ACLU Sues To Protect Your Right To Swear

The ACLU is suing the police in Pennsylvania for issuing tickets to people who swear. They argue that it is every American's constitutional right to drop an F-bomb. From the article: "'Unfortunately, many police departments in the commonwealth do not seem to be getting the message that swearing is not a crime,' said Marieke Tuthill of the ACLU of Pennsylvania. 'The courts have repeatedly found that profanity, unlike obscenity, is protected speech.'" This is a big f*cking deal.

Comments

Re:Hmmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

This should be fun.

Niggers! (for once it's not offtopic!)

Re:Let it rip...

[TyrainDreams]

Instead of coming up with a witty and thought out reply I instead say...

Fuck you. Pretentious fuck head...

Re:It's odd...

[Blakey Rat]

I decided to annotate some of your post with the implicit meaning made explicit. Look for the parentheticals.

Certain words have crept into vocabulary and are now used to the exclusion of other words. It seems young folks are unable, now, to express themselves without swear words. (I'm better than those people.) It seems that they are completely unaware that there are actual words that actually MEAN what they are trying to say; but since they don't know them, they attach the same word that everyone else attaches for emphasis. (I have a better vocabulary than they do.) So we end up with sentences that include the same word, for emphasis, three times... when all they really mean to say is "I was astounded."

To me, people who use swear words for pretty much everything sound uneducated and ... well, the follow-the-crowd type... someone who is clearly influenced, in the way they talk, by whoever is around them at the time. (I'm obviously educated and borderline genius.)

It's also interesting to me that people argue that words have no meaning out of context, etc., and typically argue that with someone who is offended by that kind of speech... and yet, then they use those same words specifically to offend or be abrasive. (I write these big academic sentences because they make me feel like a big man.) That's not out-of-context, that is a very specific context. If you are using a word specifically to offend me while claiming I shouldn't be offended because it's out of context, you're being rather rude. (Being so vastly superior to you, I'm never rude.)

I personally dislike swearing. I find it ... well, vulgar and uneducated :) (Unlike me; I fart perfume and shit roses while creating new branches of mathematics on a daily basis.) Here's my actual "political" response though: as long as I am not allowed to use certain terms for people because it's "politically incorrect" or "offensive" to them, etc - for example, "black" or "gay" or perhaps saying that some act or sexual orientation is a "sin" - then I don't see why you should be allowed to swear and cuss under to offend someone under the guise of free speech. (Also I'm apparently a huge racist.)

I hope that this clears up any misunderstanding.

Re:Hmmmm

[randyleepublic]

Dude, your old man fucked you up worse than you realize. You still can't think clearly. What an asshole he was! I'm sorry.

BTW religion is mind control propaganda as evil as evil can be. Just because some non-religious people are evil too, doesn't excuse the 10,000 years of horrifying abuse we have suffered as a result of failing to realize that religion is a sure symptom of insanity and acting accordingly. Hello?