The 1600s were a watershed for swear words (2022)
historytoday.com
historytoday.com
These new curse words are in fact so taboo that the most powerful of them cannot even be uttered in a context of explaining that someone else said them, and can only be referenced in an oblique manner such as 'he said the N-word' or 'they uttered a homophobic slur'
That stuff has been scrubbed out of text communication in multiplayer games for ages now, and I think it'll be forcibly removed from voice communication with increasing frequency soon.
However, this is only in the largest games. Gaming is now one of if not the most valuable media industries out there and only growing, however there are still a lot of niche games where either for cultural or demand reasons there's zero interest in censorship. Go check Wargame Red Dragon global chat for instance.
That doesn't mean that those words aren't curse words. In fact, it's a sign that they are curse words. It wouldn't be so edgy to say them if they weren't so heavily frowned upon by "polite society"
I think maybe an easier example to consider would to be to put 'fuck' and 'shit' aside (since its even harder to understand how these were ever really taboo), and instead consider the older more religiously inspired curses like 'damn it', 'blood the mary', etc.
These curses (in certain circles) were hugely taboo because in the worldview of the times, they were deeply harmful to use on a metaphysical / spiritual level. You were doing real harm in the world by exclaiming "damn it to hell!" or telling someone "go to hell!".
This is perhaps hard for us in our current culture where even even amongst people who claim to be religious, almost everyone would just view those as empty words, but I do think there's a real case to be made that our ancestors would have understood such curses in a very similar way to the way we understand and treat slurs today.
I do know people who think "g-- damn it" is a far worse thing to say than 'fucking piece of shit' for example.
That would be my mother. Hasn't been to church in decades, curses like a sailor, but will never take the lord's name in vain.
Although, maybe with enough time, she will, it took her until she was 60 before she started saying 'fuck.'
To your point, I know groups who would find the slur less offensive than "g-- damn it."
I think you’re right.
In the article, they mentioned that words denigrating the holy or sacred were the most offensive while in more recent times the most offensive words became words referring bodily functions, sex, etc. But now as you suggest, the most taboo words in the English language are slurs denigrating entire groups like various ethnic groups, religious groups, women and the elderly.
Some words imply the person you're insulting is unsavory. Some words imply "I have power over you such that I can do anything I want and you can't stop me."
The degree to which this violence is allowed in a culture also conveys the power of the word in play.
There're many categories of violence, and semantic violence can evoke any and all of those.
Even when Alan Pardew (and I take great pleasure in being the first to mention his name in this forum) called opposing soccer manager Manuel Pellegrini "a fucking old cunt" it wasn't perceived as a slur on his elderlyness. It was the cunt bit that got him in trouble - and, even then, not that much.
I feel like it's becoming a word describing people that have passed their prime (~35+ yo).
Yes, I'm fully aware that the word initially described people that were born during the baby boomer years (~1950) and that the people that are currently 35yo are millennials.
80 years ago was 1944 - not exactly a boom year. Most are 60-65-70 and would not consider themselves elderly. It's a very loaded word.
You go directly from middle aged to elderly, there isn't a step in between. Being elderly can cover a very wide range of years.
That said, I've had friends that were elderly in their mid thirties.. State of mind and all that.
(Rationale being retirement planning advisors encourage people to make the most of those first ten years (65 to 75) to do bucket-list things while (usually) they still can)
I think that kind of progression has actually run its course within the narrower contexts it has been able to - take back the word empowerment, etc. But breaking out into the general societal context seems impossible as long as those words still acutely hurt significant contingents of people, as most people don't want to casually engage in hurtful behavior.
Then again if America loses the election on Tuesday, perhaps society will just regress to the point where most people are just fine stoking group hatred (it's cheaper than bread or professional circuses, after all!), and "general" acceptance will happen that way. I still don't personally see myself taking part though, despite being otherwise quite enthusiastic about swearing.
I think what you mean by "full blown general curse words" is what I'd actually call "faded dying curse words" if what you mean is that it's something you could say in casual conversation without people thinking less of you.
By the point that a curse word is used for emphatic punctuation, it's because the people using it don't actually believe the word holds real power to do harm, it just carries residual power because of a cultural memory of a time where it was taboo to say the word.
So I think these slurs would only become part of a regular persons vocabulary of merely 'rude' words if regular people stopped thinking they were doing real harm by uttering them.
