5 Things – Offensive Language
Not too long ago, a very nervous student approached me after class (a college sophomore level ethics class) to talk about my use of offensive language. This was the first time this topic had been brought to my attention, and so I was taken aback. I wasn’t really sure how to react. I mentioned that different people are offended by a variety of reasons, and so I would need her to be specific about which bits of language she found offensive. At first, she was reluctant, because even thinking about the language I used in class was too much. I was a little confused because I go out of my way to avoid what I perceive to be offensive language. I never use language to generalize or stereotype. I don’t use the “F” word. I don’t use derogatory language. I was sincerely puzzled. She eventually listed the offensive culprits by giving the first letter of the words she found offensive. The letters included were F,A, and S. I asked her to really think about an instance where she heard me use the “F” word, because again I go out of my way to avoid that word in class. She then settled on A and S. And it is true, I have used ‘ass’ and ‘shit’ in class. Whether or not I use them in an offensive way or not, is a matter of perspective.
Let’s look at an example, you can be the judge. After going over Plato’s The Apology, I like to summarize and breakdown the details. Socrates was accused of natural philosophy, sophistry, corrupting the youth, honoring gods not recognized by the city, and atheism. Socrates does an incredible job of defending himself against the allegations levied against him by Meletus. Unfortunately, he is found guilty and sentenced to death. It’s bullshit, and in no uncertain terms, I say as much. The last two charges are contradictory, how could he be guilty of both? Again, more bullshit.
Leaving aside the details of my discussion with this student, I agreed without hesitation or debate to quell my use of the terms she found to be offensive. My reasoning is that I want her to understand the topics presented in class, and if all she is getting from Socrates powerful speech is that Carrot said “shit” in class, then that is a problem. As I mentioned, this is the first time anyone has ever asked me to censor myself, and it doesn’t feel great, but hopefully the decision to oblige is helpful.
Ever since this conversation occurred, I can’t help but to consider the nature of offensive language.
Here are 5 things about offensive language1.
- What is a bad word? As someone who doesn’t embrace any notion of objective morality, the word ‘bad’ carries no ethical weight for me. In that sense I wouldn’t suggest that any word is a bad word in terms of being evil or immoral. Of course, several words are hurtful, and I think that independent of moral weight, people have reason to care about other’s feelings. For that reason, certain words, hurtful, slanderous, insulting words should be avoided, but not because they are bad. They should be avoided simply because they are hurtful. I do believe that bad words exist in another sense. Words that are too vague, or ambiguous are bad words. Not in the moral sense, but in the functional sense. In this sense, ‘good’ is a very bad word. If you inquire about someone’s day and ‘good’ is the best response they can give, then they are doing a poor job of communicating how their day went. In this sense, ‘good’ is bad. Some words are bad because they look bad. In 2016 Duke Magazine published “pulchritude” as the worst word in the English language. Try saying it out loud, it’s horrible. Some words are bad because of their spelling. I’m looking at you ‘colonel’. ‘Couldn’t’ve’ is a word that makes sense, but wow, it looks like S#%T.
- Speaking of S#%T, why do we consider ‘FUCK’ worse than ‘F@#K’? I don’t typically write ‘fuck’ but when I do, I’ll usually spell it in some code. But we all know that ‘F@#K’ means ‘FUCK’, so why are we covering up the U and C? It seems to have some similarities to blurring out a naked body, but one major difference is that U and C are constants. When it comes to naked bodies, they are personal and unique. ‘FUCK’ doesn’t have any personal notions of being timid or bashful, it has nothing like that because ‘FUCK’ is a word, a word that gets its meaning and power from us. And in a sense ‘F@#K’ seems to give ‘FUCK’ even more power simply because of the desire to blur out the U and the C.
- When it comes to the offensive nature of a word, intention matters. When an angry child looks their parent in the eye with the seriousness of a trial lawyer and says, “I don’t like you”, or that “you’re a butthole” it can be hurtful. ‘Butthole’ and ‘dislike’ are not generally considered offensive words, but with the right intention they can sting. If someone told me that I looked like a sack of bleeding colon polyps, that would be upsetting, but not because bleeding colon polyps are offensive words. On the flipside of intention, lack of intention can show how otherwise offensive terms could be dormant. Imagine someone who was raised in a family where medical jargon was not available. Imagine this person had a medical issue that needed to be addressed. While at the doctor’s office they may say frankly, “my pussy has a terrible rash”, or “my asshole is clogged with shit”. These terms are simply used as nouns, and any doctor who is offended by nouns is probably in the wrong profession.
