The Curse of the Cussed Profanities

The New York Times' Natalie Angier explores the science of swearing. The least surprising revelation: "The investigators have found, among other things, that men generally curse more than women, unless said women are in a sorority."

Comments

[Jennifer]

The title "Much Ado About Nothing," Dr. McWhorter said, is a word play on "Much Ado About an O Thing," the O thing being a reference to female genitalia.

I heard a slightly different explanation about the title in grad school--the title was still a reference to female genitalia, but the word was actually "nothing," in that men have "something" whereas women have "nothing."

And I've never been in a sorority, but I can turn the air quite blue with profanity.

[Delta Sister]

"The investigators have found, among other things, that men generally curse more than women, unless said women are in a sorority."

Like, ohmygod, fuck you for saying that.

I am soooo telling my sorority sisters on you.

[andy]

"By the same token, he said, nothing is more deadly than a person who is too enraged for expletives - who cleanly and quietly picks up a gun and starts shooting."

Of course, they had to get in their obligatory anti-gun message. They didn't say "nothing is more deadly than a person who is too enraged for expletives" and just leave it at that. But it is the NYTimes after all.

[Phil]

I doubt that this will make much of a dent in the favorite aphorism of the self-regarding smarty-pantses of the world -- Swearing is a sign of a limited vocabulary/diminished intellectual capacity -- but fuck those cuntrags anyway.

[J]

"...but fuck those cuntrags anyway."

Ha! Yeah, it's the stupid fuckwit shitbags who don't swear who are limiting their vocabularies. There are so many entertaining combinations and permutations of the words fuck, shit, dick, etc. If used in a timely and creative fashion, they can be very entertaining and informative.

[dead_elvis]

So who swears more, sorority sisters or sailors?

[K1avg]

How the fuck should we know?

[mediageek]

I predict gaius will poke is head into this thread, shake his head, click his tongue, and post something practically cryptic about the fall of western civilization.

[Jennifer]

who swears more, sorority sisters or sailors?

A sorority sister who's just been told "Those pants make you look fat."

[Semantics 101]

So is it a "hate crime" if a black man rushes into a black church with a machine gun and hoses the congregation while shouting, "I hate you black motherfuckers!"?

[Lost_In_Translation]

In the majority of the United States, the word "Fuck" means to copulate. In New York, I think it means "and"

[Rhywun]

men generally curse more than women, unless said women are in a sorority

Or said women are from Long Island - holy crap, they cuss a lot.

[Jennifer]

I think the FCC is making certain words more obscene than they'd ordinarily be. A hundred years ago, "darn" and "hell" were rude words that you'd never say in polite society, but since then they've become acceptable. And I really think "fuck," at least in its adjectival and adverbial forms, would have already gone that same route if the FCC didn't keep it enshrined on the Forbidden List.

[Akira MacKenzie]

What's the difference when you childishly say "bull-roar" as a substitute for "bullshit?" You're essential saying the same thing, why is one word "clean" while the other is "obscene?"

Is the concept of fecal matter so horrific that we must silence every mention of it from our thoughts and words save for a few juvenile phrases? (e.g. "Poop," "poo-poo," "cah-cah," etc.) The same goes for the word "fuck." Are we ashamed of sexual intercourse that we don't dare utter it any word that describes it except various "polite" words? (e.g. "coitus" "make love," etc.)

People who say that "curse" words are sign of low intelligence should look to the two thugs from Frank Miller's Sin City who spoke in long, impressive sounding words to cover up their stupidity. It's not the words you use for the message that convey intellect, it's the message itself and to some that's the point: To silence certain messages that shake up world-views and smash conventions.

[mediageek]

So is it a "hate crime" if a black man rushes into a black church with a machine gun and hoses the congregation while shouting, "I hate you black motherfuckers!"?

Only if it's Michael Jackson.

/Thank you, I'm here all week. Try the veal.

