Talk:Profanity/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about Profanity. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Archive 2

Contradiction in the Introduction

There is a sentence in the 4th paragraph of the introduction: "Seventy-two percent of American men and fifty-eight percent of American women swear in public [citation needed], and Sixty-one percent of adolescents and Eighty-nine percent of adults swear in public." that is self-contradictory. (How can 72 percent and 58 percent of men and women swear, but 89 percent of adults swear?) I don't know anything at all about it so i'm not changing anything, but this should probably be looked into.

We are no diviners

"Additionally, puta is genitive and accusative case of two often used words in south Slavic languages" Ok, that's the most unhelpful mention they could make. It syas its the case of two often used words but... Which words, which south Slavic languages? Hey, it's not proper to list just half of the information.-GTB 9:41 12/9/2006

Digg

Why does there need a be a reference to diggs profanity filter, its not exactly unique, so I removed it. I mean every major forum uses filters.. 81.138.3.234 23:19, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Disclaimer

Is there any way to make the disclaimer at the top more obvious ? I've missed it many times and think other people will. --AirLiner 04:38, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Japanese

I take exception with the Japanese section. The word manko, or alternately, omanko, is the Japanese equivalent to the English profanity c*nt and is considered to be the foulest word in the Japanese language. It's typically censored in publication and broadcast. Most Japanese, when typing it on the internet, will censor themselves by using masoko (since the so and n characters in hiragana and katakana are similar to one another) or blot out the center character altogether. The article also fails to mention that the Japanese will typically use the English profanities as their own. The section also smacks of an Orientalist POV.--YoungFreud 06:54, 9 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Agreed, the previous content was ridiculous. I've given it a thorough rewrite, comments welcome.

I take exception with the original poster taking exception. Is this supposed to be an encyclopedia or a prime-time television segment, censored and niced-up for the kiddies? Re-instate the Japanese and other language sections, but include the original poster's comments about the strength of the epithets.

Also, writing "manko" as "masoko" on the internet is not self-censorship, it's bypassing word filters. A similar example would be writing "kitty-gai" (in katakana, with a "te" and small "i", like in Hello Kitty; sorry, can't enter Japanese on this computer) instead of "kichigai". TomorrowTime 21:26, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Russian

The Russian usage is very interesting! Can you give an example of use?

Also, by whom are words "banned" in Russia? Does the government have the right to censor words from all discourse? That belongs in the article on censorship, I imagine. --Dmerrill

You can find examples at [1] --Devotchka

Is there a specific name for that slang? It would be good to have an article on it (in it?). -- Error

It's not Russian-only. It's very alike in Polish, and probably in other Slavic languages. --User:Taw

Common profanity in different languages

Would a "Common profanity in different languages" page be useful?

Ppetru

How about "let's swear with Wikipedia!" ;-) seriously, though, I remember reading that in some countries religious swearwords are more taboo, in other it's sexual words. some both? -- Tarquin 07:20 Aug 6, 2002 (PDT)

Russian

Profanity took a very interesting form in Russia where there exists a language of sorts, most of its words based on four basic profane roots - nouns penis, whore, c*nt and verb f*ck. At least two hundred derivative words exist in this language, plus countless word combinations. It is possible to sensibly communicate using just these four basic roots. Due to countless very fine nuances (stress on a different syllable changes the meaning of certain words etc.) it is not easy to master that language which is very widely used in Russia, especially in rural areas. Before the 1990s these words never appeared in print (except special articles published in universities) and still are officially banned on TV and in the movies.

I would have to see a source for this, to believe it.

Well, then find a source. Other people on this very talk page have confirmed it already. AxelBoldt

How can there be a "language" with only 200 words in which it is possible to "sensibly communicate". If it is indeed "very widely used" it should be easy to find a source. A dictionary listing of banned obscene terms as cited above is not a source showing the existence of a distince "language". I've seen similar lists before, for Japanese as well as Russian.

I guess you have to be Russian, or know Russian, to understand it.

