Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Swearing...


Yes. Swearing.
I had been reading Mark Haddon's "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time" but stopped for about a week, I guess due to the election and what not. It's is a hugely entertaining story of a boy on a path to find something and his interactions along the way... oh, and his own little quirks.

So I start again... the boy is on a train in England and a policeman is trying to get him to leave the train, when suddenly the train doors close and the policeman, realizing that he is now stuck on the train, shouts, "Shitting fuck." Not "fucking shit" or "shit, fuck." I laughed much longer than I should have.

Now, let me inform you that I love swearing. I love how the words get put together and inflected differently. How they can be said with elation, sadness or anger... or just for the fuck of it. In community college (that's as far as I got) we had a whole class on the word "fuck" and all of it's variations.

I enjoy hearing people swear that don't normally partake in this type communication, sometimes even offending themselves (which is sad because it should not be offensive).


Why should it not be offensive, you might ask? Because it is the use of words. Expressive words, but words, none-the-less. Now, let me be clear that I am not advocating the use of words to degrade people, the color of their skin, the lifestyle, etc. I am simply speaking of the words like, but not limited to: fuck, shit, damn, ass and the list goes on.


My argument: The intention of the word "shit" does not change because you say "crap" or "shoot." If someone gasps, or says they are offended by such swearing, it is because they have been taught to be offended.


So, back to "shitting fuck." If you don't find that funny... well, you probably haven't enjoyed reading this fucking post.

Sorry.

3 comments:

Jessica said...

I LOVE this book. I lent it to Dan, actually. Love it. And just today, I had a conversation with my co-worker about whether it was right to ask someone at a football game to stop swearing because your kids were within earshot. (I said it was right to ask, but not reasonable to expect them to stop, necessarily.) What do you think? Do you swear around your kids? Are you okay if others do? Have you had the chance to discuss it with them yet?

Chris Magnuson said...

the book is marvelous.

not sure how i feel about the kids. i definitely want mine to know that swearing is a choice that an adult can make.

stephy said...

David was reading that book while I was in labor with Lolly but I never got to it.
I think swearing all wrong is so funny. I knew someone who would say "Bastard to you, you big hell!" bahaha!
For the most part I try not to swear around the kids. When they have repeated some words I say "That's a grownup word, and kids can't say it or they will get in trouble" and they seem to get that. So far.