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Cursing as Peephole Into Brain Architecture
tabdelgawad writes "The New York Times offers this excellent and entertaining writeup on cursing and its role in recent studies of the brain. The article discusses the universality of cursing across time, space, and culture, its varied roles, from linguistic evolution to anger management, and its uses in recent brain research. You can also read all about the sexual effects of uttering obscenities and the swearing habits of sorority women." From the article: "Researchers point out that cursing is often an amalgam of raw, spontaneous feeling and targeted, gimlet-eyed cunning. When one person curses at another, they say, the curser rarely spews obscenities and insults at random, but rather will assess the object of his wrath, and adjust the content of the 'uncontrollable' outburst accordingly." As someone who plays a lot of MMOGs, in my experience this is only mostly true.
I wonder how Wimpy Curses work vs. Real Curses. I myself don't have a tendency of cursing I tend to use the old curse or wimpy curse words like "Dag Nabbit!", "D'Oh", "Arg!", and "Crappy", and "Cruncy". I tend to shoot them out just as often and with little though like other people shoot off Real Curses.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
There is no fucking way that this bullshit is anything but bullshit! Motherfucking fuckfuckers! Fuckshitfuck! Fuck!
Note to mods: I'm probably being sarcastic.
Oh Shit! Did I think that out loud?!?! Man I'm going to look like such an ass! I'll never be able to make another comment and be respected around here agian!
New slogan: "Cursing, does a body good."Generation Trance: What generation are you?
What about the perpetual fuck as a comma crowd though? How do they fit into this? Are they de-sensitized?
THat's not entirely true. A single swear word can be, well...
Rocco: Fucking... What the fuck. Who the fuck fucked this fucking... How did you two fucking fucks...
[shouts] FUCK!
Connor: Well, that certainly illustrates the diversity of the word.
(quote shamelessly stolen from The Boondock Saints)
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
hey say, the curser rarely spews obscenities and insults at random, but rather will assess the object of his wrath, and adjust the content of the 'uncontrollable' outburst accordingly."
And that expectation (which we all have) is why it's so damn funny in Office Space when Samir, the non-native English speaker, is cursing completely inappropriately. SON OF A F$*(!
A computer without Microsoft is like ice cream without ketchup.
If we want to really clean up government and speed up processing in the criminal justice system, we should put $100 million into fMIR as lie detectors.
We could have an electoral truth telling challenge between candidates to see who's telling the truth and who isn't.
Abstinence is a government conspiracy. www.SafeSexZone.co
I want to propose that language is an advanced form of cursing.
piss fag mothafuckings pussy orgasm fingerfuck prick ejaculated blowjob pissering cocksucking slut pussys fucking kum shitings fingerfucked motherfuckers pornography cumming mothafuck blowjobs pissin mothafucks fistfuckers gangbanged kondum pissing fuck cumshot pissoff fingerfucks fistfucking fingerfucking cock cocks ass farted gaysex fellatio hotsex gangbangs bitcher lusting cocksucks cocksucked cuntlick fuckme lust porn cyberfucked mothafucked cyberfuckers mothafucking cyberfuck orgasm faggs phonesex fingerfuckers fistfucker pornos beastial fuckings bestial shitty fistfuck fucks bastard fagot cuntlicker smut kummer jizm mothafucka orgasims fucked mothafuckas horny phuking fistfucked ejaculation phuked motherfucked mothafuckers farts motherfucker pisser farting bitch fistfuckings mothafuckin cocksucker fagging cocksucking cum goddamn phuq fartings motherfuck bitching kumming ejaculatings fucker mothafucker pussies horniest dildos spunk cunts shittings cunilingus phukking asshole motherfuckin cunt assholes cyberfucking phukked twat jack-off orgasms beastiality cummer phuk jerk-off cunnilingus clit kock farty jism jiz bestiality faggot motherfucks fuckers shitters porno fistfucks beastility damn motherfucking fuckin mothafuckaz shitfull gangbang cums phuks kums hell dildo slut motherfuckings bitchin shitter cunillingus fuk bitches shit shitted bitchers felatio cuntlicking fagots fingerfucker cyberfucker ejaculating ejaculates pissed dink shitting ass prick fart of an asshole.
I know that I tend to react "guiltily" to being challenged, regardless of whether I'm actually in the wrong. I suspect this is a consequence of the fact that, when one's parents are enraged at, for example, the paint on the walls, one's guilt or innocence (no really, my sister did it) ceases to be an issue. Then if, as I suspect, the detectable physiological reaction to guilt is fear-based, it could be that the so-called "liars" just had parents who were a bit hasty with the shouting and the smacking and the grounding. Hardly a basis on which to lock them up.
For the love of God, please learn to spell "ridiculous"!!!
Which brings me to the question - why does WoW let me say 'crap' - but not 'LSD' ?
I personally think that WoW should have a 'receive' foul language option to increase entertainment.
So if two people both have the flag on - they can spit what ever they want at each other.
Sort of like VpV.
EMail: 0110001101100010010000000110001101110010 0110000101111010011011100110000101110010 0010111001100011011011110110
I have no idea where they got that (and many others of their facts) from, but wiktionary says otherwise. It seems to be pseudo-researched with a couple of reputable quotes here and there... Oh well.