Better to say instead that someone wrote down a list of 200 Russian swear words, nearly all of which are derived from 4 profane roots. --Ed Poor 17:42 Sep 23, 2002 (UTC)

No, it's more complex than that, although calling it its own language is slightly exaggerated. Basically you can take pizda, khui and a few others, conjugate them in any way you choose into verbs, nouns, adjectives, adverbs, whatever, and end up with a meaningless yet obscene word. хуй (d*ck) > хуило > хуиня > хуйнуть > хуёвый... and because all parts of language are represented, you can even form grammatically complete sentences! Jpatokal 05:45, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)

f*ck

I absolutely don't get moving f*ck here from its own article. If the f*ck article was "a holy mess", which I don't buy, what good does it do to dump it unchanged here? I proposes moving it back (and will do so after a 24-hour cooling-off period. I will edit it a bit when I do, but it really isn't bad as a stand-alone article, but it distorts this article mightily. Ortolan88 18:00 Sep 23, 2002 (UTC)

I have to agree. --The Cunctator

Yes, I agree too. --KQ

so whats stopping you people? Phuqerofall 21:01, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

French and Spanish

"The situation is rendered more complex when other languages enter the picture. In European Spanish, coño (usually translated as "c*nt" in English) is very common in spoken discourse, meaning no more than "Hey!" or "Christ!". Likewise, in French, merde (usually translated as "sh*t") is also quite common as an expletive meaning little more than "Damn!". Some scholars have noted that while the French and Spanish are comfortable hearing native speakers use these words, they tend to hear the "stronger" meaning when the same words are spoken by non-native speakers. This may be similar to the differences in the acceptability of queer or nigger depending on who is saying the words."

I not skilled enough in English to rewrite it ! "Merde" translate as "sh*t" and used like f*ck. Ta voiture de merde = Your f*cking car No need to refer to queer or n*gger this isn't more acceptable in French than in English. Equivalent of queer might be a little worse in French, and nigger might be a little stronger than is French equivalent but I'm not absolutely sure.

"Some scholars have noted that while the French and Spanish are comfortable hearing native speakers use these words, they tend to hear the "stronger" meaning when the same words are spoken by non-native speakers." Well it's not obvious it can work it two senses my german-speaking grandmother liked to say "merde" in French while she considered "Scheisse" in German as awfull. As for mùyself "niquer" or "baiser" are worse than "f*ck". Ericd 19:51 Feb 5, 2003 (UTC)

I am German and I speak French, and in my impression, the situation is comparable with respect to "sh*t" in both languages. I added the German half to that phrase. Having worked with quite some exchange students, many of them from the U.S., they are usually quite baffled by the excessive use of Scheiße in German. Even kids say it. Djmutex 08:34 May 2, 2003 (UTC)

I don't agree at all. I'm German, and to me "Scheiße" is extremely offensive, and totally out of the question in normal conversation (maybe apart from groups of youths). I notice it becoming more and more common especially among kids, but I, for one, take offence in its use, and most people I know would, too. (To the point that I even hesitate typing it here.) Laca 17:06, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

taking God's name in vain

I think the part about "taking God's name in vain" should be changed. The meaning of the phrase is to break a contract (ancient Jewish businessmen would sign a contract in the name of God, and breaking that contract was said to be "in vain"). The idea that it refers to profanity is a common misconception, due to changes in modern contracting. The part about it should be either removed or clarified. -- LGagnon

I agree, up to a point. First of all, we really don't know how the phrase was understood in the time of Moses. We have an excellent understanding of Jewish thinking around 600-700, due to the Talmud, and a pretty good understanding for a few centuries prior to that, but Moses was a couple of millenia back. Second, "taking God's name in vain" has been used to refer to profanity, especially that involving "God", "Jesus", etc., in both European and American christian circles for centuries. When English speakers hear "taking God's name in vain", they think "profanity", whether they agree that this is what it means or not. But, again, you are basically right. So, how to restate this? -- Nowhither 23:55, 20 May 2005 (UTC)

- "the use of profane expressions towards religious figures".--84.222.195.61 21:31, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

What about "Dio Can"(In Veneto Region) or "Dio Cane" (God's a Dog)? Mind you this is ONE OF THE WORST use of profane expressions towards religious figures (thanks user 84.222.195.61|84.222.195.61), should it be put as one of the top of the list along with Dio porco? I was born in Padova, and lots of (vulgar)people use it frequently. Leonida August 27, 2006

phatnav.com copy

Anyone know about this?: http://www.phatnav.com/wiki/wiki.phtml?title=Profanity and its charming & false copyright notice, "All content Copyright 2003 - PhatNav and Diagonal Media Group Inc. (Except as noted on pages containing separately licensed content.) All rights reserved." Koyaanis Qatsi 20:46, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

