RascalPuff's Blog

Having posted the preceding message at another forum, a (female) moderator inserted the following commentary:

"Important even obvious questions: What is this thread about? And what contributions are being requested?" (the fact that she asks, demonstrates how far removed she is from the glaring - nationally epidemic - problem at issue...)

I responded:
This thread hopefully alludes to be the beginning of a series of communication trends for reducing or nullifying altogether the most practiced method of projecting or otherwise imposing 'shock' (often from considerable distance, and anonymously) into conventional communications; especially among people in public places like a coffee shop, or restaurant, or waiting in line for a movie, etceteras.

Hearing the issued epithet (and what it really means) hurled from the open window of a passing car, for example, is an everyday American experience. The perpetrator is rewarded by the loathing he induces in everyone within earshot. The subjected verbal explosion - upon it's typically abrupt interruption - often paralyzes people in mid sentence (When women exhibit this kind of behavior they are emulating amok male values).

Upon recovering from the stupefying verbal attack, effected people characteristically ask, 'Why do people do things like that?'

Whereas, the demystification of the motive - 'to stun people often in the company of children' - is not generally understood for what it is. It isn't usually talked about, except on the occasions when the anti-social bomb is hurled. The flagrant perpetrator is perceived as an inscrutable 'magician' of some kind, rather than the desperately impotent wielder of the cheapest shot in the idiomatic English language.

The request for 'contributions' to this thread is a petition for others to express - to calmly talk about - their perceptions of this national phenomen, with the hope that a better public understanding of the disparaging epithet will contribute toward a dilution of its toxicity, and thereby reduce the exposed practitioner's motive for that kind of behavior.

The most fundamental and powerful language of the rape mentality is in high profile here: the most used verbal insult being directly related to the fastest growing violent domestic and street crime in the nation, namely the physical abuse of women and children - including rape - by male assailants.

228.3 in reply to 228.2 Response from the same moderator:

Well, whenever my six year-old daughter asks, "Why is f ck a bad word?" or something like that, I tell her, "Because someone, somewhere wants to be offended by it."

The reality is that even if you manage to strike all the profane words from the language, people will invent new ones. And that doesn't just include the potty-mouths. Rather, the people who most need profane words in the language are those who are offended by them. That is, they will find something to be offended by.

To paraphrase the great Ozzy Osbourne, one of the wonderful things about America is that you have the right to get pissed off. And people have certainly seized that right.

Although he might have said that after people got upset that he urinated on the Alamo.

--------------------------------------------
From Kaiduorkhon
To ALL


This is not an exemplary case of the random selection of a profane word by which an argument such as yours may be tractably presented.

The word 'f ck', bereft of a negative context, might even have a positive and/or loving inflection - as you exemplify in your reflection of it's innocent usage by your six year old daughter.

On the other hand, when that positive and loving intonation and usage is transposited into a destructive intent and denigrating context, it no longer compliments the act which it alludes to, but, rather, insolently insults and contemptuously defiles it.
To project the innocent option inherent to the word, in a context of anger and insult, is to turn the word and its meaning upside down and backwards; to very deliberately and insidiously make the word 'bad'...

Take note that your exemplified six year old daughter had already, somehow, been educated to the fact that the word was 'bad', and asked why. She didn't learn that from listening to loving talk and gesture, which is indeed, where the word - philologically speaking - originated.

Constructing a defensive argument against the herein qualified 'misusage' of the word and its - rape mentality supporting - connotations, is a distinctive form of 'blaming the victim (an American recreation)'.

'People will always find something to be offended by' , is an irrelavant pretext, finding 'people' responsible for the responsibility of (specific) others (refer, 'blaming the victim').

Whatever you say, Kaiduorkhon, whatever you say.
Originally Posted by Kaiduorkhon

Take note that your exemplified six year old daughter had already, somehow, been educated to the fact that the word was 'bad', and asked why. She didn't learn that from listening to loving talk and gesture, which is indeed, where the word - philologically speaking - originated.
”
Well, that's what familial bonds are for. Without religious idiots to teach her stupid things like, "Curse words are from Satan," the situation would be much different.

Do you not remember what it's like to be young? I learned to cuss sometime around second grade, and like all things verboten—bad words, bad television (and, sometimes, good), Dad's old Playboy stash, peeking at girls' underwear, &c.—we wanted to do it more simply because we weren't supposed to. Ask around Gen X; I don't think I'm making any particularly unique claim.