- The power we give to words is important. There is a marked difference in referring to the outcome of Socrates trial as “an unfortunate event” and referring to the outcome as “total bullshit”. There is a difference between referring to Meletus as “a wanton disruptor” and referring to him as “an asshole”. There is even a difference between calling him an “A$$HOLE” and an “ASSHOLE”. Not only is there power in the assigned meaning we give to words, in turn words also give us power. In a 2009 study called “Swearing as a Response to Pain” researchers from Keele University were able to show that swearing reduces pain. In their experiment those who were permitted to swear could hold their hands in ice cold water for up to two times longer than those limited to using neutral language. Those who were allowed to swear also reported feeling less pain. Similar studies showed that swearing can also help with psychological pain! Fuck yeah!
- Climbers use what some would deem to be offensive language all the time. Two ‘F’ words that almost always to go hand in hand are ‘FALLING’ followed by ‘FUCK’. I don’t think that’s a problem. As we’ve seen, there can be power in swear words. Sometimes “holly shit” is an appropriate response to the difficulty of a route. Sometimes ‘Holy Shit’ can be an appropriate name for a route. Sometimes “holy shit!” captures the essence of a route in a way that “holy moly!” just can’t live up to. Sometimes climbing hurts, and if tossing f-bombs around improves the odds of sending a route, then, bombs away. However, I am in no way suggesting that climbers should have free reign with the language we use in and around the crag, there is a line that has been crossed in the past when it comes to naming routes. A line that goes against the goals of inclusivity and open-mindedness. A line that clearly steps into the realm of hurtful, and for that reason I am absolutely in favor of renaming and re-establishing routes that have any racist, bigoted, or inflammatory connotation.
Just because someone is offended, doesn’t entail that the language is offensive. Oftentimes when someone is offended by language it says more about them than the “offender”. My hope is that this student’s request is a one-time occurrence, I can go without calling a Meletus an asshole for one semester, but to go without for the rest of my career would be total bullshit2 malarkey!
V5 5 Things 1 Topic
- Much of this piece was inspired by philosopher Rebecca Raoche’s Philosophy Bite: On Swearing.
- For more on the philosophy and nature of bullshit, I highly recommend philosopher Harry G. Frankfurt’s book/paper On Bullshit.
thedihedral.com 
Carrot, you are brilliant. Thank you for this.
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You sure know how to brighten someones day. Thank you!
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🙂
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Okay, a brillant piece! Keep sending your writing my way!
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I’ll do my best! Thank you!
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I never thought college aged, young people would be pearl-clutchers. Oh how times change.
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I had to look up pearl-clutches, what a spectacular expression! I’m with you though, I think college is supposed to be about learning things that are uncomfortable. Wild times for sure!
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“I think college is supposed to be about learning things that are uncomfortable.”
Pardon my French, but no fucking way!
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Haha, who knew?
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Marcia, U’ve got it; an old man, now; but as a young Cajun boy isolated on the prairie, College opened up my narrow world vision and began to see bright colors
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As as inherent swearer (raised by loggers, was in the military, etc.), I read this with a smile on my face. I’ve tried to cuss less, but it seems to be a part of me that, at this point in my life, I should just accept. I enjoy the freedom and conveyance it allows.
Great post.
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Thanks Aimee! Cheers to the loggers and the military, and the creative language they supply!
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When I worked in a hospital, I asked my patients how they were feeling. When they said “fine”, I didn’t believe them (since I saw trauma patients so they were almost always in pain – and, as you said about “good”, it’s not a very good word). When they said “like shit!” I knew they were being honest with me and I could work with that. Some would then apologize for the language and I would reassure them that I could understand feeling like shit in their circumstances. When I had a patient with Crohn’s Disease (a bowel disease with which he’d lived for 60 years), he told me “Buddy – your job is to make sure I don’t get no fuckin’ colostomy!”, I knew exactly what he wanted and didn’t want.
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That is reassuring!!! That guy sounds like an ideal patient! You knew what you were getting, and where he stood! I hope he managed to avoid the colostomy!!!