It is misleading indeed. Wikipedia:Copies_of_Wikipedia_content_(low_degree_of_compliance)#phatnav.com. - snoyes 20:52, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

fart and turd

In my experience, "fart" and "turd" are not considered profanity; for instance, even heavy usage of both would probably not garner a movie an "R" rating, and there are ads targeted at very young children that use these words. Meelar 21:02, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Use of this article in Court

Anyone know more about this? In [2]:

[Wikipedia] has even been used in litigation, when in July 2003, a Wikipedia article on profanity was cited in a motion to dismiss a case in a Colorado court.

Found a reference here ""Wikipedia as Participatory Journalism: Reliable Sources? Metrics for evaluating collaborative media as a news resource" (PDF), April 2004, by Andrew Lih.", which links to The Smoking Gun, which has scans of the court papers. It seems the actual reference was to Fuck (first page of the court papers) Cool. -- Chris 73 | Talk 02:44, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)

"Big three"

What are the "big three" swear words, as referenced to in the 300th episode of the Simpsons?

Probably there aren't any; I suspect the writers just played off the inherent confusion in such a statement for humorous effect. Or, it could be a very subtle dig at the "big three" networks - ABC, CBS & NBC. -- FirstPrinciples 09:28, Oct 8, 2004 (UTC)

I have seen that episode too and always understood them to be (in order of severity) sh*t, f*ck and c*nt. User:195.93.21.100 19:23, September 22, 2005 (UTC)

I always though it was shit, fuck and cunt, they're far more offensive than sh*t, f*ck and c*nt!

Airplane CVR transcripts

Cut from article [Regarding 'sh*t']: "In over 50% of airline crash recordings, these are the last words uttered by the crew in the cockpit."

In the past I have reviewed dozens of CVR transcripts, and although 'sh*t' does occur frequently, I find it very hard to believe that it's the last word uttered over half the time. I suspect this is a silly urban legend, the sort of thing that propagates all over the internet with no basis in fact. I've cut the claim out until someone can offer solid evidence for it. -- FirstPrinciples 20:00, Oct 6, 2004 (UTC)

Psycholinguistics

Psycholinguistic studies have demonstrated that profanity and other taboo words produce physical effects in people who read or hear them, such as an elevated heart rate.

Does anyone have a reference for such studies? Apart from a reference being useful for the wikipedia article, I'd appreciate it for my own work!! The JPS 04:55, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Who needs a reference if you can use comon sense: Its ridiculously stupid to believe that a certain sequence of verbal sounds (and not its volume or its meaning without intonation) can cause physical effects while others, that sound very similar, dont!

Try the following test: Talk to a pet, or someone who does not unserstand the words of your language at all, any baby would do, or invent a language yourself. Now Talk to your subject in a very nice and caring way and say something like:"I am going to rape you and than I will kill you slowly and painfully because I hate you f*cking a**hole." :) . Than insult the subject like you are swearing a thread by saying something like:"I love you so much!" :( (see there is a reason for emoticons). Note the emotional and physical reactions of the test subject, that simply does not understand the words you use even though they have a meaning for you (that you just set by how you spoke, not what you spoke).

Its the message that is the message, language is just a package, a transport medium. And of course messages that are used more often are stored in other parts of your brain, no matter what sequence of sounds or letters are linked to it to pack and convert it into a transport medium.--Ollj 09:02, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I can't agree with the above argument, although perhaps I don't understand what the user is trying to say? If, as a teenager, I had written a friendly letter to my grandmother making use of words like "fuck" and "shit," I have no doubt that it would have affected her heart rate! (And resulted in a phone call to my parents.) Sans sound / volume / intonation, to her those words were absolutely unacceptable, especially coming from a grandchild. Granted, if I'd screamed them at her in a fit of rage, the physical effect would have been more severe. But the words in and of themselves also had power. P.S. I'd like to see a reference to the studies too. Glitterspray 06:13, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

However, your Grandmother can understand the meaning of the words, or at least the implications. If you were to swear at her in a forign language while talking sweetly, she would have no idea of the insults. The point is, it is only the meaning that our culture has attatched to them, that particular meme, which gives them meaning. Larklight 13:35, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Should it be deleted?

