Comment on Why do we use the term Ban when it's temporary? Why not the more accurate, Suspension?
Rentlar@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
Ban just means you are not allowed to do something. You can add a qualifier to note how long it is but on its own, there is no implied timeframe. A permanent ban means it will not be lifted after a certain period of time.
A suspension means that you stop doing something but you could expect to restart. In most contexts this is on a temporary basis, but you can specify an “indefinite suspension”, which practically is the same as a permanent ban, but perhaps connotating greater chance to appeal it or some conditions that may occur at an indeterminate point that would lift the suspension.
Steve@communick.news 3 weeks ago
If it’s not implied that it ever ends, how long would it last? Forever seems the reasonable answer. And as far as I know that was the prevailing assumption until 20ish years ago. I’m asking how ant why that changed.
Rentlar@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
Right. Often times when something is banned, it is usually banned “until further notice” hence permanent or indeterminate length, but not always. It’s the qualifier that will specify whether a ban is temporary or not.
The Prohibition Era was a time when alcohol was banned indefinitely, until it was repealed. Campfire bans generally are only during the season when the risk of fire is high or are disallowed during specific times of day, and those have been around for a while. Being grounded is a ban on going anywhere until a kid meets their parents’ wishes or after a certain time. Temporary parking restrictions for a special event or snow clearing have been around pre-internet and those are called parking bans. It’s not the ban itself that means permanent, even if there were a lot more uses of it meaning “until further notice”, than for a specific length. You could say that the usage of ban qualified with a specific time expiry is more common now than it did before, but I would argue it did exist in the past. Why that is, I could only guess.
xmunk@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
I think you misread their response. It’d be similar to ask “How long does a timeout last” - it depends on the time affixed to the state - timeouts have no inherently defined length.
I think
banin the tech world was originally understood to be permanent - but in the real world ban has always had the flexibility to have an assigned term. As the internet has grown it seems that ban is gradually returning to being non-permanent though a lot of systems will still differentiate between a ban (permanent) and a suspension (temporary) - though, again, there are instances I’ve seen of “Account permanently Suspended.”Steve@communick.news 3 weeks ago
A Time-out has Time in the word itself. The definition also explicitly mentions a limited time, and uses the word Suspension that I already showed means temporary.