... But, think about what are considered to be offensive in one country might be okay in an another country. And the opposite of course.

 

And don't forget - it's only a sport. Go out and have fun!

[bug and snake]

I wasn't sure about posting this - the very fact of posting it may cause offense to some. Therefor, I am looking for a moderator to make the call. (yes, I am!)

The word is not medical you see, but the story is the total truth.

I used to work in another country as a lecturer in a military college. One of the favorite candy bars among the various expats (coz it really was good) was a chocolate and biscuit confection [which had a name that is a slang term in Western countries for a "private" body part.]

Oh, while I am on that subject, we used a bug spray called 'Fanny' also.

My point is that words can actually be innocent in one language and mean something completely different in another. There is a website somewhere that features just such things but I lost the link some time ago.

 

[Yep, did need to edit that just a bit. You can describe what you're getting at without actually using the word, as I've done above in my edit. Thanks for the invitation to edit. Your post raised valid points, as have many of the other recent posts to this topic. Keep on keepin it clean. -- Keystone]

Edited December 7, 2003 by Keystone Approver

[Jomarac5]

bug&snake wrote:

My point is that words can actually be innocent in one language and mean something completely different in another.

Agreed. In previous years I spent a substantial amount of time travelling overseas in Asia and saw LOTS of English translations on products that were absolutely outrageous -- the name of one particular brand of toothpaste could turn some people off of brushing their teeth forever! But as a visitor to a country where English is not always spoken and cultural diffences abound, I just accepted it as that. I certainly didn't find it offensive knowing that it was simply a misunderstanding of language interpretation.

 

In the end I don't think that any of us can be expected to know all the translations that go along with our cache names. But we certainly should be mindful of the offensive words in our mother tongue.

 

*****

[bug and snake]

Thanx Mr Admin person sir..... *S* (for not wiping it completely)

Just a thought, even that word I got away with in the above post. In the US it is yer 'sit upon' while in the UK only ladies would have one.

 

US/UK - two nations separated by a common language. (I forget who said that but it is so true)

[bug and snake]

Absolutely agree J5, it's all in the perception as far as I am concerned but there ARE a lot of people who would not be so generous in such cases.

I have spent many extended periods in Asia also. I know exactly what you mean. The most well know example being Coca Cola..... (something like 'bite the wax tadpole' in China - TADPOLE? Did I say TADPOLE?)

[+Johnnie Stalkers]

How about the Chevy Nova....Spanish translation = Chevy No go.

[+Sparky-Watts]

Batman translated in Japanese: Fluttering mouse-boy.

[+Johnnie Stalkers]

I personally find the word 'puppy' to be exceptionially offensive. As a child I was mauled by a pack of wild rabid puppy Jack Russell Terriers. To this day I cannot even watch Frasier. Could you all refrain from using the P word in any future post?

 

After opening myself up like that I think I need a hug, has anyone seen my tree?

[+Team GPSaxophone]

Batman translated in Japanese: Fluttering mouse-boy.

There, not all words mean what 'most' think they do

[bug and snake]

Any time I see a cache with the word 'discomknockerated' in the name I just refuse to go look for it - so there!

Edited December 7, 2003 by bug&snake

[Cholo]

so bring it on!

 

I will give 5 bucks to anyone that can offend me!

Bring it on!!? That sounds just like Dubya. You owe me 5 bucks, make that 5 dollars American.

 

This language stuff is one of my favorite subjects. I remember asking in the Nordic forum about a user name 'Kaka'. I was informed that it could be a Swedish or Norwegian cookie. The word you brought up in your first post is the actual name of a town in Austria. I'm sure things like that will be taken into account by GC.com.

 

The use of certain words for a cache should be governed by common sense. All of the arguements here are fun, but basically a waste of time.

[+hedberg]

One really good example of how bad things can go when naming things:

The car company Honda was working on a new model, that they wanted to name 'Fitta' that is a really nice word in Japanese. Something lucky. And the japanese wants good names that gives luck, when they name their products.

 

But they forget to check what the name meant in different language. Suddenly there was a wordwide pressrelease from Honda saying that they were launching their new model with that name. In northern Europe (Sweden, Denmark, Norway and so on) does this name happens to be an quite offensive name, it's let us say a fish with eight arms minus 'octo' in the name. Okay, everybody understood? A female genitalie...

 

And ooops, they had too change the name in these countries of the car. The same with a Swedish Still water on bottle, that they tried to sell to a country (don't remember which), but the name of the water (LOKA) meant in that country 'Poison, not good to drink' and things like that... Yeah, not good to call water on bottle.

 

So, if I have understood everything right shall we try to avoid using the local 'bad' words and the english 'bad' words in our cache and cache texts. But the problem might be that not everybody is aware that some words are bad, or perhaps have a good side also. If you ask someone in Europe if they are 'gay', most probably they will knock you down, because here everybody only know that word as 'homosexual', not as 'happy'. So the word 'gay' might not be good to write on a cache page, like 'When you find this cache, you will be gay!'. I think that the most Sweds will be upset, but not an american or someone from the UK for example.

[+DirtRunner]

I think it would be safe if you kept the vocabulary to what you would hear on television before 21:00.

 

Safest for everyone

DirtRunner.

[Jomarac5]

Dirtrunner wrote:

I think it would be safe if you kept the vocabulary to what you would hear on television before 21:00.

Obviously, you don't watch Showcase or Bravo.

 

*****

[+hedberg]

Hum? In Sweden they can show porno movies or talk about sex or drugs on tv at anytime... And use any kind of words...

 

The radio morning show are quite explicit, it is okay to make fun of jews, arabic people and things like that... It is almost impossible to sue an another person in Sweden..

 

(Off-topic, yes... But now we are getting back on track again...)

 

But as we said earlier, we can't assure that anyone will be offended by our cache or cache pages. Misspelling words can mean something different, also words can mean other things that expected in a different language or local slang.

 

But we can try to keep it as good as possible, but we will never succeed with getting it 100% free of bad words.

[+Team GPSaxophone]

If you ask someone in Europe if they are 'gay', most probably they will knock you down, because here everybody only know that word as 'homosexual', not as 'happy'. So the word 'gay' might not be good to write on a cache page, like 'When you find this cache, you will be gay!'. I think that the most Sweds will be upset, but not an american or someone from the UK for example.

The word 'gay' hasn't meant 'happy' in the U.S. for quite some time.