What are "swear" words?

[Serivas]

What are swear words? How did they get known as such? Why do people find their use offensive?

I don't agree with the rule that is common across various mediums that say swear words are wrong/offensive. I'll abide by them... but I don't particularly like it.

I actually think the idea is entirely hypocritical. I can express my displeasure at a certain thing with a variety of words that mean roughly the same thing but its somehow wrong to say a small selection of words instead? Like for instance, I'm putting new shingles on my roof from the wood up, as I'm hammering the nail, I accidentally hit my thumb. In this situation, it's somehow acceptable to yell "dang!" or "shoot" or maby even "crap!" but saying the swear word equivalent is somehow offensive and horrible? Would it be comparable to say that black people are bad because of their skin color as to swear words are bad because of the sound thats made?(Sorry if I sound a little racist there, I'm just drawing analogies.)

I just never gotten the whole "you can use these words, but not these" while how they are used to express things is held on a totally different level. I can still communicate my displeasure at something/someone using any word I want but depending on my choice of words its somehow detestable. Of course, then I'm sure one of you will draw comparison of the not-so-favored word to describe minorities. But I think those kinds of words are a little different. I'm not exactly sure how to think about them. on one hand, there's plenty of ways to insult them should you chose. But on the other hand, the very definition of the word is such thats meant to be offensive. I don't think its right to use that kind of language though....

"But Serivas you putrid cauldron of gushing insensitivity! If people would use these words more often, it would hamper the effectiveness of communications!" Yes and no... While it would hamper communications if every word was from a small selection of words, it wouldn't make much of a difference to people who can actually talk about things in a reasonable manner. In a place where there are no rues on such things, people still generally tend to favor other words entirely while still using "swear" words every once in a while in specific conditions. It doesn't devolve into the level where everyone is constantly flaming eachother, but when they do the occurrence of the words don't change much. Of course, I'm talking about a normal kind of person. I'm sure there are a few that will jump on swear words more often then not when aggravated. All and all though, I think a person should be judged more on what they express rather then what the say.

Do I want the rules of the forum to change? no, not really, the current ruleset is satisfactory. This is just whats been bugging me over the years about various places and people.

 

[Jeremy]

The words in question are descriptive of excretory and sexual functions with a strong negative emotional valence. I wonder if you can imagine the state of mind one needs to be in to find that type of mixing of concepts and feelings acceptable. Or to go even further by imposing that state of mind on others with words.

The way people speak--the how of what they say--is actually a very good indicator of their inner state, which is usually entirely mechanical. Here we are trying to be more conscious, and by focusing on how we say things and on how we are being perceived by others we can shine light on our own inner states and do some cleaning up, psychologically speaking.

That being said, your racist analogy was incredibly inappropriate.

 

[Johnno]

Well consider the "f" word...... bad vibes all around if you take a look back at its origins.

John Philip Cohane in his book "the Key" makes a good case for this word originating from the word havoc which is the combination of the root words hawa (the infamous pig god) and Og/Oc, a long forgotten god.

He also write of the word havoc

"Haue Oc" was a cry sounded on the batlefields of Britain after victory. It signalled fighting was over; the time for pillaging had arrived.

Also of interest, Laura writes in Secret History of the World page 404:

Aeschylus calls the Nile Ogygian, and Eustathius the Byzantine grammarian said that Ogygia was the earliest name for Egypt. When Babylonians first brought their Syrian Tempest God to Egypt, the one who, disguised as a boar, yearly killed his brother Adonis, the god always born under the fir tree, they identified him with Set, the ancient Egyptian god of the desert whose sacred beast was the wild ass, and who yearly destroyed his brother Osiris, the god of Nile vegetation.

And Shakespeare:

Cry "Havoc" and let slip the dogs of war- Julius Caesar, III i

Perhaps the Bard slipped in that one to get past the censors?

Anyway the root of the "f" word seems to be tied with war and famine at the very least.