[mccleary]

I pity the egos of modern day sailors -- they now stand accused of swearing less than sorority sisters and engaging in drunken spending sprees that are downright frugal by Republican standards.

[The Anti-Puritan]

Fucking New York Times! I tried to go to the article, but the NYT web page made my computer freeze up. I haven't read the article, but if it treats the fact that men generally swear more than women as a surprise, it shows the politically correct blank-slate mentality of NYT liberalism. How ironic that so many of the defenders of evolution against creationism refuse to accept evolutionary psychology's implications for differences between the sexes.

Because I anticipate this possible objection, I'll say that I don't doubt Jennifer when she says she can swear up a storm. Natural selection depends on variation among individuals, so EP does not suggest that all men or alike or that all women are alike.

[Rhywun]

Is the concept of fecal matter so horrific that we must silence every mention of it from our thoughts and words save for a few juvenile phrases?

The article hints at the answer - that curse words are a universal feature of human language, and therefore culture. There is some human need being satisfied by the existence of forbidden words. I think if "fuck" and "shit" stopped being forbidden words, human nature would quickly find other words to take their place.

[The Anti-Puritan]

Jennifer:
I think the FCC is making certain words more obscene than they'd ordinarily be.

FCC stands for Federal Communist Commission. I want to see social conservatives be forced to explain how they can justify the crypto-Marxist notion of publicly owned airwaves when they prefer to trust in the free market almost all the rest of the time.

[fyodor]

I like the part in the movie Tank Girl, which takes place way in the future, where a young girl says, "This is so buggada!" and Tank Girl goes, "Don't say 'buggada,' it's not lady-like. Say 'fucked-up'!"

[Larry A]

"By the same token, he said, nothing is more deadly than a person who is too enraged for expletives - who cleanly and quietly picks up a gun and starts shooting."

I haven't observed people who start out cursing then go quiet. My experience is that there are people who get enraged and get loud, and people who get enraged and go quiet.

As for "most deadly," I'd nominate the person who isn't enraged, but whose philosophy encourages to harm others. I.e. those who burn heretics to save their souls, etc. Particularly once they learn to handle explosives.

[Troy]

I don't know the etiology or my cursing or why I do it with such indefatigable alacrity or whether it impacts my vocabulary, but who gives a fuck.

[fyodor]

I remember when I was a real little kid I thought I'd be a good boy and never say anything worse than "darn" but one day I was so mad I couldn't hold back any longer and I finally said "damn."

And boy did that feel good!!

[dead_elvis]

What's the difference when you childishly say "bull-roar" as a substitute for "bullshit?" You're essential saying the same thing, why is one word "clean" while the other is "obscene?"

My father had the same idea, which is why when I was a kid, I was never even allowed to say "darn" or "dang."

[Gary]

For those that claim that cursing is symptomatic of lower intelligence, consider that the word "fuck" has inspired more etymological study out of everyday people than most any other word.

Hell, it's even inspired a short passage on the etymology itself and its uses in everyday conversation.

So fuck it - all those people claiming a lower status for our fucking vocabularies can go fuck themselves six ways from Sunday. They're the ones who are fucked in the head.

[Eric the .5b]

I think if "fuck" and "shit" stopped being forbidden words, human nature would quickly find other words to take their place.

Along this line of thought, I think there was a SF story back in the 70s where, at some point in the future, the word "jizz" was officially proclaimed obscene and profane just so there'd be one obscenity left to use.

[Eric the .5b]

consider that the word "fuck" has inspired more etymological study out of everyday people than most any other word.

You ain't jokin'.

[Phil]

I think if "fuck" and "shit" stopped being forbidden words, human nature would quickly find other words to take their place.

I nominate "semprini".

