One word Danes (and other N.Es) often get in trouble for is 'fuck'. In Denmark it is no problem to use this in many business meetings but will often spell trouble when we participate in a meeting with people from USA. We simply do not see using it as something to avoid.
(and pupils in Denmark will absolutely not be sent to headmaster or parents contacted if they use it. At most it will be a glance from the teacher if they use it too much).
In any case, none of the cats I’ve meowed at over the years have ever seemed too offended - perhaps I’ve just been lucky. Barking at dogs has been a totally different story, though…
I've always assumed it is the same with meowing at cats: "we appreciate your effort. At least you didn't shit in our litter box like Jerry"
Funny enough, our second cat learned the local dialect after joining the family. I guess the moral here is to just gauge the room and hope for something fishy to come out of the cabinet.
I'm an anglophone - en_GB.
The word fuck has been adopted by pretty much the world as a naughty expletive that generally doesn't cause complete outrage but is expressive enough to be generally outside normal and polite conversation. I think it is a triumph of people getting something right: As a complex species with disparate concepts and languages, we have managed to pick a single word to cover quite a few concepts and situations. Fuck's time has come (ooerr).
To be honest, I'd like to be able to swear in a foreign language (I can manage German and French so far but without much enthusiasm). Please feel free to reply with your finest swearing and put downs.
The rest of the world seems to have never got the memo about the affectionate uses of the word cunt.
How about strange?
I binge-watched all of Farscape in under a month during college over a decade ago, and "frell" (usually in the form "frelling ____") seems to have become a permanent part of my vocabulary. The word is a 1:1 translation of every meaning of "fuck", used very liberally in the series.
There's a bunch more swears and work-inappropriate sayings they also leave "untranslated", but "frell" was probably the most used.
Feck is a bit more intriguing. I think feck really means the same as fuck but it is the Irish sticking it to the English and turning a rude word into a simple expletive that Mummy can use. If so - good job. I would love to hear some thoughts about this from someone from the Isle.
However, as Hollywood managed to promote 'fuck' as a generic expletive with no meaning, these are actually less polite, as they emphasis the meaning that was gone.
I also wonder why people write f*ck. If you want to swear, do it. If you want to be polite, don't do it. If a censoring system won't let you use fuck, be more creative. F*ck with a star just seems to say you're a pushover.
(Is there even a clear distinction between "cultural" and "linguistic"?)
https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/news/the-seven-dirt...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_dirty_words
(Aside, but I don't think Carlin ever credited Lenny Bruce:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenny_Bruce#Obscenity_arrests
Lenny Bruce's 1962 "Dirty Words" album is on Spotify and Apple Music; worth a listen if you've never heard it.)
Jackson's use of fuck is typically to add emphasis to a statement, and actually, I think he uses "motherfucker" a lot more than bare fuck[1], but in any case, fuck has different meanings depending upon context. Consider: Oh fuck. Fuck off. Fuck you. I'm fucked. Hey lady, you wanna fuck?[2] This fucking bug. Let's get the fuck outta here.
It's an adaptable word but still bleeped on the air in 2022. At the same time, it's okay to allude to it on primetime TV as in: "Holy mother forking shirt balls!"
[1]: https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2019/06/samuel-l-jackso...
The other problem is who are these people imposing those rules on us? Is this the thought police who hide behind the anonymity of public outrage and public morals but typically work for media outlets as editors, or legislators or law enforcement and judiciary? Are they an anagram of Non Technical Computer Users?
Not using it in vain is one of the ten commandments:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thou_shalt_not_take_the_name_o...
The "these people" are us, and I don't believe there's actually a formal list of banned words. Rather, Federal law prohibits obscene, indecent and profane content from being broadcast[1].
It's then up to us, the public, to work out whether content falls into one of these categories. NBC could, for example, choose not to bleep fuck during a daytime podcast. That would probably lead to a bunch of complaints to the FCC. The FCC would then fine NBC, and I gather, ultimately could revoke NBC's broadcasting license.
What's offensive changes over time[1]. Maybe fuck won't be seen as offensive some day, and then networks will be free to broadcast it over the air because no one complains to the FCC about it.
[1]: https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/obscene-indecent-and-pr...
[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Production_Code
Religion has only been around for about 2000-3000 years, and if it was banned so we couldnt utter the word god anymore, I wonder how long it would take for the epigenetics to work out of the gene pool.