I can also tell you my daughter learned those words from uncensored episodes of Family Guy and South Park, the former having been regular viewing material pretty much her whole life. (I believe her first complete sentence was, in fact, "I need a Jew." Which was either adorable or horrifying, depending on which parent you were.) Oh, those and a couple of video games.

And while this approach to parenting has proven controversial even within my side of the family, I can tell you that, practically, it's paying off. She asks me about words, their meanings, and why they upset people. Instead of the usual reprimand she faces from her mother or maternal grandparents, she gets practical advice and insight from me. So far it seems to be working. She tests out new words and combinations on me to see how I react; I tell her how the words work, what they mean, how they're used, and why she shouldn't use them. And I get no reports of her mouth being a problem like that. Not from her school or from my mother. Not even from her paranoid, Jesus-freak maternal grandparents whose world-flight neurosis is so tangled that they're upset because my daughter wasn't raped. I know, sounds #### up, right? But it's really hard to explain that chapter and have it sound believable. Needless to say, she will experience greater negative effects from being bundled off to a strange office to have her anatomy poked and prodded for a negative test result, and her mind raked over by psychologists, lawyers, and a couple of detectives—her first video interview when she's five?—and you should have seen her mother's head snap to attention (and nearly off) when the lead detective told us they had nothing, and our daughter said nothing happened. I mean, there's very little joy to be had in such an episode beyond the relief of being officially told what you already knew, but yes, watching a nearly pure Freudian neurosis quietly explode right before my very eyes was satisfying.

But I digress. The proper test of my parenting theories began last year, and will continue in this phase for the next two or three years. Covers a lot, not just cussing.


“
Constructing a defensive argument against the herein qualified 'misusage' of the word and its - rape mentality supporting - connotations, is a distinctive form of 'blaming the victim (an American recreation)'. ”

One of the interesting things about curse words is that they have no genuine meaning anymore. We know what "####" and "####", for instance, are supposed to mean, but they also have oddly diverse applications that have nothing to do with rape or excrement.

Yet here you are, trying to forcibly reinsert the rape paradigm into a word that has largely lost its meaning. I think you're an example of someone who has a need to be offended.

And that's the thing, Kaiduorkhon. You could do much more to fight the rape mentality if you didn't depict the effort as a caricature of a serious issue.


“
'People will always find something to be offended by' , is an irrelavant pretext, finding 'people' responsible for the responsibility of others (refer, 'blaming the victim'). ”

To what responsibility do you refer, and who assigns it to any given individual?

The use of a word is the responsibility of he or she who uses it. Finding offense in that word is the responsibility of the offended.

I mean, you and I are posting in a virtual community in which the idea recently arose that calling cowardice by its name was insulting and should be forbidden. And the same thing applies. I recognize that nobody likes being called a coward, but when that's how you're behaving? Well, there goes our ability to address untoward conduct in our community. I mean, anyone should be able to denigrate ethnic minorities, women, and homosexuals without facing the insult of being called a bigot, right? And, certainly, those who lie regularly should be spared the offense of being called a liar. And it works both ways. It is anyone else's choice to be offended by being denigrated for their skin color, sexual anatomy, or the gender of their sex partner. And it is a bigot's choice to be offended at the notion that he is a bigot. (It should be noted, however, that the issue has passed, and it does not appear we are about to impose such a standard generally.)

Again, I think you'll find more success in fighting the rape mentality if you don't present the issue as a hyperdramatic, emotionally incoherent scaramouche.

This discussion actually reminds me a bit of Marge Simpson:

Bart: Hey, boy, you want to play fetch?

[SLH looks up, tired, then puts his head back down]

Aw. Me and Santa's Little Helper used to be a team, but he never wants to play any more since his bitch moved in.

Marge: Bart, don't ever say that word again!

Bart: Well, that's what she is. I looked it up.

Marge: Well, I'm going to write the dictionary people and have that checked. Feels like a mistake to me.

(The Simpsons)

I would suggest that, just like Marge, you're determined to be offended. This doesn't help your cause. Now, naturally, some people use profane words to insult, but the conduct in question here is the intention to insult. What words one uses, generally speaking, are irrelevant. (Specifically speaking, the insult is more effective if the words are tailored to the target.)

Give me enough time, I can make "popcorn" a profane word. I can always find a way to make it offensive to someone, because there will always be someone to be offended. Hell, I managed to make a three-letter shorthand—"het"—into an offensive word even though nobody has ever demonstrated to me that calling a homosexual a heterosexual is fighting words. Seriously, when was the last time you saw a fistfight break out because someone wanted to rebuke the pejorative that they are heterosexual?