 

[Z...]

it is funny because it does serve to channel your anger or frustration when you attach adjective f.....g to something. It can also spiral out of control once you start using it and sooner or later you end up using it for everything.
I am sure the sounds that are made by vocalizing certain words carry particular vibrational frequency or energy

My grandmother use to say - every time you utter a swear word angels flee from you and they need long time to come back

South park dudes were playing with this concept in one episode

 

[Serivas]

I never seen the words as sexual... the f word, to me, was always something that generally meant more of a "I screwed up!" or "ow!" thing, but I can see where your coming from there. Also, I had no idea how it all started. I thought the word originated from what Chicago police used to call prostitution. That b word, yea, that seems a little sexually oriented in a derogatory manor... but I've seen it used for everything else.

What do you guys think of the prospect that language itself evolves too? I can't think of any examples of the top of my head... but what always made me wonder is how the other f word is used. Originally derogatory gay bashing, it seems to have been blunted to mean just about anything, though seems exclusive to youth(such a sad thing, that).

As for the part nf3 said about the choice of words as an indication on the inner being, I'm not sure I agree wholly, but it's not like I'm perfect. I could very well be frustrated in that way? I don't think of it much though. But people I know (though not a lot) are usually free with their words and they don't seem to overt in the way described. But they don't add them in every sentence at all either. I don't know enough people, but from yours or someone else's experience, is this true?

 

[Rabelais]

My mother used to tell me, when I was but a wee nipper back in the 50s, that profanity was the attempt of a weak mind to express itself forcefully. That may often be, but as is stated here, language and its usage changes with time. It has certainly changed since the 50s.

Is there a time when certain words in certain context are appropriate? I don't know. It’s not my call to make for others.

There are books full of wisdom without one single sordid epithet, so those writers found a way to communicate great and powerful thinking without resorting to vulgarities... and yet I find Hunter Thompson's often coarse use of the English language informative, artfully crafted and engaging as well. Thompson’s “colorful” descriptions of egregious injustices and men’s inhumanity to their fellow men would seem somehow neutered had he gone back and edited everything to comply with the standards of political correctness and current social mores.


"From s**t, thus, I extract pure Shinola." is a character's statement found in Umberto Eco's, Foccault's Pendulum. In its context, it did not offend me, in fact, I found the remark amusing. Eco is not known for gratuitous profanity.

It all seems to boil down to context and intent, "or so I think."

 

[Jeremy]

As for the part nf3 said about the choice of words as an indication on the inner being, I'm not sure I agree wholly, but it's not like I'm perfect. I could very well be frustrated in that way? I don't think of it much though. But people I know (though not a lot) are usually free with their words and they don't seem to overt in the way described. But they don't add them in every sentence at all either. I don't know enough people, but from yours or someone else's experience, is this true?

I wasn't singling you out. This concept applies to everyone. If I stub my toe and a string of four letter words automatically issues from my mouth it certainly gives me pause for thought about where my mind is at the moment if that's the first association I made.

We navigate reality by building an internal map of the physical and psychological landscapes around us. A few parts of reality are mapped fairly accurately but for the most part, depending on any reading errors we have, the other parts are mapped according to our own subjective biases. When we speak, we are describing our map to other people, and any errors in the map show up in our choice of words, our voice, and our body language. Others can then get a general idea of how we structure our memories, where we place emphasis on emotional associations, where we miss things altogether, etc.

For example, someone who structures their map with a strong bias towards emotional likes and dislikes will display that in their choice of adjectives, adverbs and verbs. The same goes for physical and intellectual bias.

Racial bias displaying itself as a choice of words irrelevant to the point of the discussion is a recent example in another thread here.

Psychopaths often reveal themselves with strange verbal descriptions of guilt, as Cheney did when interviewed on Fox News after shooting Whittington in the face.

"The image of him falling is something I will never be able to get out of my mind," Cheney said. "I fired, and there's Harry falling. And it was, I'd have to say, one of the worst days of my life, at that moment."

