Kerwhopping the Mafousle

I'd heard mention about it before, and then promptly pushed it out of my thoughts, like other mental detritus. Today, it came up again. If you hadn't heard, someone wrote an app that takes another person's ebook (digital book) and combs through the text for any words the writer of the app deems inappropriate for children. It doesn't just black out the word though - it substitutes in another word entirely.

I wrote my books using the words I wanted to use. If you don't like those words, don't read my books. Use the app and you're not reading my book; you're reading the mutated, whitewashed bastard of what I wanted to say.

My books aren't intended for children or young adults. Frankly, if you're letting your child or young adult read my stuff, you're being a little loosey-goosey in the parenting department.

If I wanted random words dropped into my stories, I'd do it myself.

Olivia swears. (Not as much as I do, but she does.) Could she use another word? Yes. does she want to? Bobtruckle no!

If you're going to run around editing someone else's book, what's next? If there's a same sex relationship, are you somehow going to tack on a Mafousle to one of the partners and change the pronouns? (Or nip a Mafousle off, for that matter.)

How about religions that don't match your own? How do you rewrite those references to protect fragile minds from the incredible diversity of the spiritual world?

How about bad guys that hurt people? They exist in the real world. You can see them on the news. Are people allowed to die or do we just subtly stop mentioning them?

Here's the clean version of my story:

There was a woman named Olivia. She and her non-gender-specific friends had some stuff happen to them. More stuff happened. There was a bad guy that hurt people. More stuff. The end.

There, wasn't that nice, clean, and boring as Banthapoodoo?

So warning, if you like your stories, clean, tame and lily white, oops.