Whilst most of us would not like to see people prevented from criticising
their governments or expressing their own political or other beliefs there
is an equally strong feeling that the spreading of messages of racial hatred
and so on should not be condoned.On top of this there is a question of how much sexual or offensive language,
however they are defined, should be tolerated in any particular society.
A classic example of censorship is when BBC Radio went as far as changing the
first line of Philip Larkin's famous poem from, "Your mum and dad,
they f--k you up", to, "Your mum and dad, they tuck you up"; somewhat
destroying the meaning and intention completely, but, with the defence that
they did not wish to offend their listeners.
This site does contain some offensive language ( by reference to what some
would call offensive ) especially in
Hippy's Poetry Collection and I have had to
decide what to do about its presentation.
My stance has been that I am free to express any view that I wish providing
that it is legitimate and acceptable to the majority of those that will be
seeking out the pages that I have written. I do not personally believe in the
spreading of offensive material just for the sake of being offensive and hope
that no one is offended by anything that I have to say on this site although I
accept that there will always be some who find things I say offensive to
themselves.
In determining what does amount to offensive material, and particularly
offensive language, I have had to take into account the beliefs and wishes of
the people who are providing the resources I am using to publish what I have
to say.
I have therefore had to excercise a degree of self censorship in what I can
present on my web pages.
Whilst I do not consider anything I am publishing on these web pages to be
offensive, in terms of content, I do acknowledge that some of the language used
may be deemed to be offensive by those providing the aforesaid resources.
My decision has therefore been that I will publish and be damned in
terms of content, providing that I feel the contents of such a publication is
justified but, in terms of possibly offensive language, I will modify such
language to fit the beliefs and wishes of the resource providers.
If a resource provider, who is making my pages available to the internet world,
requests that no offensive words be used in pages that they provide resources
for; I will, where I recognise that I am using an offensive word, other than
that which is accepted as commonplace, use the traditional technique of
disguising such words.
My criteria of what I can or should be allowed to publish has been modified
by a respect for the people who are allowing me to freely publish in the first
place and under such circumstances willingly accept self censorship rules.
You will therefore find, on occasion, some words that you may not find offensive
yourselves disguised; please accept that this is not because I am ashamed to use
such words but is something that I feel must be done to allow what I want to be
published to be published without offending those who are providing the means
to publish ...
