How Not to Get Censored
--by Matthew Dunnyveg
One of the most common complaints I hear on Disqus is about being censored or banned for no apparent reason. A complaint by another poster is what prompted this OP.
Sometimes we are censored for relatively obvious reasons. While not all posting sites may directly state as much, the most obvious way to avoid being censored is to mind our manners and morals. This includes not being personaly abusive toward other posters, using vulgar or obscene language or images, not doxing others or ourselves, and stating what are considered to be obvious untruths as fact with no supporting evidence. But what happens when we adhere to this common sense attitude toward manners and still get censored?
Sometimes we get censored because of the intolerance of site owners for dissenting opinions. There is little that can be done about this other than finding another place to post and spreading word about this site's intolerance. When this happens, instead of getting upset, we should be happy; it means the censor has no intelligent response to our arguments. This means we won.
But what happens when we mind our manners and morals, and the website is on the same side of the political fence we are? While stories about censorship are welcome on this OP, these mystery censorship incidents are what this OP is really all about. For example, many posting sites will have key words that will prompt automatic censoring. And since human censors either have bad attitudes or are bored, the chances of one of these posts being approved isn't good.
Sometimes the keywords that prompt censoring software aren't very obvious. Over at Breitbart, trying to be humorous with the obviously humorless, I wrote on an offshoring story that if congress is going to offshore our jobs, we should respond in kind by importing congressman for $150 a month from the Punjab. Guess what? That post was censored and it turns out that I was censored because I used "Punjab", which is hardly an obvious choice. I know this because I reposted my comment changing every keyword except Punjab only to have my post censored again. My experiences have been even worse at other sites, and on both sides of the political spectrum.
So, what I would like to hear about are specific words that will get us censored at specific sites. There is no use writing up posts that aren't going to be published. This OP will be published on several sites. If I get good enough responses, I will write up another OP with the results so we know what the rules of posting sites are even if they don't have the courtesy to inform us about such things. If you have something to say on this matter, please let us hear from you.