His inner map doesn't have room for the feelings of others. Or rather, his lack of conscience prevents him from mapping the feelings of others in the first place.

People often reveal lies that they are telling themselves with self-contradicting statements and "yes, but" arguments.

Repressed negative emotions towards other people reveal themselves in sarcasm and other unconscious verbal aggressions.

Many low-level pathologies and neuroses will set the tone of a person's overall verbal communication. I knew one person who revealed his sex-addiction by weaving sexual innuendo into everything he ever said. And he swore (pun intended) that his manner of speaking meant nothing.

Thompson’s “colorful” descriptions of egregious injustices and men’s inhumanity to their fellow men would seem somehow neutered had he gone back and edited everything to comply with the standards of political correctness and current social mores.

Neutered is an interesting adjective in that context. :)

 

[Approaching Infinity]

Such a stimulus unleashes upon the partner a torrent of pseudo-logical, largely paramoralistic, often insulting utterances which always contain some degree of suggestion. Utterances like these inspire aversion among cultivated and logical people,
who then tend to avoid the paranoid types.

AFAIK, it is generally paranoid types (characteropaths in general) that have what is termed "potty mouth." Their words are laced with that "extra quality" which makes a word paramoralistic. So I'd hazard a guess that "swear words" come from psychologically deviant individuals. Their utterances then latch onto the young, the weak, the immoral, etc., and thus begins the chain of insulting and derogatory terminology. Conversive by nature, their special quality makes them contagious.

 

[Kel]

Sometimes I get into swearing myself (usually by myself or with my sisters--what a riot that can be) and I have to tell ya, I just have a blast with it. It makes me laugh and lighten up. Judge this behavior how you will. To me, the words themselves don't mean a whole lot--it's the feeling behind it.

 

[Rabelais]

Neutered is an interesting adjective in that context. :)

It is also interesting that you would read that into it. "Weaving sexual innuendo?"

For the life of me I cannot think of better word to use in that sentence... given the context. Masculinity is a highly visible characteristic of Thompson's work. To imply that that work would have been emasculated by toning down or eliminating the profanity was exactly what I meant. No innuendo there.

 

[Al Today]

I was taught that it is not the word used, it is the intent that matters.

 

[Ominous]

William S. Burroughs wouldn't be William S. Burroughs without the "swear words." Writers use them to make a specific point or effect. I dont believe that a potty mouth is necessarily a deviant, either.

 

[Jeremy]

It is also interesting that you would read that into it. "Weaving sexual innuendo?"

No. I was just thinking that Thompson's intensity looked a lot like what Gurdjieff called 'abuse of sex'. So it seems to me that your observation was quite accurate. Apologies for not being clear.

Anyway, Thompson and Burroughs were not doing the Work. Here's what Gurdjieff said about the abuse of sex:

"Then the other question—'Is sexual abstinence useful for the work or not?'

"It is useful if there is abstinence in all centers. If there is abstinence
in one center and full liberty of imagination in the others, then there
could be nothing worse.

"And still more, abstinence can be useful if a man knows what to do with the
energy which he saves in this way. If he does not know what to do with it,
nothing whatever can be gained by abstinence."

"Speaking in general, what is the most correct form of life in this
connection from the point of view of the work?"

"It is impossible to say. I repeat that while a man does not know it is
better for him not to attempt anything. Until he has new and exact knowledge
it will be quite enough if his life is guided by the usual rules and
principles.

"If a man begins to theorize and invent in this sphere, it will lead to
nothing except psychopathy.

"But it must again be remembered that only a person who is completely normal
as regards sex has any chance in the work. Any kind of 'originality,'
strange tastes, strange desires, or, on the other hand, fears, constantly
working 'buffers,' must be destroyed from the very beginning. Modem
education and modem life create an enormous number of sexual psychopaths.
They have no chance at all in the work.

