It's good that kids will get to read this as part of their class, but America as a country needs to relax when it comes to swearing. How much damage can reading the word fuck do to someone who is 13-18 years old?
We have a cultural norm that adult authority figures do not swear in front of children or provide them with educational materials containing profanity.
I can see why this norm may be irksome to some people but I don't see how it is harmful.
I certainly wouldn't have any problems with it for 13-18 years olds, but I can see why there is some push back.
Especially in an age where saying "son of bitch" could be construed as a perpetuating hostile workplace environment for women.
I've got a filthy mouth and I sort of wish I didn't.
I'd also be against cleaning up important classic works that use language that isn't really allowed anymore. That is whitewashing history.
Who is 'our' here? Cursing is part of the language in many industries. They are just words with added emphasis. Saying something like 'crap' is akin to saying 'awe shucks' and does a bad job conveying the seriousness of the situation. Using a word like 'fuck' in the same context does convey an additional seriousness of no other word.
I don't curse that much, but when I do it is to make a point. If I was stranded on Mars looking at the road ahead as this character did, I absolutely would be cursing.
Yeh, there's some swearing but ultimately it's partly about context, and partly about parents expectations of their kids and he knows we wouldn't accept the same language from him.
besides, a loud expletive is sometimes required in certain situations. :P
Yes, words are just words. It doesn't matter if you replace Fuck with shit or damn or pussy. The expression of the word is, in some situations, completely disrespectful of those around you.
Respect. There's a severe LACK of it now-a-days.
I can put headphones on. I can't put a blindfold on.
hats indoors? really? you think that's disrespectful?
there's a severe lack of common sense nowadays, and uppity folks are proof of it. fuck words. :P
"Hats indoors" is a superset of "hats in a theater" (ignoring outdoor theaters). Saying that something applies to a subset isn't an argument for why it should apply to a superset.
There might be a good argument for them being rude. The theater isn't that argument.
It's less censoring and more of an abridgment.
The fact that both situations would occur in a school setting is completely irrelevant to me. I don't think that it should play a part in the "abridgement" decision (although I recognize that it would, and that my opinion on the matter is likely to be controversial). It's more important to me how closely it fits the purpose that it's being put to. In the case of my two examples, scientific vs artistic truths.
I thought the swearing in that book was very tastefully done. For me it added a bit of lightness and humor to the whole thing. I'm actually pretty disappointed that they cut so many of the swears from the movie.
To be clear, the character is a foul-mouthed variety of person. But if he weren't, and the book were absent of swearing, it would not seem any less authentic to me.
See the Apollo 10 logs: https://www.jsc.nasa.gov/history/mission_trans/AS10_CM.PDF
In some cases it really felt like they were just going back over text and adding them in as an afterthought.
https://4f46691c-a-dbcb5f65-s-sites.googlegroups.com/a/micha...