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Today's Children Are Officially Potty Mouths
tetrahedrassface writes "When the Sociolinguistics Symposium met earlier this month swearing scholar Timothy Jay revealed that an increase in child swearing is directly related to an increase in adult swearing. It seems that vulgarity is increasing as pop culture continues to popularize vulgarities. The blame lies with media, public figures, politicians, but mostly ourselves. From the article: 'Children as young as two are now dropping f-bombs, with researchers reporting that more kids are using profanity — and at earlier ages — than has been recorded in at least three decades.'"
So fucking what? /sarcasm
If curse words become a part of normally accepted speech, what the hell will we use for curse words then???
I Am My Own Worst Enemy
When those children are adults, it will no longer be considered profane. Problem solved.
as my toddler would say, that's fucked up!
Monkey see, Monkey do. I have noticed an increase in the amount of swearing that adults do too. I'm guessing also that parents aren't beating their children (spanking) or rinsing their mouth out (with liquid dish soap) as much either.
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My nephew just turned 4 a little while back. Sadly, he has a speech impediment that has made him difficult, if not impossible, to understand until very recently. Over over the past 6 months or so his speech has improved considerable and we finally know... that the kid swears like a sailor, he's probably been swearing for years and no one ever knew it. Seriously, we're all in the kitchen and we hear "Holy shit!" come out of the living room, go in to see what's going on and he's watching Sesame Street. Obviously we tried and failed to not laugh, so I can't imagine we helped the situation any.
... blame the parents. The media just reflects what is acceptable to society.
I've always wondered though why Americans get so upset about bad language and sex, but violence on TV is ok for children to watch.
Swearing is relative to a perceived base.
On the old people stodgy baseline it is all swearing, even "boobies".
On the young people base line "fuck" is emphasis mark.
Language changes. Swear words are something that change quite quickly.
I don't know how others feel, but I've never felt some sort of stigma against using swear words. The only time I refrain is when it's socially unacceptable (i.e. at a funeral) because then other people would potentially become upset towards me. At my funeral though? I'm going to encourage it. From the grave.
It's time to change the expression from curse like a sailor to curse like a 2-year old.
Actually, there's a study that shows when people swear after getting hurt that it has a therapeutic effect. As in, hitting your thumb with a hammer accidentally and yelling Goddamit When you hold it in, it makes it worse. So I make a point to swear when I hurt myself, and I do feel better immediately.
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I have never understood the stigma about swearing. They are words, just like any other. What really is the difference between saying "I took a dump" and "I took a shit"? They mean exactly the same thing, but for some reason shit is a dirty word.
It is all about how you use words, not the words you use. You can be just as vulgar and mean without using "swear" words. Is it really less offensive for me to say "The best part of you squirted out of your father's substandard size penis and rolled down that chunk of lard your mother called a thigh" than for me to say "Holy fuck that is cool"?
Words are just words, it's the meaning behind them that matters.
"Information wants to be expensive" - Stewart Brand, the same guy who said "Information wants to be free"
What? How?
What difference exactly does it make if someone exclaims Fuck! instead of Custard!
How is the latter displaying a more advanced vocabulary? And why should anyone care?
I find that swearing is often very effective at expressing my thoughts and feelings.
Fear is the mind killer.
These goddamn kids are diluting the strength of words. I'm going to have to get creative now. The trick I think is to combine things that multiply the strength of the words. Here are some examples of profane combinations, and please don't let the kids get wind of them:
"Jesus Fuck!"
"Christ's Tits!"
"Mother of God's Firm Ass!"
"Jesus Raped!"
I could go on..
I agree. I just wish we Americans had more of the colorful insults of the Queen's English: http://septicscompanion.com/showcat.php?cat=insults http://www.labnol.org/internet/insult-anyone-in-shakespearean-english/7251/
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
This isn't much of a surprise to me anymore. In previous generations we idolized decent, intelligent, articulate and educated people. Somewhere it was decided that nobody can or should have to aspire to be any of those things and we should just aim for mediocrity because EVERYONE can be mediocre!
At least in the US I am seeing this perpetual dumbing-down of the culture (some will argue here that the US culture was pretty dumb to begin with hehehe). Instead of "dressing for success" kids now wear these pants that sag down to their knees. This is a holdover from the prison culture where clothes are baggy and ill-fitting. Reality TV idolizes people who are often foul, vulgar, have no education and oh yeah, don't have any kind of gainful employment. What do we learn from shows like The Hills or Jersey Shore? Instead of keeping rigid and tough education requirements, public schools in the US have been dumbed-down so that "everyone gets a chance." Well I have some news - in the real world, nobody gets a chance, you have to work your ass off to get anywhere.
What do people who use foul language constantly say when they are really angry. You can't use foul language because there is no difference from the way you normally talk. I'm saying that swearing is OK but keep it to a minimum. I quickly take notice when people that rarely swear actually do swear, I know immediately that they are really ticked off.