Akira, even dumber than the "mild" versions of so-called "curse words" are the print convention of depicting them as "sh*t," "f*ck," "*ss," and so forth. Printing them that way conveys the exact same meaning and content as just prining the word, but somehow that final vowel or consonant is made so talismanic, as if it somehow removes the idea the word is conveying. I maintain that there is no difference in semantic content between "fuck" and "f*ck," and newspapers should not be shy about printing the former.

[Pipsqueak]

FCC stands for Federal Communist Commission.

Really? and all this time I thought it stood for Fecal Cunt Club.

[Man Out Of Times]

Fucking Times page won't! fucking! load! the FUCKERS! and the fuckin--

...

(Gets gun.)

[peachy]

Seriously - fuck can be used as more parts of speech than possibly any other word in our famously flexible language. There's a great story about a flight mechanic in the Pacific War who managed the following sentence with reference to a piece of balky machinery :
"Fuck! Fuck this fucking fuck!"
Which is to say, four uses (out of five total words), each a different part of speech. Now that's some impressive linguistic ability...

[Lowdog]

I love swearing, especially trying to figure out new and original ways to put a string of swear words into a sentence. Sometimes, as in peachy's example, I try to create a sentence of only swear words.

[Captain Awesome]

That article was dripping with santorum.

[ralphus]

Growing up my father only used one curse word:

Goddamnmutherfuckingcocksuckingsonofabitch!

Usually repeated over and over under his breath like some sort of fantastically perverted TM mantra.

Lowdog,

Fuck you, you abso-fucking-lutely un-fucking-believable fucking fuck face of a fuck stained fuck head fuck.

You mean like that? 🙂

Fuck it dude. Let's go bowling.

[Eric the .5b]

Peach - read my linked Wikipedia article. You'll be very amused. 🙂

[Rhywun]

newspapers should not be shy about printing the former ["fuck"].

I disagree. Forbidden words serve a useful purpose by representing the most "extreme" speech available - and again, it seems to be part of human nature to have a such a set of words. You can't fight human nature.

[Ruthless]

"I heard a slightly different explanation about the title in grad school--the title was still a reference to female genitalia, but the word was actually "nothing," in that men have "something" whereas women have "nothing.""

Jennifer,
Seems as though someone would know Shakespeare's mind better, but, the way I remember it from my commentary is that "nothing" is a pun on "noting" which meant eavesdropping back in the day.
The play features a lot of eavesdropping.

[Jennifer]

newspapers should not be shy about printing the former ["fuck"]. . . . .. I disagree. Forbidden words serve a useful purpose by representing the most "extreme" speech available - and again, it seems to be part of human nature to have a such a set of words.

Yes, but it's ALSO part of human nature that today's horribly shocking expletives are tomorrow's respectable yawners (Zounds!) But now we have an Official Government Commission to determine which words are offensive and which are not. Let the newspapers print "fuck" if they want to--and if the word is as offensive as people say, then their sales will decline and they'll stop printing it.

[Stevo Darkly]

I only cuss under the most extreme circumstances -- e.g., I'm in traffic, I've just stubbed my toe, I've spilled something, I'm trying to make photocopies, or MicroSoft Word is being more "helpful" than I want it to be.

However, I've discovered that old expletives that have become shopworn and dull and flat from overuse ("Shit! Fuck! Asshole! Motherfucker! Cocksucker!") can become shiny and exciting and shocking again if you recombine their elements in novel ways: "Shit-mother! Cock-hole! Bastard ass-fuck shit-cocker! Dick-shit ass-wad cock-mother! Fuckshit ass-mother dillfuck cockwad crapdick shit-cock dillpisser!" Try it.

This is my "Heloise's Helpful Hints" entry of the day.

[ralphus]

Stevo,

Thanks for the tip fuckdick.

[Stevo]

Yes, exactly!

[Lowdog]

Stevo - yeah, that sounds more like me when I'm going off on some tirade. People probably think I have turrets syndrome.

[Ruthless]

Lowdog,
I thought only tanks and similar heavy military apparatii have "turrets syndrome."