To the point, in reference to their Stroop test (on page 2), where people were startled by obscene words moreso than neutral words, I find it to be the reverse in "comfortable" environments (as they vaguely mentioned). That is to say, so many people swear habitually that it's not even a big deal in casual situations. To find someone that says "poop" instead of "shit" or something unique and unsensical like "fatty arbuckle!" instead of "fuck!" tends to startle people in surprize. At first, at least.
The novelty of profanity has been worn out to the point where it doesn't have the desired effect anymore. Therefore, I subscribe to the alternative: Using unique and creative utterings to describe my feelings.
This way, after people get to know me, and get used to me being profanity-free, and then one day I get REALLY pissed off and say FUCK, they know I MEAN IT!
Works wonderfully. Plus, makes swearing that/i much more fun.
- shazow
Another interesting observation was made by George Carlin. He was essentially guessing that teaching somebody not to use certain "bad" words is the first step in teaching them to be complacent. If you can teach them not to make certain sounds, you can teach them not to yell at authorities. Often, people who play the "word police" are very controlling. Of course, cursing is not a sign of an educated person, but when you hit your shin on a corner of a desk, "fuck!" is a more appropriate response than "I think I experienced pain" ...
A religious war is an adult version of a fight over who has the best imaginary friend
Why is it that words come to be 'forbidden' after normal usage before. At one time, none of the swear words used today existed. Remember, someone had to invent all of these words. On the flip side, why is it that swear words, after repeated use, lose their 'evilness'?
Nowadays, the phrase, "Oh, golly!" may be considered almost comically wholesome, but it was not always so. "Golly" is a compaction of "God's body" and, thus, was once a profanity.
Is it that profanity is in the eye of the beholder? If I were talking to somebody in a room can call the person a 'fucktard', chances are the person I'm talking to would take offense. But in a different scenario I'm talking with a French man that doesn't know a word of english. Now I can call him whatever-the-hell I want to. And just as long as I'm using the inflections in my voice as if I were telling a joke, he wouldn't know any better than if I were telling a joke.
What makes a word a word? It's not the arrangement of the english characters on the post card that offend me - the association between the arranged letters on the notecard and my past experience with that word that makes it vulgar. Ever since we have been children we have known which words not to say - not by the letters F U C and K, but by the face on my pissed off mother. That surely would explain why a child, illiterate or foreigner wouldn't find our swear words offensive.
So, after reading the article, I question the reactions that the tested subjects had to the swear word on the card. We aren't born with these conections in our head, they are learned.
Lastly, another question for the readers: Can swear words be taught out of existence? You would think that if people stopped taking offense to swear words that people would stop using them. It would make sense that if we were taught that 'shit' was a synonym for Cotton Candy, then it wouldn't really be offensive.
Feasible? bs? i dunno...
Slash-for-Thought
*everyone turns around and stares*
What? I said shit.
No you didn't. You said 'shazbot.'
I...left the stove on. *runs*
you can have my violent video games when you pry them from my cold, dead hands.
Prime UID Club
The Alternative Dictionaries
2743 Curse and Slang words in 162 different languages.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
Yea, the part about the sorority girls. I was pretty dissapointed. Here's the whole quote,
"The investigators have found, among other things, that men generally curse more than women, unless said women are in a sorority, and that university provosts swear more than librarians or the staff members of the university day care center."
There. I saved you 5 mins of reading just to be dissapointed that there wasn't really anything about sorority girls and sex, just cursing.
80 comments and counting and I'm still yet to see a CUNT around here...very disapointing...oh, wait...this is slashdot - no girls allowed.
Mongrel News all the news that fits and froths
You donkeyhumping popefelchers! Only grabastic nunblowing babyraping cumburpers use such pedestrian terms like "Fuck".
On-the-fly Creatific Curse Constructions, is a great way to keep even the most guttermouthed cock-master off guard in a linguistic duel.
--A young Professor runs around the lab, shrieking "EUREKA" at the top of his lungs and grinning like a madman.--
Grad Student: Hey Professor, what's going on? did you spill the bromochloride down your pants on accident again?
Professor: I have had, perhaps, the most wonderful epiphany. It's BRILLIANT, BRILLIANT I TELL YOU.
Grad Student: Okay, I'll bite. What is it?
Professor: You know the Tri-Delt Sorority next door, the one with all the hot women that wouldn't speak to us unles we paid them?
Grad Student: Yeah...
Professor: Well, we're going to pay them to talk dirty to us.
Grad Student: But we barely have enough for Ramen noodles. We cook them here and pack them in our underwear for heat at night. Where are we going to get money?
Professor: That's the genius of it! We'll come up with a grant proposal for a cognitive study about swearing! Then we just tell them we have to find some local subjects who swear a lot, and we're SO IN!!!
Grad Student: It'll never work...
Turn your spam filter off for a day. Read every spam. Delete every one manually.
After the first 5 or 10 spams, you'll be up to "cocksucking motherfuckers". By 20 or 30, you'll be using "pigfucker" like it was a comma. After 50, you'll graduate to ("pigfucker" being redundant) "democrats, republicans, senators, congressmen", and by the time you're into the triple-digits, you'll have come up with your own expletives that'll put any rendition of The Aristocrats to shame.