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He was (ideal) and he did (avoid the colostomy). He died (years later) with colon intact. I told the story at his memorial service and his daughter came up to me and said “You really knew Dad.”
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Haha…that is such a good story, just the fact that you went to the service says a lot about the relationship you developed with that guy! That is awesome!
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like George Carlin said it’s okay to prick your finger, but no um…yep, not bad words……I hate how words are used. Woke seems to be used as a way to take shots at certain people, and I always wonder if those that do that, actuall understand where that term and it’s use came from, and what it actually refers to
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Interesting that you said that, I just went to a talk on the history of ‘woke’ and it was really interesting. I think you are right though! And George Carlin is the perfect reference for this piece! Man…I should have mentioned him for sure! Thanks for the thoughts!
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When I worked in community radio we had George Carlin’s seven words that you can’t say on TV posted on the studio wall to remind us not to say them on the air. I always wondered if having them there helped or if it would subconsciously plant those words in our minds so they’d be more likely to slip out.
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‘Oftentimes when someone is offended by language it says more about them than the “offender”.’ – indeed. When we are triggered, if we are conscious enough to realize it, it’s an opportunity for self-reflection and growth, otherwise it stays in the shadow, that unconscious realm of “all-that-we-wish-not-to-be”, where it can be unconsciously projected onto others.
By the way, I just used “F***” as wordplay in my latest headline as a substitute for “fund”. ; )
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Great thoughts!!! And I love the word play. I am inspired to come up with more fun ways to use F***! HAHA, thank you!
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Great post! I’ve come to the conclusion that no matter what we do or say, we’re going to offend someone. If a college student is offended by words that are staples on most any cable channel now, then they must have a serious stick up their a$$.
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Haha…great point and I couldn’t agree more! I am a little worried that I made a mistake in changing my language, if there is a next time I’ll probably ask for an argument and moral reason to change beforehand. Hopefully there is no next time though.
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I doubt there will be a next time. I wish you luck!
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This is by far one of your best entries. I suppose we can credit the fucking bitch Kidding) student for this. She obviously has a very narrow lens of life & world & this class will indeed widen her view a tiny bit because of you & your “reasoning”.
Your reasoning is the greatest take away in the entire read. I’m in awe of that. The greater good is her understanding the topics not you Carrot saying shit. Stoic to say the least. Thank you for sharing.
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Thank you Sunyamar, hopefully she gets something more out of the ethics class, I am a little worried how she is going to handle ethical dilemmas, if she is struggling to get past words.
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Excellent blog! I had a mom who not only swore a lot, but trained her pet cockatiel to swear too, so “bad words” are not a big deal for me.
You might like this story … My mom was always on the grouchy side and one day we were in a car together and she was in yet another bad mood. It was a beautiful day and there was NO reason for her to be like she was.
So, I said, “Mom, cheer up. Let’s sing a song together.” I started singing “Old MacDonald.”
She said, “What about Old Mac Fuck-Face?”
I started cracking up, and together we sang, “Old Mac Fuck Face had a farm, e-i-e-i-o, with a fuck fuck here and a fuck fuck there, here a fuck, there a fuck, everywhere a fuck fuck…”
We’re laughing so hard and she goes, “A lot of fucking going on at that farm!”
One of the most memorable times I had with my mother, the curmudgeon.
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That is such an endearing story!!! Next time in in a bad mood, I am going to try singing about Old Mac Fuck-Face. That is hilarious! Thank you for sharing!
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Love this song & story so much .
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We are definitely not siblings! I never heard my mom say that word, nor could I imagine her talking about sex with us.
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“The power we give to words is important.” I had to deal with that kind of fucking bullshit when I was teaching. I think fvck and f*&k (etc.) are just fucking hypocritical and hypocrisy is worse than the word “fuck” on any reasonable scale of evils.
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YES Martha!!! How did you handle it?
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Ahh… Well, 38 years is a long career and pretty much everything happened during that period. Since I was teaching stuff related directly to language, sometimes I explained that Fuck was a perfectly good English word until the French invaded England and made all kinds of great English words (like the whole fucking language) illegal. Once some students did a group project on the word fuck and that was fun. It included this video.
