Swear

quote:

Originally posted by Serenity:
all the popular swear words were a form of blasphemy.

I wonder if Lord (Sir) is considered blasphemous.

quote:

Originally posted by Serenity:
While curses involving body parts and functions are common today, their shock value has lessened.

Must be a regional thing. Seems there’s still a few that the shock value hasn’t lessened.

quote:

Originally posted by Serenity:
The notorious "f-word" dates back to the 1500s, and it's been impolite ever since.

It has to be one of the most flexible words around. And, it’s an acronym for a law with such a highly legal sounding name.

Now be honest - when you see "f-word", do you really think it means some abstract four-letter word that starts with an “f”, such as fart, or do you say ****?

Also, a “fart” involves both “body parts and functions”, and it definitely is “common today”, but it isn’t considered swearing. I guess members of the AARP are doing more farting than f-wording.

It's a safe bet that when hitherto taboo word is used on television (after about 9pm, of course) it has lost its potency.

I have always found it fascinating how writers got around having their characters use such terms without actually putting them in print. I think my favourite is "a short Anglo-Saxon expletive".

GG

Interestingly, swearing can come from another level of our brain than that of normal speech. (To test - hit your thumb with a hammer really hard and listen to what is said - often quite restrained and polite people will use the 'f' word in this situation!). Occasionally stroke victims who have lost the part of their brain that controls speech will quickly learn to use swear words to communicate, much to the delight of their families!

R2

quote:

Originally posted by Serenity:
(from Yahoo)

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Serenity, May 13, 2005 02:59 PM

Thanks for adding the source – I was beginning to wonder.

It is true that disfunctional brains often relearn, capturing swear words. A good example is an Alzheimer's patient. It proves what my parents always said. Swearing shows a lack of knowledge of the English language!( ..or whatever language you speak) You can't argue with parents, you know. ( my Pastor also frowns on it! )

quote:

Originally posted by Serenity:
It proves what my parents always said. Swearing shows a lack of knowledge of the English language!

But what does one use as a good, and contemporary, substitute for hell?

I could not resist..Heaven, of course!

quote:

Originally posted by Serenity:
I could not resist..Heaven, of course!

Good one!

quote:

Swearing shows a lack of knowledge of the English language!

True enough. Our Greek neighbours had four young sons who would rattle off long unintelligible sentences to each other in their mother tongue punctuated at frequent intervals with the "short Anglo-Saxon expletive". (Now that they speak more than passable Australian they use it far more often of course.)

GG

Additionally, when I’ve just hit my thumb with a hammer, I don’t care if I’m showing a lack of knowledge of the English language, as I’m sure those that just got into a traffic accident. Now, when if I’m more selective of my wording, I’ll admit to taking that extra second and a “Mother-” to my response.

Jolly good, but "Bloody Heaven!", "What the heaven", not to mention "F...... Heaven" do lack a certain impact. Much as "Hells above" or "Good Hells" don't seem to quite hit the thumb....sorry - nail, on the head either.

Emo

My take on this.
I use swearing for the archetypical hammer on thumb, alone if possible.
Those who swear in normal conversation are showing a form of illiteracy, but worse:
They make every sentence aggressive - do we need any more aggression?
They could not care less if anyone is offended by it.
They make everything difficult to understand - if you spoke something like "The fredding quick brown fred fox fredding jumped over the fredding lazy fredding dog", could you understand it better, and that is swear-free!
They encourage toddlers to pick this up, and eventually it becomes the norm.
In the UK, we have something called 'the beautiful game' - a phrase similar to 'industrial action' that means the opposite.
Said game players are often your usual yobs, spitting and swearing like there is no tomorrow, so the kids use them as role models. They also 'earn' millions of £, paid by the poor fans.
Verb sap.

Taboo is such a strange classification for acts that a society deems inappropriate. Humans have had ecclesiastical and secular laws since they evolved into something more distinctive then their simian cousins (sometime we should discuss that prostitution isn’t the oldest profession). But taboo is an extra restriction reserved for the things that society feels are really nasty, such as incest and cannibalism (additionally strange in that “taboo” originated from a Polynesian language where both were “practiced” – sure wonder what it would have been like if they weren’t rehearsing, but doing it for real).

The ban on cannibalism seems unnatural. I can understand not herding live humans into some Soylent Green recycling plant, but after someone has died from starvation, then why is the thinking that it’s better to let the worms chow down than it is to let the humans? The Leningrad Siege is a great example – although there was some A.1. Steak Sauce used on a few, most didn’t indulge. In fact, those that were starving used up scarce calories to bury the starved. The team that was stranded in the Andes had the right approach (“You can eat me if I can eat you” – loose interpretation).

Now, I wouldn’t suggest drinking some Chianti like Hannibal Lecter – that would be completely inappropriate – better a Cabernet.

Food for thought - there are those strict vegetarians that won’t even pull fruit from a tree but wait until the fruit drops on it’s own – well, that would have applied to Leningrad (they were definitely dropping on their own).

And, I don’t think murder is considered a taboo. Personally, I would give a higher rating to something that happens to my body before I’m dead than afterwards.

It’s funny the emphasis, and sometime violent reaction, we give to some words, and the emphasis we don’t give to others. It’s also funny (meaning sad) how the same word can be acceptable, and almost commonplace, when said by one person, but upsetting when said by another.

quote:

My take on this.
I use swearing for the archetypical hammer on thumb, alone if possible.
Those who swear in normal conversation are showing a form of illiteracy, but worse:
They make every sentence aggressive - do we need any more aggression?
They could not care less if anyone is offended by it.
They make everything difficult to understand - if you spoke something like "The fredding quick brown fred fox fredding jumped over the fredding lazy fredding dog", could you understand it better, and that is swear-free!
They encourage toddlers to pick this up, and eventually it becomes the norm.
In the UK, we have something called 'the beautiful game' - a phrase similar to 'industrial action' that means the opposite.
Said game players are often your usual yobs, spitting and swearing like there is no tomorrow, so the kids use them as role models. They also 'earn' millions of £, paid by the poor fans.
Verb sap.

I surely do agree!!

Sometimes I think kids must be born with their brains hardwired to learn new languages by learning the swear words first. Just about every kid around here can swear in English, Spanish, and the local American Indian languages, but most of the kids only speak one or two languages fluently.

Mine had better not swear where I can hear them..in any language!

quote:

Originally posted by Serenity:
Mine had better not swear where I can hear them..in any language!

But you agreed with Mike's first sentence. In fact, you "surely do agree".

quote:

I use swearing for the archetypical hammer on thumb, alone if possible

Not saying I do this, but agreeing if you must, do it alone! I assume the "I" in Mike"s post is Mike.

quote:

Originally posted by Serenity:

quote:

I use swearing for the archetypical hammer on thumb, alone if possible

Not saying I do this, but agreeing if you must, do it alone! I assume the "I" in Mike"s post is Mike.

Hi, Mrs. M. [grin]