Swearing

[Abdul Alhazred]

Why are some people offended by words? Not how the word is used, but just the word itself. It's often said that people who swear have a limited vocabulary; that's bollocks.

It really is about words not meanings.

Does saying "Goddamn that f**king ◊◊◊◊" mean that one is calling upon the creator of the universe to condemn to eternal torment the immortal soul of excrement which engages in sexual intercourse?

Of course not. It means "I hate those outrageous lies", only stronger. Perhaps it is the intensity that offends.

 

[epepke]

Re: Re: Swearing

It really is about words not meanings.

Does saying "Goddamn that f**king ◊◊◊◊" mean that one is calling upon the creator of the universe to condemn to eternal torment the immortal soul of excrement which engages in sexual intercourse?

Of course not. It means "I hate those outrageous lies", only stronger. Perhaps it is the intensity that offends.

Clearly you're right.

"May the creator of the universe condemn to eterninal torment the soul of sexually active excrement" (I shortened it a bit) isn't going to be edited in this forum. So that's obviously not why it's offensive, let alone (cough cough) "obscene."

I don't think that it's about intensity either. Consider the following. "If a squamous, scrofulous, pustule such as yourself could possibly resist your onanistic impulses long enough to divert some glucose to the shriveled peanut-sized ganglion that you laughingly call a 'brain'..." is several orders of magnitude more intense than anything I could say with sexual, scatological, or profane oaths.

 

[Wyvern]

Re: Re: Swearing

snip
What the ◊◊◊◊ is the f**king point of using a f**king word to the f**king point that it f**king means f**king nothing but that a f**king noun or verb or adjective is about to be f**king said?
snip

Having previously worked on college campuses for 11+ years, I can tell you that this is exactly what you hear these days when you walk across a campus. The words, themselves, don't bother me. But I am kind of amazed at how free these young adults feel to express themselves this way in public, no matter who is present to hear them. Myself, I tend to refrain in public so as not to offend anyone. I guess it's one of this generation's modes of rebellion. And perhaps it also means that our nation is becoming (or will soon become) less affected by these words.

 

[mummymonkey]

Re: Re: Re: Swearing

And perhaps it also means that our nation is becoming (or will soon become) less affected by these words.

We'll need some new cuss words then.

 

[epepke]

Curse or swear word are words that, in general, we have been taught to respect as somewhat sacred, that have special or additional meaning. This is all learned behaviour or emotional attachment to words. If a word that is supposed to have special meaning was used day indaily by certain groups, like jehova for example, then it would lose that emotional attachment that was special because we would become used to it's ordinary reality, that it is just a word.

I don't believe this for a nanosecond. "Urinate" is not a swear word, nor is "fornicate," nor "excrement." Yet the Saxon equivalents that mean exactly the same thing are swear words.

 

[Donnie]

I don't believe this for a nanosecond. "Urinate" is not a swear word, nor is "fornicate," nor "excrement." Yet the Saxon equivalents that mean exactly the same thing are swear words.

Yes, and we currently have swear words that convey similar things to the words in your example that are becoming more and more accepted as inoffensive expressions due to their daily use...

 

[epepke]

Yes, and we currently have swear words that convey similar things to the words in your example that are becoming more and more accepted as inoffensive expressions due to their daily use...

How often do you hear people in "daily use" using "fornicate"? If anything, it's a more rarefied term than its four-letter equivalent. If anything, it's more "sacred" as I usually only hear fundamentalist Christians use it.

While there is a process according to which a more commonly used word becomes more acceptable, this process does not explain the stigma attached to the canonical four-letter sexual and scatological oaths. Before the Norman Conquest, these were common words, and it was that event which gave them their stigma.

 

[allanb]

I have to disagree. The "F' word can, in some situations, give more emphasis than any other word.

Right, and your anecdote makes a good point: the effect of the word depends a lot on how often it's used. If you use it a couple of times in every sentence (and there are such people) it means nothing. If people know you as someone who doesn't use it, and then one day you do, they will sit up and take notice.

I suspect that everyone needs to have in his vocabulary a few words that express strong feelings at the risk of shocking other people, and that these words can be different for different people and can vary from one generation to another.

My son, when very young, asked me whether it was OK to sat "f***". I said something like "I don't care too much, but there are a lot of people who really don't like it, so it's better if you don't." He said, "Well, can I make up a word for when I get angry?" I said that was a good idea, and he thought for a while and said: "How about fubluck?"

I assume that fubluck is not a banned word in this forum; if it is, I will be fublucking annoyed.

 

[Gregory]

Re: Re: Re: Swearing

Having previously worked on college campuses for 11+ years, I can tell you that this is exactly what you hear these days when you walk across a campus.

As a college student, I can tell you it is not. Or maybe my college is just more restrained than yours.

 

[Fluffy]

I'm not offended by cursing; I'm just tired of hearing it.

What he said.

 

[Interesting Ian]

Originally posted by epepke


Fair enough, but I wish "you" (they?) would stop calling such words obscene when they are merely indecent.

Flagrant official illiteracy isn't so hot from an educational foundation, either.
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Perhaps, but ask the schools and libraries which they would prefer.

Well yes, they prefer flagrant official illiteracy

 

[Interesting Ian]

To be honest, I don't really care that much what you want to call it, epepke. I DO care if JREF gets banned from schools and libraries.

Why?

 

[BPScooter]

Just coincidentally, I ran across this forum topic right after reading H.L. Mencken's amusing, honest, tasteful and erudite treatment of profanity in his "The American Language." I recommend looking at your local public library to find or remind. I'm all for the old-fashioned and new swear words, just not anywhere near any place where I might offend or my children could absorb an interesting new model. Sort of like why I wear deodorant and don't smoke in a restaurant. Courtesy. Mencken comes off as pitying those who lack the gift or occasion to freely swear up a storm as needed.

 

[tim]

Why?

Because, Ian, this forum is not a toy for your amusement, but has a serious educational purpose. That may mean nothing to you, but it does to me.

 

[BPScooter]

So in Mencken's vein of swearing freely, as needed, I'm not personally offended when someone like George Carlin or Penn & Teller get salty with the language. Penn does it well, but I'm pretty sure the full impact would be lost on a little kid. Not me! Matter of fact, I was happy and grateful when I saw the intro to P&T's intro to the Alternative Medicine episode of BS. When Penn launches into the body of the show with "Let's try some... BS" his delivery just cracked me up so much.

My hesitation is that in so doing, the force of the argument or evidence or logic is somehow overshadowed and it offers the easily offended a nice handy excuse to disengage. "Well, I don't care if he has a point, he uses bad language" is something that not only little old fogies say, but also young parents, I'm willing to bet.

This was well captured in a Vonnegut book, can't remember which one, but KV used nothing but "gosh darn" level words and explained it in very clear terms in the first pages of the book. Something like the force and power of the language is lost through overuse.

So let's keep our dirty language nice and dirty in context, and our clean language nice and clear. Best of both worlds. When you can handle both, then Penn, Teller, Carlin are ready for you!