I think that this page should be deleted, as it contains too many rude words. Yesterday, my brother went on to Wikipedia and saw this page. I was disgusted.--Jontsang 18:05, Apr 21, 2005 (UTC)

Ah, shut up, you little pansy motherf*cker. Go cry to your mommy. Maybe she'll give you some comfort sex to make you shut up and stop crying.

Well I for one don't think the article should focus on dirty words. Don't you think most people know these words already? And What value does it bring to a person to learn them? If someone wants to learn dirty words they could go to a page labeled as such. It would be much more educating to discuss profanity as a cultural phenomenon, and what makes something profane, than merely stating lists of profanities. Bottom line, what is gained by it?

Yeah, profanity is for f*cking sh*theads. When will these a**balls stop swearing? Motherf*cking pottymouths. George The Man 03:36, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Haha. Oh man. Little kids or people who can't handle "damn" and "hell" really shouldn't be on the Internet. Did you know they have PORN on the Internet?! For real! Pictures of naked people doing naked people stuff! Stay away! 24.119.243.182 00:10, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

I agree with all sweraing responses. You do not have the right not to get insulted or disgusted or criticized!!! Especially on the internet. Jontsang you really disgust me, and im enjoying the freedom of it. Enjoy free speech but please dont spam.

I think that wikipedia should have a warning screen come up before you enter a page with explicit words.

AGREED! Just because they have a disclaimer (a Wikiclaimer perhaps?), a reasonable duty of care does exist when it comes to corruption of the youth. After all, we dont see pornographic images here and for good reason. A warning at the top of any pages that are specifically about swearing/swear words should be put in place. Lincoln187 08:32, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, I disagree. You can't say it's a surprise that you make a search about 'profanity' and find 'a page with explicit words', can you? It's like all those people who are shocked by porn in internet, but type 'sex' in Google... Dux Corvan 19:59, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Umm, here's a serious reply. Wikipedia is not censored for the protection of minors. See Wikipedia:Content disclaimer and Wikipedia:Profanity for more info. Sorry you got a bunch of idiots responding to you here. Mrtea (talk) 20:46, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Proposal

I think we should start a separate article specializing in a list of profantic words. I want translations of swear words in this list as well; click List of swear words to start the article. --SuperDude 00:01, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

It has been proven that swear words are important and you can have scholarly books on swear words. The book "On Bullsh*t" by Harry Frankfurt is a good example of this. JerDW

Yeah, I don't think it's bad to have profanity listed on this page, but I think it would be better to have a different article for listing and defining swear words. This article seems a bit disorganized to me, and I think it could focus more on the history of profanity... I do think it deals w/ profanity in other cultures quite nicely though.

The article List of swear words has been created, but I don't really see the need for it. We already have lists of profanities in various languages here; I am going to propose on Talk:List of swear words that that article be merged into this one. Also, I am removing the reference to On Bullshit as that book is not about swearing or swear words as such, it is about bullshit and bullshitters. MarkBrooks 11:13, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I changed my mind about the merge, since the foreign profanities are no longer on this page; they were moved elsewhere by Openlander but a vandal had reverted to an old revision of the article. See Reversion. MarkBrooks 13:25, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

i have checked and there is no list as of now. i would make one myself however i really dont know what words can be found socaly inaceptable and i feel that others may feel the same way other wise the list would have been created ages ago —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Phuqerofall (talk • contribs) 21:26, 10 April 2007 (UTC).

A** wad

Why's this at the very top of the article? I highly doubt it's used widely - or am I wrong?--Joewithajay 14:51, July 15, 2005 (UTC)

Verbal abuse

I'm not so sure verbal abuse should redirect here. There's no real coverage of it. It tobably needs an independant article or should redirect to an article on forms of abuse. --DanielCD 22:06, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Concur absolutely. Profanity may or may not be abusive, and veral abuse may or may not involve profanity. It is a separate subject. KillerChihuahua^?!? 16:17, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Shoud profanity go into the "Language" catagory?

