--- /dev/null
+ EXPURGATING THE ENABLE LISTS\r
+ÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜ\r
+\r
+\r
+The ENABLE2K word lists are not filtered or expurgated in any way. Words\r
+are excluded only for reasons of form (e.g., o'clock, DNA) or linguistic\r
+affiliation (e.g., bonjour, ubermensch), but never for reasons of bad\r
+taste (quinine), offensiveness (televangelism) or disreputability\r
+(irregardless).\r
+\r
+Nevertheless, the ENABLE2K compilers recognize that its lists may have\r
+applications in situations where such all-inclusiveness may not be\r
+appropriate. For instance, an ENABLE list may be used in a game program\r
+which might be used by children. The ENABLE2K supplement includes\r
+the MAKELIST program, which allows one to produce a custom word list by\r
+merging one or more or the lists supplied by ENABLE2K and its supplement.\r
+This program offers the option of removing potentially offensive words\r
+from its output, at any of three levels of squeamishness.\r
+\r
+It should be noted that the nature of the English language is such that\r
+complete expurgation of potentially offensive words is impossible, even\r
+ignoring the problem that each individual has his or her own standards of\r
+offense. Many English words have both offensive and inoffensive uses, and\r
+many of these are so common in their inoffensive uses that it would make\r
+no sense to attempt to remove them. Examples of such words are "screw" and\r
+"fairy". The best that one can hope to do is to remove words that are\r
+generally considered offensive, and which do not have common inoffensive\r
+uses.\r
+\r
+Further, the compilers of ENABLE2K can make NO GUARANTEE that the MAKELIST\r
+program will remove all words which might prove offensive in your\r
+application. If the possible presence of offensive words in any ENABLE\r
+list is important to you, it is *your* responsibility to check for such\r
+words and remove them yourself, whether or not you use the MAKELIST\r
+program. And while we have made a serious attempt to determine sets of\r
+words which might reasonably be found offensive, we cannot know the\r
+requirements of your application. In fact, as the legal boys say, we\r
+disclaim any warranty that this package is fit for a particular purpose.\r
+\r
+The MAKELIST program offers you the choice of three levels of expurgation:\r
+Cautious, Aggressive, and Politically Correct. (Of course, you also have\r
+the option of not expurgating at all.) A more detailed explanation of\r
+these options is as follows:\r
+\r
+1. Cautious expurgation attempts to remove patently offensive words, but\r
+does not generally remove words which are not universally agreed to be\r
+offensive, or which have significant inoffensive meanings. (A few words\r
+are so notorious that they are removed despite minor inoffensive uses.)\r
+Almost all of the words removed from the second edition OSPD (r) by\r
+Milton Bradley for OSPD3 fall into this category. However, several very\r
+familiar vulgarities (of the sort still not heard on network television)\r
+are *not* removed at this level. This level of expurgation should be\r
+chosen if the goal is to have expurgation interfere as little as possible\r
+with the completeness of the lexicon.\r
+\r
+2. Agressive expurgation removes additional words that we consider likely\r
+to offend, even if they have inoffensive meanings or are held by some to\r
+be inoffensive. This results in some linguistic anomalies, such as\r
+permitting participles for verbs that have been removed (due to the\r
+offensiveness of their meanings as nouns or adjectives). We believe that\r
+this level of expurgation is most likely to be appropriate for use in\r
+situations involving children.\r
+\r
+3. Politically correct expurgation removes additional words which are\r
+found offensive by some. This list is based primarily on the standards\r
+of the Encarta (r) World English Dictionary, which are much stricter than\r
+those of any other dictionary we have seen. It labels as offensive\r
+many words with which most people seem comfortable, particularly words\r
+associated with mental disability and gender stereotypes. Examples of\r
+words considered offensive by Encarta include "idiotic", "henpeck",\r
+"crone", "slob", "klutz", "wimp" and "weirdo". If you, or your intended\r
+audience, are likely to find such words offensive, then you should choose\r
+this level of expurgation. We find it hard to imagine that this degree of\r
+sensitivity is ever necessary. But then, I'm an able-bodied middle-class\r
+white American male heterosexual baby boomer; of course, I would think\r
+that. (I'm also a "slob" and a "klutz", but we'll let that pass...)\r
+\r
+The process of removing potentially offensive words obviously entails the\r
+existence of lists of such words. These lists, unlike the other ENABLE2K\r
+lists, are not distributed in a readable form. The lists might well, in\r
+themselves, prove offensive, and besides, the last thing we would ever\r
+want to do is to increase anyone's vocabulary of abuse. We of course\r
+recognize this will not prevent anyone who really wishes to ferret out\r
+their contents from doing so. Most attempts to sanitize the English\r
+lexicon are equally futile, a fact which potential users of the ENABLE2K\r
+expurgation option should consider.\r
+\r
+\r
+---\r
+The OSPD is a trademark of the Milton Bradley Co., Inc.\r
+Encarta is a trademark of the Microsoft Corp.\r
+\r
+\r
+\r
+--Alan Beale\r
projects / deb_pkgs / scowl.git / blobdiff