I just can't wait for the part where you start going after women who tell their lovers, in the heat of passion, "#### me."
____________________

Dear Madam:
Your description of your child's first sentence sounds like what was said was, "I need'jou" (rather than "i need a Jew"), but then, it's a matter of interpretation, however horrific, novel or adorable it may have been perceived to be by you. It seems that you may have authored and edited the statement beyond it's originally expressed or intended parameters.

Your expansive opus of 'new age' rationalizations in supportive praise of the 'normalisation' accompanying the (George Orwell/Aldous Huxley predicted) destruction of the English language (and the morals and ethics vehicularized within it) is emerging increasingly in entrenched niches like South Park, and from the exemplary, teleprompted epiglottis of Conan O'brien. Long ago portended on the Johnny Carson show, where his guest, Madonna, was 'bleeped' 43 times, for employing the 'MF' word. This is the path that you vigorously enjoy maintaining...

Speaking of children and Jews, Brooke Shields and *Calvin Klien each happen to be one; *employed a 15 yr old girl to spread eagle her Network TV projected posture and announce that "Nothing comes between me and my Calvin's".

Three years previously, when Brooke Shields was 12, she played the part of a 12 year old prostitute in a movie you have to be 18 years old to see.

In April of 1979, on the Academy Awards Show (John Wayne's last public appearance), when Brooke was 15, she stood alongside of George Burns and 'ad libbed' that there were rumors going around the set of the movie they were making together - Just You & Me Kid - at the time, that there was a 'romantic relationship' going on between George and Brooke, 'because he likes his women young', and that this was good for business because, 'Sex sells tickets'. George Burns responded that, if there was a romantic relationship going on between him and Brooke, "I would sell tickets".

Audience applause; laughter.

Brooke went on to proclaim that the PRETTY BABY movie she was placed in (by her parents and the entertainment industry) three years previously, when she was 12, was 'in good taste, because I was wearing a body stocking in the sex scenes' (while being 'dry humped' by 25 year old Keith Carradine).

Draw your own conclusions.

This kind of 'entertainment' is called 'tolerance threshhold expansion'. It reduces the observer's sensitivities and makes room for increased intrusions on ethics and morality, where, a nation that is unable to do anything about, or cares not to do anything about such activities, is a nation that will be obliged or enticed to tolerate anything... Including the sexual abuse of children in the name of entertainment. The bottom of the barrel gang. Forensic evidence still available at your local BlockBuster video store...

All of this was preceding, and leading up to the 'six year old child sex symbol', Jon Bene Ramsey, who was murdered in her Boulder, Colorado home on Christmas day, 1996. Children emulating Mom and Dad by wearing hats, mustaches, lipstick and high heels around the American household are a familiar and expected behavior. On the other hand, it has no comparison with publicly televised, competitively motivated, corporate state sponsored National 'Child Beauty Pageants', featuring 'child sex symbols'.

Originally Posted by Kaiduorkhon

Take note that your exemplified six year old daughter had already, somehow, been educated to the fact that the word was 'bad', and asked why. She didn't learn that from listening to loving talk and gesture, which is indeed, where the word - philologically speaking - originated....

"I just can't wait for the part where you start going after women who tell their lovers in the heat of passion, "F ck me".

The penchant of some owners to think with their penis is a fairly well understood undoing; on the other hand, an obdurate proclivity for thinking with someone else's penis is more in line with comparing nectarines with basketballs, and trimming your nails with a hatchet.
Moreover, while delinquently languishing in your execrable role of extrasensory phallic motherhood, your compulsion to misrepresent and spell out the 'F' word speaks unlaundered volumes between the literary sheets.


Whereas, ostensibly, as clarified in the missive - and the thread - you are responding to, the appropriate circumstance for the 'F' word to occur is - as you well understand - between lovers: not as a maliciously launched, angry affront on anyone within earshot (the language of the rape mentality: the imposition of sex where it is not welcome and does not belong - the theme of this thead from its beginning).


The word 'philology' means the study of the evolution of languages. That is a statement of the obvious of course, but then, it is a reflection of the south-bound style in which your palpably tense, name calling dissertation is written.
(Refer, 'The Art of Missing - or Choosing Not to get - the Point, when you Can't Afford to Catch on.')