2008 Woodie Awards
Failure to Communicate: This column contains curse words
Luke McIntyre
Issue date: 11/14/06 Section: Opinions
You've been warned. If you are offended by the use of certain English words, then this column is not for you. It is about you, but it is not for you. You probably won't be able to handle it.
There are those among us who hate curse words just for existing. People who don't hate the meaning of the words, which can change given the usage and context, but simply hate the four or five letters making up the sound "fuck," "shit," or "bitch." A logophile by nature, I've always had a fondness for words. All words, including curse words. I've also always had a certain distaste for people who claim curse words to be useless collections of letters that inherently make a person sound dumber for using them.
For those who embrace the red-headed stepchildren of the English language, curses are like the spicing you sprinkle over a sentence. A properly placed swear can kick a statement up a notch. "What are you doing" is decidedly blander than "what in the hell are you doing." More emotion can be inflected, or the statement can take on a degree of seriousness, or any number of other meanings can be given to what are extremely flexible and useful phrases. We should be careful not to over-pepper our words, but nothing beats a little flavor.
And, like all words, curse words carry meanings and can be used for a purpose. During the course of any political discussion with friends, I will never say "I disapprove of President Bush's stances and I dislike him very much as a person." I will say, probably a number of times, "Fuck Bush." Those two words won't be the crux of my argument, of course, but it's a perfect description of how I feel about our president.
I'm not alone in this sentiment. Take the Supreme Court case Cohen v. California. In 1968, Paul Cohen was arrested for wearing a jacket that displayed the words "Fuck the Draft" on its back. "Offensive conduct," the Californian cops determined. Cohen not only won, but the court's majority opinion stated that not only was Cohen's use of the word "Fuck" protected political speech, but there was no other phrasing that Cohen could have used that properly expressed his opinion.
There are those among us who hate curse words just for existing. People who don't hate the meaning of the words, which can change given the usage and context, but simply hate the four or five letters making up the sound "fuck," "shit," or "bitch." A logophile by nature, I've always had a fondness for words. All words, including curse words. I've also always had a certain distaste for people who claim curse words to be useless collections of letters that inherently make a person sound dumber for using them.
For those who embrace the red-headed stepchildren of the English language, curses are like the spicing you sprinkle over a sentence. A properly placed swear can kick a statement up a notch. "What are you doing" is decidedly blander than "what in the hell are you doing." More emotion can be inflected, or the statement can take on a degree of seriousness, or any number of other meanings can be given to what are extremely flexible and useful phrases. We should be careful not to over-pepper our words, but nothing beats a little flavor.
And, like all words, curse words carry meanings and can be used for a purpose. During the course of any political discussion with friends, I will never say "I disapprove of President Bush's stances and I dislike him very much as a person." I will say, probably a number of times, "Fuck Bush." Those two words won't be the crux of my argument, of course, but it's a perfect description of how I feel about our president.
I'm not alone in this sentiment. Take the Supreme Court case Cohen v. California. In 1968, Paul Cohen was arrested for wearing a jacket that displayed the words "Fuck the Draft" on its back. "Offensive conduct," the Californian cops determined. Cohen not only won, but the court's majority opinion stated that not only was Cohen's use of the word "Fuck" protected political speech, but there was no other phrasing that Cohen could have used that properly expressed his opinion.
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