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This question was recently closed by user vote.

I am not here to upturn your decision, but rather shed a light on how we can improve it in my own eyes.

Obligatory: My thoughts do not reflect the views of SE as a whole nor do they reflect what the other moderators believe. This is posted of my own volition only. Take it as such.

In Australia our TV is not that censored. We can watch the English version of Gordon Ramsey Kitchen Nightmare and hear every swear word.

In the American version they beep the word, add a defocus to his mouth so you can't lip read. I have even seen instances of where they defocus logos on caps and tea shirts.

The ultimate absurdity was Blazing Sadels from Mel Brooks where they placed horses neighing when the cowboys where eating beans in the famous fart scene. When this aired on Australian TV there was such an outcry that the scene was deleleted the TV station had to re air the show a week later with the fart scene in tackt. They appoligised and claimed they sourced that version from one of their other suppliers.

Why is censorship so strict in the US?

Initial text for the lazy.

This was the original form of the question. Although a bit rough in speech it raised a good point with a comparison for consideration. While further clarification can be brought into this, it is a good question at heart.

And then the proverbial feces hit the fan when this was added:

The children are often cited as the reason for censorship yet recent events show them using hand guns to kill their classmates. So maybe the skewed censorship laws are part of that. We can see moments of war on the news where people are bleeding and dying without censor ship as long as they don't swear.

I see where the user is coming from in adding this line, but with lack of sources and context, poor worded rhetoric like this triggers things that could be construed as exploiting recent tragedies (Sandy Hook the most famous obviously). And just generally talking in bad taste rather than to obtain information.

It tanked the question and pushed it into closing territory.

I do not believe this was @Doogfar's intent.

I do believe the intent is to get information on how American Censorship is different from another country's standpoint.

Now, no offense to @Stefan, but I don't believe his answer provides enough substance to be the "Accepted Answer" It is indeed a good point in itself but not enough to answer the question fully.

Now, @Dan, @Iandotkelly, and @ChristainRau all bring up excellent points in the comment section that can also be used to answer the question in an interesting and meaningful way. And that is why I would like to see this question improved and a bunch more answers on it.

It is this kind of content that is kind of controversial, upsets the established order and brings overall, a deep question that can be answered by many, each with equally correct points BUT also has one significant correct answer among them all to fit into the SE format.

So I say to you this: let's improve this question, get it reopened, and show what kind of brains behind the keyboards there are here.

As a side note, this is the kind of subjectivity that we must stay away from when bringing up these kind of issues. For example, this question originally had a line that was tounge-in-cheek about nudity in Holland.

That one line, that one singular little statement said to me that this question was just a "Let's bash on American Censorship gaise!".

Its a wonder what a single line can do to a question for me. Then again, I'm also a bit ban-happy on this site so my strictness is a hurdle to begin with.

However, @Doogfar was willing to take out that last bit and just from removing that, the question returned to what it was: A proper inquiry that piqued my interest and allowed me to start watching this question intently waiting for the next answer.

TL;DR This can be improved, let's do that and re-open it, kay?

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    I like this. I was not a fan of the question initially, for reasons others have highlighted. But I like what you're doing here, @TylerShads. Even if it doesn't work, it's smart+healthy for the site to try things like this from time to time. +1
    – stevvve
    Mar 21, 2013 at 21:37
  • I understand(and share) your interest in the question. But what could had been an excellent question on American Censorship is ultimately a rhetoric attempt by the OP at an open-ended bashing of American Censorship Guidelines. And IMO, @Christian Rau's first comment to the question should had been instructive enough for the OP to suitably edit the question.
    – Sayan
    Mar 28, 2013 at 6:22

3 Answers 3

-1

The reaction to my question gave me an answer I needed. The question in my mind stands as is, no censorship.

If you would like to continue the discussion feel free to do it outside of my question. I will not adjust my question.

If you want to take the ultimate censorship and delete a my question, go ahead, I have my answer.

As to the answer I accepted, surely that is my call, otherwise what is the point of the site?

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    While I don't want to impute this on you, from this answer I got a feeling you may have taken the constructive efforts of improving your question (including this excellent meta discussion started by Tyler) more negative than it was meant. But it may also be that I incorrectly misinterpreted your slight hints to the censorship in this answer as polemic. Other than that, of course it's entirely your decision what answer to accept and nobody forces yout to change this...
    – Napoleon Wilson Mod
    Mar 20, 2013 at 21:48
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    ...but then again nobody stops us from improving your question so that it (and the additional objectively better answers it might attract then) further helps others (and maybe even you) and helps to improve the whole site, apart from merely answering the question you had in mind at that moment.
    – Napoleon Wilson Mod
    Mar 20, 2013 at 21:49
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To be honest, I'm not sure that cleaning up the question would really make it fit SE's format. Part of the problem is that from the perspective of some countries, yeah America is pretty strict. But from the perspective of others it's pretty relaxed. The only real way to answer this question is to list every single rule and the history of how each rule came about, and that's just not feesable in this format.

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    We can make it in direct comparison to the OP's country to narrow the scope, i.e. Australia
    – Tablemaker
    Mar 20, 2013 at 19:27
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I am still in not a favor for this question but still if it got edited to make it more specific(specially in the title which is completely unjustified statement ) , Then i think it can be re-opened. Stefan answer is not that bad, its partially answering the question but the problem is that in the current state of question answering it fully will be too problematic. So, first we should make it more specific before opening it. And at-least we can give it a try. My vote is in to reopen if it got re-edit in a good manner.

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