Does anyone think profanity should go into the "language" catagory because profanity is just the more taboo words to language.

Profanity is part of language. You talk profanity, do you not? Lifthrasir 01:03, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Censoring the article linked to this page

Remember that some people are very sensitive to foul language. Therefore, how about blanking the whole word with dashes except the first and last letter of the word? It goes like this:

This is an example of a b-----d word.

Would that be possible? If I did that on the article, some would consider this as vandalism. --218.111.193.107 05:25, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

If someone is sensitive to foul language, then looking up an article on profanities is an interesting for them to do. The words should not be blanked out. Remember, there are people here whose primary language is not english and may not know what the "f-word" is. To say "f---" would remove clarity. Some may consider "fart" to be inappropriate, so what would "f---" be to them? -- 209.182.101.246 22:04, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

In my opinion, having the complete words is vital for the purposes of an explanatory encyclopedia. It must have a neutral, aseptic and not affected by prejudice approach. Censoring is a mutilation for non-rational reasons, and implies a strong subjective bias about the topic. Imagine a book about ginecology or urology for the preparation of future doctors in medicine having all sexual features in pics concealed behind big black stars 'to avoid hurting someone's sensitiveness': It's absurd. Foul language is language after all. Its words have an ortography and a meaning, and form part of a tongue. They have therefore to be in any serious dictionary. 'Politic correctness' can not be an obstacle for knowledge. That doesn't mean the article should rejoice innecesarily in its use, but shouldn't avoid it, either. Dux Corvan 01:18, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Blasphemous swearing expressions

Reading the articles profanity, blasphemy and minced oath, seems that in the english language there is no example of well known swearing expression against God or other religious figures; I mean stronger expressions than "God damn it" or "bloody Mary", like addressing religious figures like animals, motherf****rs, or other. So is this lack in the english language or in the wikipedia article?--BMF81 11:40, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

I think it's inherent in English. I'm a native speaker, and the most remotely non- "God damnit" blasphemous phrase of that sort I can think of is "Christ on a cracker", or possibly "Jesus H. Christ", but those are both exclamations used in roughly the same way (albeit slightly more playfully) as "Jesus", "Christ" or "Jesus Christ". Alas, from what I can acitively recall, English does not have any particularly interesting blasphemies of that manner, not in the way that certain other European tongues do. Or at least, I should say AMERICAN English doesn't. I'm not sure about Canadian, UK or Australian dialects. Certainly, the phrases that use religious blasphemy-type stuff like that that I can think of are mostly relatively inoffensive, save somewhat for "God damnit", which is one of those words that on some TV networks, at least, is often partially or fully censored (for instance, a number of anime dubs on Adult Swim that use the phrase had the "God" part blanked out), even after times when censorship laws stop taking effect or on cable stations that aren't technically legally censored. I even know someone who finds "Goddamnit" to be really offensive, even though she uses "shit" and "fuck" all the time. Anyway. So, that answer your question, albeit ramblingly? 63.21.33.93 06:21, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

yes, thank you very much :) --BMF81 19:34, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

3rd paragraph

Why does the third paragraph have censored words? Twilight Realm 04:29, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Probably because BMF81 preffers/preffered to write it that way. Besides, I mainain that this is not an "article" but a discussion on it, some policys may not apply.Myrtone

A Slight but Necessary Adjusment

Hey everyone! I ran through the whole article and vagued the swear words... like replacing <swear word here> with f*ck... :) LebanonChild 16:19, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. This is an article about the words and we should not censor. And as noted above, it is Wikipedia policy to use the full word or nothing.
If a person was sensitive to fuck, shit, ass, etc. why would they be looking at a Profanity Article. 말틴 (Martin) [[User:Martin|USER | [[User_T:Martin|TALK]]]] 04:57, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Profanity and the Brain

Is there any difference in the way that the brain treats profanity compared to every other word? I ask because of the existance of coprolallia. Alister Namarra 20:51, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