[parse]

Jennifer, I'm quite certain that 100 years ago--circa 1905, if you are counting--the word "hell" was used quite often in polite society. (In Sunday sermons threatening hellfire and brimstone, for example.) And I would be surprised if the word "darn" wasn't more acceptable than you claim, even in usages other than those describing what you do with worn-out socks. Since it's use as a profanity seems to have arisen as a euphemism for "damn," its hard to believe it was anywhere close to unutterable after the turn of the 19th century (and probably not before then either). Why coin a word you can't say to replace another word you can't say?

[Lowdog]

Yeah, yeah...fuck cunt shit motherfuck piss shit whore!

[Stevo Darkly]

"turrets syndrome"

You know, some comedian once said, "Most people think the language we use today is coarser than it was in the past. So what was 'Touret's Syndrome' like back in the 1920s?

"Did people say, 'Last night I went to the speakeasy and I.. Guh! Guh! Guh ... Googley-moogley! So, anyway, I went to the Ji-Ji-Ji ... Jiminy Cricket!

" 'Bottom! Bottom!'"

[ralphus]

I read an interview with David Milch where he pointed out that while you'll hear cocksucker and motherfucker bandied about the streets of Deadwood you'll rarely hear and God damn or Jesus Christ. The reason being that back then taking the Lord's name in vain was considered much more offensive.

Personally, much like Stevo, I like to combine my blasphemies with curses to create new taboo words. My new personal favorite is Christfucker.

[linguist]

There is some human need being satisfied by the existence of forbidden words. I think if "fuck" and "shit" stopped being forbidden words, human nature would quickly find other words to take their place.

Yep. It's amazing how strong this cultural-linguistic taboo is, though. Even for professional linguists who study this sort of thing, there's often a hesitance and thrill in including *those* parts of the language in your study.

Hehe. I did my thesis on Eminem. It really ISN'T easy to face a bunch of professors and quote him. Also, it's very weird to talk about inherently emotional words in such a pedantic way. It kind of feels wrong in the gut.

[peachy]

"Think you can cut down on the casual swearing, boy?"
"Hell, yes."

[Lowdog]

linguist - David Allen Grier and one of the Wayan's brothers used to do a skit on In Living Colour where they would be dressed like professors and would recite hip-hop lyrics in a faux-English accent and a real elitist sorta delivery. Shit was funny.

"Came back out feeling ten pounds lighter...."

[smacky]

I think the FCC is making certain words more obscene than they'd ordinarily be. A hundred years ago, "darn" and "hell" were rude words that you'd never say in polite society, but since then they've become acceptable. And I really think "fuck," at least in its adjectival and adverbial forms, would have already gone that same route if the FCC didn't keep it enshrined on the Forbidden List.

I don't know if I agree with that -- Owe it to my knowledge of the Puritanical attitudes about sex in America. "Darn" and "hell" don't fit that category in any sense; "fuck" does have a sexual connotation and etymology, even if not used in the sexual sense. Anything sexual or excretory is deemed "Obscene" by the FCC, and that's a big no-no and always will be for many people, especially people with kids. Even radio broadcast "Safe Harbor" hours do not allow anything remotely "Obscene" to be aired. I think even if the FCC did allow the use of this word in publication (if that's what you were indeed suggesting), someone would complain because of its sexual roots.

FYI, as for "fuck" in the adjectival and adverbial sense, the FCC already does allow its use during "Safe Harbor" hours on the radio, for the same reason I think you were suggesting in your post. As long as it's not used in an "obscene context" it's kosher.

[smacky]

I hate the Fucking Crap Commission.

[dead_elvis]

No one has yet linked to this

I just wish it starred Troy Mclure.

Now y'all have a craptastic, fucktacular day!

[Phil]

newspapers should not be shy about printing the former ["fuck"].

