"Are Curses Necessary In Literature?" or "Mother-Fucking Swear Words, Yo!"

[Seil]

Now, here's the thing:

http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u59/Poetisch/thingrs2.gif

And he was created by Stan Lee and martin Goodman and drawn first (I think) by Jack Kirby. So there's that. But anyway, on to racial humor and white guilt. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8gAb3uc6fk)

T5pFOA3zWAAu3kQ3xJn4cU

Now I love comedians. I love, love, love comedians. I really take heart with the idea of making people laugh, leading them in to looking at something from a different point of view, and getting paid to talk. I think that's cool, and I've got mild anthropophobia.

I just think that hanging out and telling people your point of view is cool But it's like Christopher Titus (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvINZZnEJCU) says:

And don't get me wrong, I wanna hear your pain... just, for God's sake, just put it in joke form, that's all.

Here's the topic at hand; swear words. Do they increase the effect of a given statement? Do they emphasize a mother-fucking point? Are they part of the common vernacular? Why the double standard of letting some people use them and others not? Where do we draw the line at swearing? Why do we associate swearing with the lower class? Can swearing be used in "civilized" conversations?

Why do we swear?
Who invented swear words?
Why did they catch on?
Why do we call them 'swear' words?

Time for some mother-fucking research, y'all.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

I swear in formal presentations and at weddings. I use it as punctuation. People who are offended by swearing are the types of people who I would be a bad person if I wasn't offending thus they should be used at every occasion.

[Seil]

I need a comment from one that which who doesn't isn't drunk.

[Amake]

If I have kids, I want to teach them they're not allowed to swear unless and until they don't need to. A swear jar with actually noticeable fees should help foster the right mind set: That the more you swear, the less valuable your swear words become. And when you can't just say fuck whenever you feel like it cause half your allowance is at stake, you're forced to develop a more nuanced and varied language to express the degree of intensity of your emotional state and whatnot. Swearing seems like an easy shortcut, but it can so easily become a crutch that limits your linguistic mobility.

Me, I've developed a bad habit of swearing on the Internet, but at least in real life conversation I've only cursed once in the last 14 or 15 years. Might have been over 20 years since my friend had heard me swear until this time a couple of months back. And you can bet your liver she noticed. I don't mean to brag when I say I blew her fucking mind hole with this one word.

And that, in my opinion, is what swearing is for. When I choose to swear I aim for effect. Goosebumps. Widened eyes. Traffic stopping all over the city and time resting like an arrow on a drawn bow. Kind of like when WWI soldiers didn't (http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=fuck) use the word fuck in a sentence.

[PyrosNine]

In terms of literature, curses aren't entirely neccessary, but to go without them one is deprived of a powerful set of wordtools that have specific, cultural, emphatic meaning.

A bad writer might be crude unnecessarily, but a character who has up to this point been fairly clean mouthed suddenly dropping an F-Bomb? now the reader sees that this is something really, really troubling for the character, without needing a dumb

"He frowned, he didn't like this."

added in.

Some words are lingo, slang, culturally specific: Someone who yells out bollocks is someone a lot different than someone who says motherfucker. And someone who says it as "mutha fucka" is someone else entirely!

It can't be profanity for profanity's sake, but used in the proper time and in the proper way, a swear word is just as useful as any other, if not moreso.

[CABAL49]

Course it is. It irks the Baptists and that's okay with me. Gotta be a rebel yo.

[Flarecobra]

Only when it is approprate.

[Locke cole]

A well-placed profanity can make a sentence really work and convey an emotion quite powerfully. I will admit that I quite often run into situations where I can't really think of how best to say something without a profanity, though I try not to use it when possible.

The key is "well-placed". Profanities can hold a lot of meaning, but if you throw them out all over the place, it cheapens the effect. It's like hat thing where if you say a word over and over again, it stops sounding like a word. It loses its meaning.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Swear words and other oaths, when carefully used, can be good tools of characterization and add verisimilitude to written language for reasons others have stated above. When used incautiously, you and your characters come off as 13-year olds who've just discovered Youtube comments.