So unless those words stop being routinely used for ignorant personal attacks, I don't see how swearing with racial slurs could become trendy for anybody but racists rejecting the idea that racism continues to be a problem. A decade ago I had more of an idealist post-racist outlook and could have believed that in a few more decades we'd be at the point where these words would have lost their deeply personal punch, with their only lingering effect being to cause pearl clutching (and who doesn't want to needle pearl clutchers?). But at this point that looks to be a pipe dream. Which is why I say it's a similar dynamic of words being off limits, but it's not actually the same. Some social mores have fundamental merit, believe it or not.
Maybe in some social circles, but in most circles I run in, saying "fuck" is still considered quite offensive.
It's hard for me to explain the difference, but (as an educated and relatively eloquent person) I would really hesitate (as in, physically struggle with my throat) to curse in my language aloud in a public place. Saying them among my friends or family would be seen as between mildly offensive and absolutely unacceptable. When hearing someone curse in public, I instinctively assume they're uneducated or intoxicated.
Meanwhile, i can freely swear in English among the same people (and online, and in most situations abroad). My mother, who I have never heard curse in my language, says "shit" like it was "oh darn". I see English swear words everywhere online. They really don't feel like a taboo to me.
Again, think of how radioactive "the N-word" is in all but the most radical of english speaking circles nowadays. Other languages have things like this with different histories and reasons.
I've tutear'd people in what would be casual settings for Americans and really felt the chill instantly.
With regard to online (and music, and movies): have you paid attention to the social register in which you're seeing them used?
The N-word has been reclaimed by people of color, but remains taboo for others to say.
The F-slur is in the process of being reclaimed by gay people, but remains taboo for everyone else.
I can't think of any parallels in past English curse words -- "fuck" was taboo no matter who you were.
There's still large segments of the internet not subject to hysterical brigades of thought police demanding every typed word be cross referenced with the ever-growing Manual of Self-Censorship and Conformity with Whoever Is Offended In The Loudest Manner.
Yesterday on twitter someone posted reddit screenshots of a ukrainian dude in a thread. He said he was voting for trump and his account was semi-public, and some absolute sociopath started sending screenshots of it to every university and internship program he could think of.
We all know that the 'factual context' is often used as cover by trolls. Whatever the excuse, people are not idiots.
Also, I'm not sure 'factual context' is a good idea - why say things that are upsetting to people? If my friend's mother just died, I don't talk about death 'in a factual, rather than personal, context'. In general, I don't describe, e.g., torture 'in a factual context'; it's not nice.
I don’t think there’s any virtue in using it when it upsets people. I also don’t think there’s virtue in refusing to use a word, even in discussions about that word. There’s a line of reasonability: using it to express hate can and should be frowned on. But substituting a euphemism in all contexts is excessive.
The person that comment referenced doesn't seem to be a troll and obviously wasn't writing in a hateful context. Ironically, the fact that he used a euphemism pretty much proves that.
I'd rather have a wild jungle internet full of anonymous people saying nigger in every second sentence than one of voluntary gestapo thought police combing through post histories to dox and hound common people because they don't fulfill the "linguistic standards" imposed by a small group of ideological/political activists.
That article didn't discuss class / culture, so whatever a nobel who's threatening an underling might say, "peon" or whatever, wasn't mentioned. Elsewhere someone made the distinction between 'insult' and 'slur' which I think is a good way to distinguish vulgarity/insult from threat.
The "N-word" was never reclaimed by black people, we always said it, and it always means something different than when said by a non-black person (and there was never a "hard-r" or a "soft-r," that's just a mockery of black dialects.) It's like the word "bitch." If a woman calls another woman a "bitch," she's obviously not demeaning her for being a women.
Also, the "N-word" was not a swear word for non-black people. It was a word to demean black people, who were demeaned by consensus by the majority of the population of the Anglo-American world. It was also used for any dark-skinned person that they didn't think of as fully human, as it was the prevailing slur during the US-Philippine War.
The "N-word" has become a swear word for non-black people because the consensus about black people has changed for the moment, and using it indicates a particular political position on race. It has been a perennial issue for non-black people to complain about because white people want a place in the oppression olympics, and it's really hard to find something that they've ever been officially restricted from doing.
