This comes up every now and then, but recently, it seems to have popped up a good bit in the past few days for me. The use of profanity when talking about and promoting the hobby.
Let me clarify quickly, I'm not talking about language used at work, at home, or elsewhere... I'm talking about language used and seen in the greater 40k blogging community.
When I started the FTW Blogger Group, I decided that the use of profanity was not necessary in order to promote the hobby. I also decided that I would not include blogs or allow blogs to join the FTW Blogger Group that used profanity on their sites.
I go so far as to remove blogs from the Group blogroll when I find profanity in them. But all of this is made clear when someone looks to join and they read the expectations of the Group.
I don't believe in censorship, but I will not promote 40k sites that use profanity. This is a matter of personal opinion. I do NOT believe I have the right to tell others what they can and cannot post on their blogs or how they can or cannot talk about the hobby. I am simply choosing how From the Warp will promote the hobby.
I do believe that most blogs have something to offer. Even if I don't agree with how they are presenting it. Would I like to see the material presented differently, sure... I think it would help the hobby more than using profanity to get the point across.
But once again, that's just my opinion and people have the right to cover the hobby in the way they feel it should be done.
Now, I'm not going to go stick my head in the sand and pretend it's a perfect world. There are lots of FTW members that link to, visit regularly and even promote sites that use profanity. I know this. I can only control what happens on FTW.
From the emails I've received over time, I know that readers appreciate the fact that there is no profanity on FTW.
While FTW will continue to promote all of the FTW Blogger Group members AND the greater 40k blogging community, it will be with this one small caveat, that it's done without profanity.
So, if you wonder why you never see links to certain blogs here on FTW, now you know why. The game is better than profanity, we shouldn't have to reduce ourselves to using it to promote our hobby.