[synkr0nized]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0486585/



No, this is actually relevant. Some of those interviewed are all for swearing, and others are very much against it. What it did for me, despite not really making much of a point on its own, was emphasize how silly "fake swears" and the like sound when you are very angry or frustrated or otherwise passionate enough to be forcing a point or yelling / raising your voice. It only, for me, strengthens the usefulness of swear words to emphasize the weight of a situation.

But, at the same time, I use them casually enough that they also don't mean much in regular conversation. So it's really more of a "what is synk's tone" than "oh shit that's a swear word being used", but at the same time taking "that tone" and tossing in a "silly poop face" instead of "fucking asshole" or whatever would just cut its impact in half.

[Aerozord]

Swearing has become so common place and overused that to me it has little effect. More often then sounding serious I find it humorous when a person swears to punctuate a point either because they are intentionally using it for irony or at how childish they are for thinking these words still carry such weight.

There are exceptions. Some writers understand they are only effective when used sparingly. If the person swears constantly the words wont have an impact because its just his normal speech. In other words you need a precision F-strike (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PrecisionFStrike) where swearing is avoided except when it is necessary for me to take it seriously.

[phil_]

If the person swears constantly the words wont have an impact because its just his normal speech.Not to pick on you personally, Aero, 'cause a lot of posters have expressed this idea of curse words having a inherent purpose to be emphatic, but what if you don't want your swearing to have an impact and do want it seen as normal speech? Like, in daily conversation, I use the word "shit" interchangeably with "things," "objects," "ideas," and "stuff." Basically, as a pronoun that applies to all nouns. I use it this way to de-emphasize the importance of what I'm talking about, because most things aren't that important, i.e. "everything is shit."

Now, in certain contexts, I can't use "shit" this way, because its status as a curse word emphasizes the importance of what I'm saying, which is the total opposite of what I'm going for, as previously explained. So I don't use it then, because it doesn't do what I want.

So, I'd say that, while words have meaning, words don't have the same meaning to different people, whether we like it or not. Being flexible in your language and considering who you're speaking to (as opposed to considering them stupid for seeing things differently) aids in effective communication. So use curse words (and words in general) when they help get your thoughts from your head into the head you wish them to penetrate, or "when appropriate."

[Aerozord]

While because of context I can figure out the intent of using the word (I know the difference between using it as an interchangeable word vs an exclamation) its impact comes out the same to me as a listener. The way I put it, is it has no weight. I know that you use that word casually and without thought. If you use it to punctuate a point it is no more effective because I know using it carries no taboo and thus it has the same impact as any synonym because to you its just as casual.

[phil_]

is it has no weight.Exactly.

[Amake]

Yeah, it's completely up to you to decide how you value each word in your vocabulary. I find it useful in my communication to have a bunch of high-rate words you can deploy as the verbal equivalent of Marlon Brando in Apocalypse Now; you may have another opinion and even as a certified linguistic genius I can respect that.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

It's ok guys, Stephen Fry has this covered (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_osQvkeNRM)*

As does TV Tropes (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PrecisionFStrike)


*Yay for still not having learnt how to embed shit!

[Amake]

I wish I could be Stephen Fry for a day and meet some of these mythical people who swear well. I mean everyone I've ever talked to in my life has perfectly correlated the "vocabulary is inversely proportional to frequency of swearing" theory. The moral here is Stephen Fry's so cool even his friends are cooler than you are. :I

[Krylo]

I mean everyone I've ever talked to in my life has perfectly correlated the "vocabulary is inversely proportional to frequency of swearing" theory. The moral here is Stephen Fry's so cool even his friends are cooler than you are. :I

Alternatively, you're just making shitty judgment calls on other people based on preconceived notions of what it is, precisely, a curse word represents, rather than based on any objective reality or factual evidence.

Really, how the hell does using a set of culturally important and emotionally charged words to convey your feelings more succinctly and concisely than would otherwise be possible denote you have a bad vocabulary?

Using small, widely understood words in place of ponderous language means you're good at communication; not that you have a bad vocabulary.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

Fuck all this bullshit

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

Fuck all this bullshit

+1 to this!