[Edit] Thinking through your final paragraph a bit more, there are "oppressions" (and I'm putting that in scare-quotes, because I think it's too strong a word; I'd say something like "prejudices" or "restricted opportunities") which some (USA) white people accurately perceive being applied to them. Those are based around class markers (think: what schools someone went to, what accent they have, what body-type they are), not race. Accurately understanding that would require / create an entirely different sociological paradigm.
Regardless, I think using either word is in poor taste.
By contrast, some of what you say is too offensive seems pretty common to me. It’s not polite, but you’re much more likely to hear someone use retard or faggot than drop an f-bomb. Maybe it’s just my social circle. I do notice people from other parts of the country are more like you say.
Those words would be socially disqualifying in many places I go, such as business meetings, most interactions with adults, most public interactions (for example, with a clerk at a store).
Now compare that to how life altering it would be for you if you were dropping the 'N-word' in such situations. The difference is that people really do believe the 'N-word' has real power to do harm. It's not just a rude word, it's an 'evil' word (which is what curses used to be).
Coon cheese changed its name to "Cheer" despite having no context where it's origin story related to its slang use. It's Edward Coon of Philadelphia's proprietary branding.
Slang words for aboriginal females have fallen out of use and were all highly derogatory along with most other objectifying language about the aborigines. Terms like murri and mob are self-referential use.
I was shocked by use of Yid 20 years ago. I think some people in Australia had little or no context of its use in Europe. Likewise Paki which is still used, to a British person from the era of the BNP and paki-bashing this word is anathema. Jap went from a term of derision to a term with probably positive meanings, jap cars are cheap, well made and reliable.
Chink was and remains abusive since the gold rush era and racist white Australia immigration policy. A nong has nothing to do with the N word, ningnong just means a stupid person. Mong is offensive everywhere.
What's (IMHO) uniquely Australian is the slang adoption of "cunt" for men, sometimes in a positive sense (good cunt, mad cunt), sometimes negative (dog cunt, shit cunt). But, just like the US, you absolutely cannot use it to refer to a woman unless you intend to offend.
"Being John Malkovitch" implied it was edgy arts scene in the US who used it. For me, it's been ex forces telecommunications technicians and .. younger bogans. This is why I think it's braggadocio: Used because it remains transgressive.
Mong is the height of slurs - simultaneously racist and a reference to 'mongoloid', a cringeful historical term for Downs Syndrome. Hundreds of years of racial elitism distilled into a single syllable.
It’s not just Reddit, it’s tiktok and Instagram, the main, or at least two extremely, inconceivably large propagaters of youth slang and culture.
But there may be some selection bias involved in the translation sampling process; by definition, taboo words won't be printed in a major newspaper headline. If he had used a racial slur against Maghrebis, for example, the NYT surely would not run a headline containing the N-word.
(whether the latter rates cusswordedness I prefer to leave to L1 speakers)
Lagniappe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWCNFzdE31A (fr-u-sd-caqc)
Très familier. Stupide, imbécile, idiot.
– C'est un imbécile..., lâcha le garçon.
– Non, c'est un con.
– C'est pareil.
M. Pelletier s'arrêta de jouer.
– Non, c'est pas pareil. Si tu expliques trois fois un truc
à quelqu'un et qu'il ne le comprend pas, c'est un imbécile.
Mais si, à la fin, il est certain de l'avoir compris mieux
que toi, alors, tu as affaire à un con. — (Pierre Lemaître,
Le Grand Monde, Calmann-Lévy, 2022, pages 20-21)
> Ferme ton déconophone, dit Alexandre. Je veux dormir, moi.
"déconophone" (laughter emoji deleted by HN)
"Espèce de con" ("some kind of cunt") is for when you mean it a bit more.
"Petit con" is "little shit". A French teacher might say that to a troublemaker student, say.
Similarly "weon" is Chilean for "huevón".
"Carajo", however, is an old word for "cock". "Conchudo" is basically "cunty". Etc.
But I'm trying to unpack the distinction here between insults and taboo words. Taboo words may not be insults; to use an outdated example, if I say that I'm going to the shitter, nobody is being insulted — probably not even the plumbing facility in question. Similarly if I am tired of waiting in line and exclaim "God damn it!" And insults may not be taboo words; if I say, "Your mother wears army boots," many people will take it as an insult, even though in English it contains no taboo words.
That book is indeed very good. Highly recommended.