I would say - yes and no. In that, I would think that the parts of the brain related to using language (both interpreting and saying/writing) would still be active in both cases, but that profanity in particular, like certain other words at certain times perhaps, hits on emotional levels as well. For instance, as we can see on this page, some people are extremely offended at these words - it's actually a stressor for them to even see them or hear about them. Other people see this, and they laugh - using delibrately crude language in response. Both of these types of cases, you'd see the brain reacting slightly differently - in the first, shock, anger, perhaps even a little (albeit irrational) fear; in the latter, amusement. It's the words - not just the sounds or the letters that make them up, but their literal meaning (denotation) and connotation and personal feelings towards the words - that bring this on. So yes, the brain - any brain - that recognized a word as "profantity" would react to it differently, either delightfully engaging in it because it's crude but to them accepted (or else, they find it fun to delve into the taboo), or in some sort of offended or even angry manner. The words DO ellicit a special, unusual response. However, it is society that constructs this first, not something inherent in the words and sounds themselves, as evidenced by how many innocent phrases sound "profane" to a speaker of a different language or words that sound merely "crude" in one dialect of a language might be almost absurdly offensive in another, or be more offensive in some contexts than in others (for instance, in British English, "cunt" is gender-neutral, whereas in American English , it's a feminine term, thus calling a British man a "cunt" would not be seen as offensive as calling an American man a "cunt", because in the latter, there's the direct implication that not only is he an uptight jerk, but a feminine, unmasculine pansy as well ;) A meaning not found in the British usage). It's no different, I suppose, than any other form of taboo imposed by a culture, except that it's probably more prevalent and easier to find. ;) 63.21.33.93 07:23, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Dutch

"Dutch is a language in which profanity takes a prominent place."

Perhaps that is true for a small group of speakers (just as in many other languages!), but not in general. --82.171.37.163 02:58, 15 June 2006 (UTC)RJV

The part about the Dutch asking God to damn them is a common misunderstanding. Actually, godverdomme is what is called aanvoegende wijs in Dutch, expressing wish or intent. What you're actually saying is "May God damn [whatever offended you]". This form has mainly fallen out of use in normal language, so the "me" part is often confused as a self-reference. The same construct can be found in "Lang leve de Koningin" (Long live the queen).

I'm not exactly sure where to put these comments, hence the change in this page. The article should really be changed to reflect this info, but I don't feel my writing skills are up to scratch to do it. - Alex

"Severity" Section Sources

The 2000 paper "Delete Expletives" located on the webpage of the ASA does not include any mention of the word "lentil" or "crakon", which leads me to conclude that the section is either ambiguous, mistaken or erroneous in citation of sources.

In the "severity" section it refers to the "top ten" words, suggesting the list is present in its entirety - then just lists eight. Where are the other two? There are ten.

Interlanguage profanity

I've found the session that tells about the sound of pronatity in other languages very weird. Is it a relevant information? Nevertheless I removed some part of it, english fuck have very little similarity with faca, portuguese for knife, and was stated that it sounded very alike.

Uh, I have to say... they do look like they have similar roots, though. "Fuck" is often used in sexual senses, and "knife" (or variations on it) is commonly used as a sexual euphemism in some languages (as is somewhat evident in the word "penis" which comes from the Latin for "sword"; ironicially, I have seen a number of overly florid prose writers come full circle and use "sword" as a euphemism for "penis" - with the accompanying "sheath" for "vagina", of course. Most of these writers, I doubt they know the actual roots of those words!). I don't know whether or not they're related, of course, but it is an interesting thought. 63.21.41.221 09:28, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

US vs UK Profanity

I'm very interested in this aspect of the topic but hesitate to add a section to the article since my information is anecdotal rather than factual. Perhaps others can expand / improve my short list for later inclusion.

Bloody. A "naughty word" in the UK, innocuous in the US.

Fanny. In the US strictly a "cute" term for buttocks. In the UK refers to female genitals.

Piss. Used casually in the UK but considered vulgar in the US.

Pussy. In the UK used sans titters as a synonym for "cat." In the US its use is always accompanied by a giggle.

I'm particularly fascinated by the fact that, while the terms "fanny" and "pussy" have near identical definitions in both cultures, one is okay in the US but not the UK and vice versa. How did this happen?

Please note that: (1) This discussion ideally would include input from Australian and other English-speaking cultures; and (2) These words have wikipedia articles of their own, although I haven't provided the links.