A thought at this point occurs to myself; You know how childerens cartoons and such get around swearing by like, saying "butt" instead of "ass" or "arse?" Yeah, what the fuck is up with that?? Like, how is that specific combination of letters in that order any worse than the other specific combination of letters in that order? Surely that's a load of crap. In fact, go back to that tv tropes page and look up some of the quotes from kids cartoons and you can see that they're basically saying the same things that adults would say with so called "vulgar" words, they're just replacing some words with so called "non-vulgar" words and somehow that is totally ok.

Clearly, all "vulgar" words on their own are meaningless and the context of those words is what is really important, as you can still convey the same context with different words anyway.

[Magus]

All I can say is that "fuck" has been rendered weightless already by all who have come before me, I don't think I'd anymore weightlessness to it by saying "fuck fuck fuckity fucker fuckington".

...well, I mean, I guess that made it slightly less weighty.

Are Curses Necessary in Literature?

If it would be unrealistic for the character or situation depicted to not involve swear words, yes, they are necessary.

[Amake]

Alternatively, you're just making shitty judgment calls on other people based on preconceived notions of what it is, precisely, a curse word represents, rather than based on any objective reality or factual evidence.
Well I guess I was exaggerating. I meant to say everyone I've talked to for long enough to have a comprehensive image of the extent of their vocabulary have fit the theory.

And yes, my semi-literate drug addled stepbrother for instance is very good at communication despite a limited vocabulary. (And constant swearing.) I'm acutely aware of how much my own exceptional vocabulary helps me understand and be understood by people, which is very little. But it does make a tiny difference which to some people can be the difference between life in a glass bubble and life on the same planet as everyone else.

[Seil]

This is a pretty inspirational speech that uses curse words for emphasis. Is it more powerful for it?

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[Magus]

All I can say is that if you noticed the four bad words in a 4 minute speech by Al Pacino about football, Scarface is going to blow you away.

[Osterbaum]

I only noticed one "bad word"; fuck. Also, that speech was kinda lame.

[pochercoaster]

Preferences for language that is "proper" in everyday life comes off as pretty elitist and classist IMO. Positive associations with a large vocabulary irk me for similar reasons that positive associations with IQ irk me. That is it's not that I think having a large vocabulary is a bad thing, it's the negative associations with having a smaller vocabulary that bother me. You can also substitute "smaller vocabulary" with particular dialects- not in that particular dialects have smaller vocabularies (they don't!), but in that people are arbitrarily judged as inferior for using them. Ultimately it's a way of discrediting someone without actually listening to them. "I don't care about how society is -ist because you said the word 'fuck' too much whilst describing how -ist it is."

Certain swears lose their meaning over time but are swiftly replaced with new ones due to the living nature of language. There will always be curse words and they won't go away.

Why the double standard of letting some people use them and others not?

Cause some of them are entrenched in a long history of oppressing groups of people, so using those words conjures up all the shitty oppression they have to deal with in day to day life. Cause it conjures up all the times that those words are used to dehumanize them, which is connected to violence against them. So when people outside of those groups use those words they are perpetuating that oppression, even if they are doing it unintentionally.

[Seil]

All I can say is that if you noticed the four bad words in a 4 minute speech by Al Pacino about football, Scarface is going to blow you away.

Again, it uses curse words for emphasis. I didn't say it was comprised of f-bombs, you cock-a-roach.

Is the statement more powerful for it, though?[/badcubanaccent]

Cause some of them are entrenched in a long history of oppressing groups of people, so using those words conjures up all the shitty oppression they have to deal with in day to day life. Cause it conjures up all the times that those words are used to dehumanize them, which is connected to violence against them. So when people outside of those groups use those words they are perpetuating that oppression, even if they are doing it unintentionally.

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Words have power. Depending on who uses them and how.

[Premmy]

Words have power. Depending on who uses them and how.
No white person is ever using nigger/nigga "right" at any time ever.

[Seil]

Not saying that it's right for anyone to use the word, just saying the word itself has power.

[rpgdemon]

Oh shooit is this turning into another one of those threads? Where we all justify or disjustify humor that is offensive? Or other things that are offensive?

[Premmy]

Not saying that it's right for anyone to use the word, just saying the word itself has power.
Whether or not it's "right" to use the word or whether or not it has "power" isn't really my point. The point is it has certain contexts in which it is used, and being white isn't one of them.