"Speaking in general, there are only two correct ways of expending sexual
energy— normal sexual life and transmutation. All inventions in this sphere
are very dangerous.

"People have tried abstinence from times beyond memory. Sometimes, very
rarely, it has led to something but in most cases what is called abstinence
is simply exchanging normal sensations for abnormal, because the abnormal
are more easily hidden.

"But it is not about this that I wish to speak. You must understand where
lies the chief evil and what makes for slavery. It is not in sex itself but
in the abuse of sex.

"But what the abuse of sex means is again misunderstood.

"People usually take this to be either excess or perversion. But these are
comparatively innocent forms of abuse of sex.

"And it is necessary to know the human machine very well in order to grasp
what abuse of sex in the real meaning of these words is.

"It means the wrong work of centers in relation to sex, that is, the action
of the sex center through other centers, and the action of other centers
through the sex center; or, to be still more precise, the functioning of the
sex center with energy borrowed from other centers and the functioning of
other centers with energy borrowed from the sex center."

"Can sex be regarded as an independent center?" asked one of those present.

"It can," said G. "At the same time if all the lower story is taken as one
whole, then sex can be regarded as the neutralizing part of the moving
center."

"With what 'hydrogen' does the sex center work?" asked another. This
question had interested us for a long time but we had not previously been
able to answer it. And G., when he had been asked before, had never given a
direct reply.

"The sex center works with 'hydrogen' 12," he said on this occasion, "that
is to say, it ought to work with it. This is SI 12. But the fact is that it
very rarely works with its proper hydrogen. Abnormalities in the working of
the sex center require special study.

"In the first place it must be noted that normally in the sex center as well
as in the higher emotional and the higher thinking centers, there is no
negative side. In all the other centers except the higher ones, in the
thinking, in the emotional, in the moving, in the instinctive, in all of
them there are, so to speak, two halves—the positive and the negative;
affirmation and negation, or 'yes' and 'no,' in the thinking center,
pleasant and unpleasant sensations in the moving and instinctive centers.

"There is no such division in the sex center.

"There are no positive and negative sides in it. There are no unpleasant
sensations or unpleasant feelings in it; there is either a pleasant
sensation, a pleasant feeling, or there is nothing, an absence of any
sensation, complete indifference.

"But in consequence of the wrong work of centers it often happens that the
sex center unites with the negative part of the emotional center or with the
negative part of the instinctive center. And then, stimulation of a certain
kind of the sex center, or even any stimulation at all of the sex center,
calls forth unpleasant feelings and unpleasant sensations.

"People who experience unpleasant feelings and sensations which have been
evoked in them through ideas and imagination connected with sex are inclined
to regard them as a great virtue or as something original; in actual fact it
is simply disease.

"Everything connected with sex should be either pleasant or indifferent.

"Unpleasant feelings and sensations all come from the emotional center or
the instinctive center.

"This is the 'abuse of sex.'

"It is necessary, further, to remember that the sex center works with
'hydrogen' 12. This means that it is stronger and quicker than all other
centers. Sex, in fact, governs all other centers. The only thing in ordinary
circumstances, that is, when man has neither consciousness nor will, that
holds the sex center in submission is 'buffers.'

'Buffers' can entirely bring it to nought, that is, they can stop its normal
manifestation. But they cannot destroy its energy. The energy remains and
passes over to other centers, finding expression for itself through them; in
other words, the other centers rob the sex center of the energy which it
does not use itself.

"The energy of the sex center in the work of the thinking, emotional, and
moving centers can be recognized by a particular 'taste,' by a particular
fervor, by a vehemence which the nature of the affair concerned does not
call for.

"The thinking center writes books, but in making use of the energy of the
sex center it does not simply occupy itself with philosophy, science, or
politics—it is always fighting something, disputing, criticizing, creating
new subjective theories.

"The emotional center preaches Christianity, abstinence, asceticism, or the
fear and horror of sin, hell, the torment of sinners, eternal fire, all this
with the energy of the sex center. ...