I disagree. Forbidden words serve a useful purpose by representing the most "extreme" speech available - and again, it seems to be part of human nature to have a such a set of words. You can't fight human nature.

Well, my point was that right now newspapers will go ahead and print "f*ck." Which is not semantically different in any significant way from simply printing "fuck." Everyone knows it means "fuck," they get the same signal in their brain as when they read the word "fuck," and for all practical purposes, it may as well just say "fuck." So who do they think they're fooling with "f*ck," and why do they think it would be so much more abohorrent to just print the "u?"

[Ruthless]

Phil,
Is it because it takes a vowel to convey the obscene that Hebrew has no vowels... to speak of ... heh heh?

Oh give me a home where the vowels roam
And the deer and the antelope talk dirty.

[Jennifer]

In retrospect I should have replaced "in polite society" with "around children"--all that crap I had to read as a teacher has corrupted my mind. Point is, a LOT of words which are perfectly fine right now used to be horrifying, but their horror faded and new words arose to take their place. And given how ubiquitous the word "fuck" is almost everywhere except TV and radio, I seriously think it would have faded to mere mild naughtiness by now, if not for the Official Government List.

[The Anti-Puritan]

Nigger has replaced the word fuck as the most unmentionable word in the English language. I'm curious: Does anyone have a problem with the fact that I didn't type N-word instead? Personally, I dislike that euphemism for the same reason Florence King does. If I tell you that I happen to be white, does that affect your attitude?

[Samir Nagheenanajar]

Stevo: Mothershitter son of an ass!

[Thomas Paine's Goiter]

My favorite curse has always been and remains "Whore!"

It's a wonderful word.

[Ruthless]

The Anti-Puritan,
Reminds me of the famous argument in Gone with the Wind about who is supposed to say, "Quittin' time"?

Who is supposed to say what when anyhow?

[peachy]

I favour "son of a whore" myself - it has a nice European flavour, and you can really emphasize the last syllable if needed. Indeed, I think the closing emphasis is critical for many expletives - perhaps a contributing reason for the many common compound curses, especially those not including solid single-syllable germanic words like "shit" and "fuck", which can be sufficiently emphatic and satisfying on their own. ("Damn" and "ass", for example, seem to be often found in compounds.)

[MJ]

"Make love" and "fuck" may have a similar denotation but the former has a positive connotation while latter is negative. They are not meant to elicit the same emotional response. Just as "aroma" and "stench" both are words for smells, one would not use them to do describe the same smell. It is the kind of sex that one would describe as "fucking" that makes it a swear word.

[The Wine Commonsewer]

Mrs TWC cusses more than she used to. Probably because she has two kids and is married to me. OTOH, I have a potty mouth and always have. My mother used to soap my mouth but it never helped. I didn't learn it at home neither as neither of my parents swore.

I've got some really creative swear words that are useful when inanimate objects do not perform to my expectations.

More than you really wanted to know regards, TWC

[Thomas Paine's Goiter]

I favour "son of a whore" myself - it has a nice European flavour, and you can really emphasize the last syllable if needed.

I dabble in "son of a whore" from time to time as well. I also like "gaping whore!" as it seems to just stun those around you.

[Phil]

"Make love" and "fuck" may have a similar denotation but the former has a positive connotation while latter is negative. They are not meant to elicit the same emotional response.

The latter is only negative because culturally, English speakers have made it negative due to a prejudice for Latinate roots over Germanic ones. And comparing it to "make love" isn't really fair; the word "fuck" is several centuries old, while "make love" is a fairly recent euphemism. The word to compare it to is probably "copulate," which is neutral or clinical at best. Or even "fornicate," which is again fairly neutral except for a few centuries of negative religious baggage, but was probably the everyday word for "lovemaking" for a long time. (Then, of course, there's the archaic "cleave to," which is really pretty naughty.)

