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In that case, the data is "words," and yes, English is defined by the words not permitted E.g. the sentence "parlez-vous français" is not English because it uses words that English speakers do not permit in their mental English-language vocabularies

Yes. Syntax means only certain patterns are allowed. But the protocol (English) makes no judgement about the purpose, or meaning, of valid combinations of words (the semantics). This distinction represents the correct analogy here. Bitcoin's protocol gives a syntax for financial state transitions, but doesn't judge whether they are acceptable state transitions. The problem is that semantics are not absolute like syntax is, and it's a fool's errand trying to control semantics. If you ban "fuck" another word will be "co opted" to somehow be equally offensive. Protocol rules control syntax, not semantics.