[dustintrex]

I posted a comment noting that some words can no longer be used because they resemble offensive words, even though they are etymologically unrelated.

I am ironically amused to note that the comment appears to have offended somebody or something sufficiently to make it disappear, even though it did not contain any actual offensive words.

[dehrmann]

College Humor did a bit on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQTJl2bwoZQ

[mdp2021]

> can no longer be used

...Can no longer be used without fumbling into people that assume the rest intends to speak demotic, "Fixed That For You".

> some words can no longer be used because they resemble offensive words

I find it very interesting on a specific historic case that the original group, of difficult pronunciation for Europeans, in the Gulf of Guinea area, "n·gr", meaning "big river", naming the Niger river and nearby countries, happened to be so close to the Latin for "black" - which is already in a way offensive, with its potential as some "reduction to appearance". (Of course, the Republic of the Niger and the Federal Republic of Nigeria correctly just shrug the coincidence off.)

[jl6]

Sadly I think those words have died, as victims of semantic pollution, through no fault of their own. Even though no dictionary will attest to an offensive meaning, they share enough phonemic material with malwords to trigger an immune response, which is not something you generally want to do to your readers.

[mdp2021]

> trigger an immune response, which is not something you generally want to do to your readers

In general, you expect readers not live «immune response[s]». It is called "sensation", and you either expect readers to be mature and having learnt to manage it as much as they learnt all other physiological and emotional and intellectual control, or if not mature you want to expose them to the world of serious adulthood for their awareness [rephrased: you do not hide adult behaviour: example must not be missed] - in which "sensation" has no part, replaced by distance, reflection and cool and objective consideration.

It is very odd to consider readers as "prone to sensation" (and that they could be legitimately so).

[plibither8]

The comment is still available [0], just "dead", so it doesn't show up on unless the user has enabled "show dead comments" on their profile page.

[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30584622

[dustintrex]

Seems to be un-deaded now, praise the mods! And on closer inspection there was one naughty word in there, although technically it's a homonym that happens to have the same spelling. (And "homonym" itself is probably best avoided.)