"Or on the other hand it works up revolutions, robs, burns, kills, again with
the same energy.

"The moving center occupies itself with sport, creates various records,
climbs mountains, jumps, fences, wrestles, fights, and so on.

"In all these instances, that is, in the work of the thinking center as well
as in the work of the emotional and the moving centers, when they work with
the energy of the sex center, there is always one general characteristic and
this is a certain particular vehemence and, together with it, the
uselessness of the work in question.

"Neither the thinking nor the emotional nor the moving centers can ever
create anything useful with the energy of the sex center. This is an example
of the 'abuse of sex.'

"But this is only one aspect of it. Another aspect consists in the fact
that, when the energy of the sex center is plundered by the other centers
and spent on useless work, it has nothing left for itself and has to steal
the energy of other centers which is much lower and coarser than its own.

"And yet the sex center is very important for the general activity, and
particularly for the inner growth of the organism, because, working with
'hydrogen' 12, it can receive a very fine food of impressions, such as none
of the ordinary centers can receive. The fine food of impressions is very
important for the manufacture of the higher 'hydrogens.' But when the sex
center works with energy that is not its own, that is, with the
comparatively low 'hydrogens' 48 and 24, its impressions become much coarser
and it ceases to play the role in the organism which it could play.

"At the same time union with, and the use of its energy by, the thinking
center creates far too great an imagination on the subject of sex, and in
addition a tendency to be satisfied with this imagination.

"Union with the emotional center creates sentimentality or, on the contrary,
jealousy, cruelty. This is again a picture of the 'abuse of sex.'"

"What must be done to struggle against the 'abuse of sex'?" asked somebody
present.

G. laughed.

"I was just waiting for that question," he said.

"But you already ought to understand that it is just as impossible to
explain to a man who has not yet begun to work on himself and does not know
the structure of the machine what the 'abuse of sex' means, as it is to say
what must be done to avoid these abuses.

"Right work on oneself begins with the creation of a permanent center of
gravity.

"When a permanent center of gravity has been created everything else begins
to be disposed and distributed in subordination to it.

"The question comes to this: From what and how can a permanent center of
gravity be created?

"And to this may be replied that only a man's attitude to the work, to
school, his valuation of the work, and his realization of the mechanicalness
and aimlessness of everything else can create in him a permanent center of
gravity.

"The role of the sex center in creating a general equilibrium and a
permanent center of gravity can be very big. According to its energy, that
is to say, if it uses its own energy, the sex center stands on a level with
the higher emotional center. And all the other centers are subordinate to
it. Therefore it would be a great thing if it worked with its own energy.
This alone would indicate a comparatively very high level of being. And in
this case, that is, if the sex center worked with its own energy and in its
own place, all other centers could work correctly in their places and with
their own energies."

 

[ScioAgapeOmnis]

I think external consideration is what it may come down to. "Swear words" have a negative association due to being used in very negative, arrogant, subjective, manipulative, and other nasty ways by countless of mechanical people. This is how they became "swear words". Saying them brings to mind all the nasty ways they are used. Not to mention the unwanted sexual and violent meanings and connotations many of those words carry. Sometimes it is necessary to do that which makes people uncomfortable if the situation asks for it - like telling the Truth. But swear words are not necessary in any situation, they are not important, they don't help anyone advance or grow, all they have is the vile associations attached to them, and nothing positive. If you're angry or upset - use that energy productively - venting by swearing to make yourself "feel better" is not productive, it's an example of mechanically wasting that negative emotional energy, often to self-destructive ends. And if you're not upset or angry, and you cannot describe something without using swear words, it's because you've been hanging out with people with no clue about just how rich languages are, and no ability to consider anyone but themselves. They are not good role models. Have some external consideration, use a thesaurus please.

 

[Beau]

William S. Burroughs wouldn't be William S. Burroughs without the "swear words."

What good has Burroughs ever done for humanity?