In todays world, I have a hunch most kids have learnt to swear by the time they start primary school, so why the mental bondage to use a euphemism and to have an excuse to beat a kind mentally and/or physically for saying it?
Would it really bring that much chaos to the world, considering the psychological idea that something banned or illicit is more highly treasured?
About 50,000 years at least:
See also "G-d"
As to the cognitive dissonance angle, for having racist thoughts regarding a non euphemism, there is nothing quite like cognitive dissonance to mess people up, but what I find interesting about it is how it affects us as our chemistry changes, ie we age, we get more intelligent, we get wise, so then we start employing innuendo to avoid the legal and societal constraints, and there is another subsection of society which does innuendo brilliantly.
In the 00sKFC tried to market their chicken as a pro health Atkins type food with none other than Jason Alexander. That one was so bad that even the fucking ad industry criticized it. Marketing the unhealthiest of fast food as somewhat healthy is not a new thing.
Before that, it was mostly used as decoration, in the US.
It really wasn't until the Double Down era that the absurdity of KFC was apparent to everyone.
It's not as high as Spinach or Almonds, but it's still in the top ten.
So, maybe they need to be sued by someone who has had kidney stones, before they reconsider that idea, or at least required to put a huge warning on that item?
You can go online or to a drug store and buy wild lettuce and/or lettuce extract and take it for pain or inflammation.
Most plants that we class as food have been domesticated to avoid some of the wild experiences that might get documented on Erowid.org but in the past were explained away as religious experiences and documented as such.
Plants, and how our gut bacteria interact with them - or not - are one of the most interesting things i can think of.
Well if you want a laugh then, try some L-Tryptophan, a few grams a day but you can do more spread out over the day.
You gut bacteria will turn it into serotonin and you'll know why serotonin is found in the outer shell of seeds. Lets just say it can give you a toilet experience much like having a hot spicy curry, you see serotonin irritates the gut in animals so the seeds get pooped out pretty much in tact so the plants can spread around, but serotonin can cause some tissues to sting enormously which is why curry can also sting.
Pepper has something in it called https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piperidine which has a mild amnesiac effect https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15878668/ so dont use too much pepper on your meal otherwise you might forget what you had eaten!
Even the “cool” elderly people I know stopped listening to the radio and broadcast TV years ago. Nowadays, everything is Podcasts, Netflix, Hulu, Spotify, YouTube, TikTok, etc. and none of them censor “fuck”. Our culture is generally becoming a lot more open and accepting when it comes to the use of words like “fuck” and “shit”, however words like “cunt” are still fairly taboo.
From my perspective, broadcast TV and radio are simply a measure of how many Americans are hanging onto an antiquated culture, and I’m sure there’s significant overlap between “people who listen to broadcast” and “people who still find ‘fuck’ offensive”, and it’s likely no longer just a function of age.
Thanks for sharing the Lenny Bruce but, I had no idea that inspired Carlin!
90% of the freemium streaming services are the same, and i'll include SiriusXM as well.
That all being said, I personally consider sectioning off parts of the language (colorful or whatever) a net positive. In my opinion, disallowing words that have "universal meaning" forces children (and people who want to run for office, be an instructor, whatever) to find better and more descriptive ways to express themselves. The alternative, as an extreme, would be two utterances: "Fuck yes!" for good things, and "aw, fuck!" for bad things.
All in favor say fuck yes
I had never considered that "Damnit" and "Jesus Christ" could be misconstrued as the names of two children.
I almost passed out laughing so hard at that album.
Sometime later, I discovered his Iron Butterfly album, which also changed my world.
then you should go and visit a therapist.
:)
EDIT: I also have my name attached to my words here and in most places on the internet, so I'm more mindful of how things said here can be read in other contexts where certain words are more taboo.
Rightfully so. Feel free to disregard.
Some people are very desensitized to sweating online, usually anonymously. Not wanting to doesn't merit psychiatric help.
All that to say there are often platform-specific norms about these things and I rarely see curse words on here.
EDIT: Also, thank you for your words.
Even my C-Level guys are saying this (banking)
Do not understan til today, why for an american this word is that problematic....
There are plenty of less severe words in english that can be used, such as "bloody" or "damn" which roughly equate to how those who speak english as a second language use "fuck"
Reminds me of a slide[1] DHH did at a Rails conference presentation.