This seems to be becoming the hot topic, the elephant in the chatroom - the balance between censorship / freedom of speech on lemmy. There are solid arguments for both ways, and good compromises too.
IMO the FAQ makes it quite clear what the devs have built here, and why. But recent discussions, arguments, make it clear that a lot of the most vocal users object to it.
I’m very curious. Many active users feel this way? Please vote using the up arrows in the comments.
There’s the right amount of censorship
I voted for this option but I would like to provide background for my opinion.
Regarding the slur filter, like others have said in this thread, the slur filter by itself doesn’t really constitute “censorship” in the sense of suppression of objectionable ideas, because it does no such thing (and wasn’t really designed to). It only removes words known to be derogatory. As these derogatory words are not necessary for expressing any ideas, the slur filter does not reduce the variety of ideas that may be expressed. In other words, it’s not anywhere close to something like Orwell’s newspeak, which actually constricted the field of ideas that may be expressed.
As I see it, the slur filter actually serves a different - yet probably even more important - role, in that it signals the values of the Lemmy project, as being friendly to marginalized people at the expense of free-speech absolutists. Probably in an ideal world we would not need such a distinction, but we do not live in that world. You can cater to people who think it should be their right to use whatever language they want, and feel that anyone who is hurt needs to “grow a thicker skin” or “deal with it” - or you can work to provide a more welcoming space to marginalized people. You will end up alienating some group, you have to pick and choose which audience to work towards. I would rather have an atmosphere of acceptance and empathy than “fuck you, deal with it.” I am not disadvantaged because I cannot use slurs on this website.
Some people take objection to the fact that the slur filter is hard-coded (and, as far as I can tell, might be deliberately made difficult to modify?). There is a misconception that software absolutely should not be “political” - this is not the case. Software, like any human creation, reflects the values of its creators. The free (libre) software movement, as an example, has always had as a political goal the advancement of computer user freedom. The decision to hard-code the slur filter into Lemmy is a reflection of the Lemmy project’s political goals.
Regarding moderation on this instance most of what is moderated is spam, with maybe a handful of exceptions, none of which I object to. It is possible the existence of the built-in slur filter reduced the work that human moderators have to do, by keeping bad actors away from this instance (and to some extent away from Lemmy as a project).
This phrase out of context is so good.