I once say a movie that used the F-bomb so often that it ruined the movie. The percentage of vulgarity was over half of the dialog. It was so bad that you couldn't tell if the actors were supposed to be angry.
It's just language. The notion of a "bad" word is so fucking adolescent it makes me giggle with disappointment. Why don't we have good words too? I propose "penis" be the official first "good word". Or we could all just work on something tangible..
Kids swearing reminds me of a great scene in Misery. If you haven't seen the film it's worth watching, it's both intringuing horror and somewhat comical (both intentionally and unintentioally). Anyway, romance novel writer Paul Sheldon is being held captive by his insane fan Annie Wilks. She reads a manuscript for his as yet unpublished novel with a more serious tone, and this is her reaction:
Annie Wilkes: It's the swearing, Paul. It has no nobility.
Paul Sheldon: These are slum kids, I was a slum kid. Everybody talks like that.
Annie Wilkes: THEY DO NOT! At the feedstore do I say, "Oh, now Wally, give me a bag of that F-in' pig feed, and a pound of that bitchly cow corn"? At the bank do I say, "Oh, Mrs. Malenger, here is one big bastard of a check, now give me some of your Christ-ing money!" THERE, LOOK THERE, NOW SEE WHAT YOU MADE ME DO!
It's a great scene, mainly because Kathy Bates is so convincing as the mentally deranged Annie. But it does bring up the sort of cognitive dissonance about swearing. What does it really damage? From a philosophical standpoint, it's kind of odd that we humans make words that are considered taboo in the first place. Words have only the power that people give them. For example, others have already mentioned how what's acceptable has changed, and on that subject, I recall talking to my grandmother once about movies she saw when she was a kid. One of them was Gone with the Wind, and when Clark Cable uttered his famous "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn" line, she said there was audible gasp in the theater. I can't even imagine the string of profanities needed to make a modern movie-going audience gasp. Actually, I think a string of profanities would have the opposite impact today, people would likely find it absurd at start laughing. So yes, language evolves, but so does society. Perhaps we've moved beyond assigning such power to words. The only exception I can think of is racial slurs, those are more offensive today to many people than they ever were in the past. It's not uncommon to find elderly folks that drop the N-word, not out of hatred or malice, but because that was just what "everyone" called black people when they were growing up. Granted, some elderly folks that use racial slurs are also racists, but it's not necessarily the case either. Things change, and not everyone can or will adapt.
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I have heard that Japanese doesn't have any words that could be considered to be profane per se. At least, that's what quite a few manga scanlation translators have asserted on their posts, when they have deign to explain :D
Instead, the Japanese seem to utilize impoliteness and rudeness. So instead of a special word like "Freddy Uncle Charlie Kent", they have a rude form of the word "YOU!", which will serve the same purpose
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Could somebody explain why this is a bad thing? If people take words less seriously, perhaps we'll stop making wars out of them.
bluHatter
....and the clue is in the word "vulgar." Vulgar language was the language of the people you had conquered. The original words that fuck and shit derive from were the normal everyday equivalents for copulation and deification. Look up the origins of "acceptable" words and their vulgar equivalents and you will see who conquered whom.
The OP is factually correct and does not even discuss race. Watch any documentary about gangs. The guys that started the trend tell you it comes from their lives spent in prison. You are projecting your own racism upon the comment.
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Swearing or cursing as a habit during general discourse is a bad thing because it is a sign of both mental weakness and lack of self control. Have you heard about the study that found that dogs bark because they don't know what else to do? People curse because they can't find anything else useful to say. Sometimes it's okay, like when you hammer your finger by accident. But wolf puppies bark, and as they grow more mature they bark less or not at all. They are able to intercept the urge, they show the self control to avoid barking. As the mental capacity and self control of people increases, they will curse/swear less. As noted by the article, people are cursing and swearing more, which means it is likely their mental capacity is also diminishing. Recent studies on how Google and the constant barrage of information has a negative effect on cognition may provide a hint as to why swearing is becoming more prevalent. That's my theory.
Yes a product of prison culture, but a product of culture. People are amazing things and they're always evolving. The current fashion has been exported around the world, and some say hip hop may just be the BEST product of US culture, in that it is truly american, original and artistically appreciative. Many of the other cultures and traditions here have built on western, native, eastern, et al roots. In this case, the baggy clothes and the rap style music, it's highly american. Be proud, motherfucker.
... That said if you play any MMO game that is simple enough for kids to play, you will likely read or hear the worst language you have ever had the misfortune to be exposed to.
I've never seen any language in an MMO I wouldn't want my children exposed to. OTOH, I've seen racism, anti-semitism, homophobia, and worst of all, incredible levels of misogyny that I would want to see anyone exposed to.
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."