We had discussions about whether language should have the power it has and where that power derives (from us). We had discussion about hypocrisy.
The funniest was when I was teaching English as a second language. I organized “movie night” where we all went to the movies. The first movie we saw bewildered my students. The second — Born on the Forth of July starring “Tom Cluze” (Japanese students, mostly — didn’t. At dinner after (Chinese restaurant next door) we talked about the movie. Pretty much every other word in that film is “fuck.” My students loved the movie not only because of Tom Cluze but because they could understand the English. The frequent use of “fuck” acted as a spacer that slowed down the dialogue so they could follow it. Hilarious to me, but I didn’t laugh because I’m a kind person.
I don’t know what young people are like now. But generally the 18 – 20 year olds I taught teetered on the rim of rebellion and their future success. For most, my careful and poetic use of obscenities was liberating; for a very few others not. One girl complained to my boss that I was unqualified to teach because of my (occasional) use of “bad” words. She tried to get me fired. It can be dangerous to trample on their imaginationless conventionality. That was, I think, the first sign I had that I didn’t want to play much longer. It was fun to fight for language when I was in my thirties; less fun in my sixties.
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Great video! I especially like that they misspelled “incompetence”. When I studied Spanish in Mexico we had an entire lesson devoted to the Spanish equivalent of fuck. The teacher showed us a dictionary devoted to the myriad uses of that one word. It may be even more versatile in Spanish than in English. Better yet, there are two different versions of the word. I found one more common in Mexico and the other more common in Nicaragua. What more could you ask?!
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My neighbor Chayo taught me. We had a little ritual of drinking a shot Tequila together on Memorial Day. Once he came out with the bottle and our glasses and said, “I’m going to teach you Spanish now, Martha.” I already spoke Spanish, school Spanish. He went around his yard and pointed at stuff and said, “Chingado. Chingadera. Chingadero. ¡Chinga! Chingon, Chingona, Chingones…” I laugh thinking about it.
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P.S. Making words taboo when we live in a world where people commit genocide, disrespect our planet, commit rape, kill people because of their skin color — seriously, totally fucked up.
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Great read. Words sure can carry lots of different meanings.
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Thank you Jessica!
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We must chuckle at the absolute absurdity of anyone grinding-axe for [their version] of PC-ness. Letters are what? Can you guess? Symbolic representations of sounds and partial sounds, eh? To suggest that “D*ck” is acceptable when “Dick” is not is penultimate looney-tunes; all that’s been done is substituting one symbol for another. Yes, Karen, we all know what D*ck means, so we’ve gained absolutely nothing trying to be polite save perhaps offending a few Richards out there who are rather proud of their given sobriquets. All of this I find odd; I’ve been chastised by yutes more than once for vulgarity; subsequently listened to [or read] their mouth music to be dismayed that my efforts pale [vulgarity-wise] compared to theirs. Finally, “vernacular” is the way sailors, farmers, mechanics, preachers, and doctors [of all [snicker!] genders] talk day-to-day, pass the butter, please, Emma. Suggest your Karen should drop out of school until she grows-up; your [we trust your honesty] restraint is above and beyond.
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This is such a great comment. I love what you write here, especially when it concerns music. I needed every word of this. Moving forward this will be my defense! Thank you!
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Pulchritudinously written!
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HAHAHA!!! That is the comment of the year!
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Has become my word of the day!
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Hahahaha! Teaching is so difficult. I always wonder when I fuck up in class if the moment where it occurs is the point in which the student who is taken aback stops listening and all but lacks any participation. Hopefully, I do so within the last 15-minutes of class 🙂
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Too much pressure on yourself; we all full up! Do it because you love it. It appears you have a sense of humor: laugh! IMPORTANT!
You r needed; it’s not for the faint of heart.
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Thank you so much. I try to be kind. I am irreverent.
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What an interesting post. Reminded me how I was angry and those $# didn’t help me at all so I called up the person to say all those words that I couldn’t type 😅 thinking back, I don’t know why I wrote F*#k instead of Fuck … loved this post!
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Haha…I’m happy you like it, thank you for reaching out and letting me know! It means a lot!
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I am as skilled in curse words as an unlaid sailor when leave time’s up!
Thank you for your breakdown! Please peruse my site at will, as I know you will not be offended!
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haha…will do Fitch!
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