It doesn't read as emphasis to me. It reads like the person is trying hard not to curse, and they think "crap" is a curse word. It's a little bit adorable, like I'm reading a comment from an obedient child.

I guess you are not from the generation of texters. This how languages work we used to use * as a way to avoid getting censored it over time became a way to curse or give emphasis.

Sounds like a generational thing.

I grew up texting. But in the 90s any profanity filters could just be turned off in settings.

People are getting used to censor themselves in order not to be reported, banned, or «hurt » other sensibilities. The words « rape » couldn’t be written in instagram for example, what a great way to deal with such a serious issue. Mainly an American thing spreading away from young people if you ask me. Sorry America, just being honest here.

America is partly guilty, but TikTok censorship is a big part of the younger generation's tendency toward self censorship.

As much as I personally dislike TikTok, I don't think it is fair to it: cultural willingness for more sensor sheep on Internet started years before TikTok's popularity in the west.

It's not the sole cause, but I believe it's the main driver behind a bunch of specific substitutions that are mainstream now or nearly so. For example, dih, ahh, and unalive. They may not have been invented on tiktok, but that's where they incubated.

There's no such censorship on TikTok, it's entirely groupthink based on people saying "when I use that word my video is seen less so therefore it's being censored".

Youtube is a lot more guilty of it though, as well as demonetizing.

well_ackshually, tik tok has a well known, long, and rich history of suppressing certain search keywords.

How is that not a form of censorship? It is direct suppression of certain forms of speech.

YouTube has its problems but I don't think it's had quite as strong of an effect on language.

It sounds like there is a documented policy or proven that TikTok does it. Just people thinking it does leading them to self-censor. Then people see others doing it and copy it. So, I guess it is censorship but not by TikTok.

You had profanity filters for SMS?

No, but I think ICQ and some IRC clients had profanity filters turned on by default. I remember visiting a friend once and realising he hadn't turned the profanity filter off. I teased him about it for weeks.

After reading through the threat here it seems more like a cultural thing. The US has quite a lot of filters for profanity. I remember from my youth that in 2009 Eminem was a guest in a Germany TV show and very happy to swear as much as possible without being censored. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/2OC-yKZ5Yag

I’ve been texting since it was first a thing (sms on Nokia phones) and no one I knows does this. We just say shit, fuck, and crap.

Is that a cultural/national thing instead of an age thing?

I've never had texts censored by texting providers, they're not supposed to read texts in the first place (at least around here).

I'm definitely from the generation of texters and there was never any censorship going on with SMSs... yours must be a cultural or regional thing.

Maybe you didn't have T9 enabled but I consider it censorship when I type bitch and it gives me chubi.

Even now I wonder if I am allowed to type bitch here...

I guess we will find out.

But typing "b*tch" with T9 is just as difficult (if not more) as typing "bitch". Anyway, I guess I never had a need to swear much over SMS. On IRC, on the other hand...

stop feeding nonsense to the masses

Am I, with around 30, in this generation? Putting * in words seems like self censorship to me. Still, might have a cultural component. German here.

It can be used for in-jokey comedic effect. For example, referring to M*cr*sft W*nd*ws or Br*dc*m as though they were offensive terms. Or *r*cl*.

I'm in my 40s and * is self-censorship to me. It must be a cultural thing.

like for example, c*nt?

Maybe more like p**p, as in "that cunt p**ped in my yard"?

I'll admit, it never once occurred to me that people might be using censored characters to provide more emphasis that a word is a swear, but I guess it does indeed do that, at least to the writer. Whether that comes across to the reader, and whether the writer cares that their intention was understood... I'm not so sure.

Hah. Yeah, I agree. It's one of those things I admit is `lost in translation` for sure.

What about ^#%& as was traditional in newspaper comics strips?

How about "Pockmark!... Freshwater swabs!... Bully!.." or "Amoeba! Bashi-bazouks! Chowderheads! Certified Diplodocuses! Nyctalop! Ectoplasm!"?

"Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!"

I was so disappointed when I tried reading tintin in other languages and found the dear captain was straight up using slurs in those. I wonder whether the english language ones have been edited over the years to remove that sort of thing

æselmassør, sortbørsgrosserer, søpindsvinefjæs, karnevalssørøver!

Findes der en Haddock/Egon Olsen tiradegenerator derude?

Known as grawlix or obscenicon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grawlix

I interpreted that as indicating something was swearing without actually swearing. So, identifying something as swearing that isn't actually swearing.

In any context I've seen, asterisks are for wrapping formatting and said formatting it to add emphasis. So being in the habit of typing `emphasised phrase`, for italics - regardless of whether the platform parses markdown/similar formatting, e.g. SMS.

To have an unclosed asterisk replacing characters in a word? I've only ever seen that as a way to bypass censorship. This spans communications from people currently in their 40s down to 20.

i do this to put emphasis, i always type "h*ck".

(although it is a half-joke since it's definitely not a curse word imo)

I think a string of non-alphanumeric characters would work much better here, like "Once you have allowed that proprietary @#$&% into your C++ codebase”

Leaves more to the imagination.

But this isn't perceived as emphasis at all. If I wanted to emphasize something, I'd be more likely to use something like *bitch* or something along those lines. Replacing a letter with an asterisk comes across as self-censorship, which is pretty silly - just use a different word if you're that uncomfortable with swearing.