The one time i remember was when there was a cinterella parody on the gay community where instead of shoes it was a dildo (i can’t link the post because i didn’t have an account then but if someone can feel free to for whatever reason ) , and some 196 posts etc. do this too but the posts are beside the point the point is like i get it lighthearted fun. but i guess it could be better for lemmy overall if they do mark things like that. Anyway what are your thoughts ?
The tag fulfils two roles in Lemmy. One is what you described as “initial protection”; but I think that the issue here is its second role, as a content filter - some people don’t want to see porn or gore at all, so they uncheck the “Show NSFW content” box in the Settings, so they don’t see anything tagged NSFW, even if they would be otherwise OK with milder content (as the “dildo shoes” from the OP).
And plenty posters know that others do it. So if you’re sharing something only weakly NSFW, you’re actually discouraged from using the NSFW tag, as it would decrease the visibility of your post.
I believe that a scale would solve it, provided that people use it consistent and accurately. My concern is if they would use it right.
And that’s why it’s an issue in the first place because one tool is used for two different purposes. If NSFW tag was used only for it’s intended purpose then using it would be straightforward.
Of course content filtering would be useful feature too but I think it should be a separate thing. In the app I use there’s an option to blur the NSFW pictures. That would be useless option if you don’t want to see the picture at all.
Regardless of the original purpose, or how the issue came to be, both roles are used and desirable nowadays. The hiding feature could be assigned to a second tag, but at this rate the situation becomes more complex than a simple scale.
And a smart interface could handle both options together. Perhaps something like this:
At least from a browser this would work nicely. Not sure on phone applications.