[Stevo Darkly]

I've read a SF book set in an anarcho-communist society where the worst swear-word was, "Bankers!" (1)

And an anarcho-capitalist society where a character swore, "Hell and taxation!" (2)

(1) The Cassini Division by Ken MacLeod.

(2) The Probability Broach by L. Neil Smith.

[ralphus]

TPG,

My personal favorite is "cunt".

It's is the nuke of all curse words. It's the most imasculating thing you can call a man and the quickest way to get woman to hate you. The C-Bomb is a powerful weapon that should only be deployed in the most dire of circumstances. Like when some fucking cunt is doing 50 the fast lane.

[MJ]

Phil,

Your point is...?

I was discussing what meanings those terms have in our culture, right now. When and how they picked up those meanings may be an interesting conversation, but is not really relevent to what I was getting at.

[The Anti-Puritan]

Phil,
Or even "fornicate," which is again fairly neutral except for a few centuries of negative religious baggage, but was probably the everyday word for "lovemaking" for a long time.

Strictly speaking, fornication is not just any instance of sexual intercourse. It refers specifically to sex among unmarried people, the other major category of sexual sin besides adultery according to traditional Christian morality.

[dead_elvis]

It's is the nuke of all curse words.

Yeah, I agree. Many women I've known who have no problem saying the most digusting, foul things absolutely refused to say that word, and would not associate with a man who did.

I've seen some parents who think babies in the first year are too young to pick up bad words; recently one of their girls started saying "fuck" (age 1 and 1/2). Surprise!

[Stevo Darkly]

And dead elvis reminded me of a joke.

A young couple moved into a house next to a lot where a construction crew was building another new home. Their 5-year-old daughter naturally took an interest in all the activity going on next door and started talking with the workers. They adopted her as a kind of mascot, chatted with her during breaks, and even had her do little errands for them, fetchng this or that, to make her feel important. At the end of the week they gave her an envelope with five dollars in it as her "pay."

Everyone thought it was very cute. The little girl took this home to her mother, who said, "That's wonderful. Let's tke this to the bank and start a savings account for you."

At the bank, the little girl told the teller, "All week I helped build a house, and this is my pay for the week." The teller said, "Oh, that's wonderful. Will you be working on the house next week too?"

And the little girl said, "Uh huh, if we ever get the delivery from the fucking lumberyard."

[Phil]

MJ, my point was that the situation doesn't reflect anything inherent in the words; it reflects a cultural value. Frankly, I think the English-speaking world derived the euphemistic "make love" solely because it still has a view of sex as dirty and shameful if ultimately necessary. Think of all the words in English you can that describe the sex act, and how aggressive-sounding they are; they really reflect a messed-up attitude towards sex, one that we deflect with phrases like "make love." If we had a healthier attitude about it, we wouldn't use harsh-sounding words like:

fuck
screw
bone
nail
ball
ride
etc.

[Solitudinarian]

Stevo,

I'd only heard the British version of that joke with "bricklayers" and "pay packet", but it is an absolute beaut, a classic.

[linguist]

Nigger has replaced the word fuck as the most unmentionable word in the English language.

Oh, hell yeah! Back to my Eminem thesis, if I thought fuck was hard to say to professors, this was harder by several orders.

[Rhywun]

And given how ubiquitous the word "fuck" is almost everywhere except TV and radio, I seriously think it would have faded to mere mild naughtiness by now, if not for the Official Government List.

"Fuck" is most ubiquitous among young people whose parents didn't teach them any better. Teenagers walk down down the street shouting "fuck this... fuck that..." without a care in the world. The problem with this is... there is no word to replace "fuck". "Fuck" is just as shocking as always.* I'm not sure if you're arguing for a world in which there are no shocking, forbidden words, but if you are - it ain't gonna happen.

*in certain contexts. I.e. in public, among strangers. Here, obviously, it is not really shocking.

[Rhywun]

ralphus,

check out the song "Christfuck" by the German band :wumpscut:. It's quite pleasant 🙂