Glitterspray 07:46, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Re bloody and fanny, I think you're right (though I'd say "bloody" is mild nowadays). Re "piss", I'd have been tempted to suggest the opposite, so suspect there's no real difference. We should bear in mind that the degree to which profanities are considered objectionable differs depending on region, social class, age, etc. On the whole, there are probably more diffences within each country than there are between countries. I don't know if the word pussy is used much to mean a cat any more. Traditionally, at least originally (see OED), "pussy" meaning pudenda was a US meaning, but it's used in both countries today and no longer considered American. --86.133.243.52 07:29, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Pussy can be considered used in the obscene sense in the UK. Haven't you ever heard of Castle Anthrax? -- feb^talk 03:50, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Sorry I haven't - however, I never said that pussy couldn't be used in the obscene sense in the UK (I agree that it can). I only said that according to the OED, it originated as a US usage. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 86.133.247.156 (talk) 13:07, 22 April 2007 (UTC).

I don't think I, as an American, consider "piss" vulgar. It's certainly impolite, or less polite, but not vulgar.. --67.165.6.76 03:03, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

I'd be quite interested to hear from our American cousins regarding the term "bugger". Although dictionary definitions relate to sexual acts, the term is used in the UK as a mild expletive, examples as follows;

"You silly bugger!" Akin to "you silly fool!"

"Stop buggering about!" Akin to "Stop messing around."

"Bugger me!" Akin to "Well, bless my soul!"

"Bugger all" - nothing

I don't recall hearing Americans using this term in this way - have I just led a sheltered life? Paul-b4 14:51, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

In American English, bugger means to sexually penetrate the rectum, as in "He or she likes to be buggered." or "He or She is a buggerer." As such it has passed into informal usage as a slightly stronger form of "fuck":

"You silly bugger!" Akin to "you silly fucker!" Playful adjective describing a person.

"Stop buggering about!" Akin to "Stop fucking around." Adjective denoting horseplay or irresponsible behavior.

"Bugger me!" Akin to "Fuck me!" or "Well I'll be dipped in dogshit!" Exclamatory surprise.

"Bugger all" - "Fuck all" - nothing Hope that is helpful. Homefill 16:14, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

Indian Subcontinent section

Wikified the Indian Subcontinent section and repaired it a bit. -Correctus 13:41, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Already mentioned...

In the past, I have done an informal survey amongst my Indian friends and discovered that none really knew the actual meaning of most cuss words. At best, they had a vague idea; and no two persons had the same understanding of any single word. This may have a lot to do with no serious etymological study of these words available to the general public. It is a good chance this Wikipedia entry will become the defacto standard in the future. I would urge people to quote authoritative citations for the benefit of future generations. Think of the children! A case in point is somebody getting fits in the current entry over the word "Haraami". It comes from Arabic (Quaran?) "Haraam" where it means "Forbidden". In Northern India, after many centuries of Islamic rule it would be natural for a lot of frowned-on activities, persons, things, etc. to be decorated with this word. That it would have much diverse usage is a forgone conclusion (like "fuck"). To think that it means only a single (or even a couple) thing; or even that the user of this word is even aware of the richness of the word's history and background (beyond the knowledge that it is offensive) is to do injustice to this glorious word. Such an act should be considered Haraam. Redblue 03:28, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

disclaimer

Even though the disclaimer at the top of this page is not a template, I think the spirit of Wikipedia:No disclaimer templates suggests we should remove it. --Allen 17:48, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree, I just stumbled across this article and was shocked that that disclaimer is there. Disclaimers are ridiculous as they only state the obvious. I would be surprised if the profanity article didn't have any examples of profanity. Thus, I am removing it. --Dylan Lak e 04:09, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Definition

I removed the following from the definition:

"Social groups who by far are considered to be profane by many studies are: ethnic minorites, teenagers, sports fans, fans of live-action movies, people who own cable television, the non-religious, residents of metropolitan areas, frequent Internet users, and fans of hip hop and rock music."

This is purely inflammatory unless there are some citations. Anca 03:35, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I completely agree with the conclusion and removal. However, I do find the list rather amusing since it seems to include most of the people on the planet! --Glitterspray 11:52, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Poner/Ponerse

About the form "puse" which is the 1st singular of the Spanish verb "poner". The verb "poner" in Spanish means "to put", not "to become". It's the verb "ponerse" which means "to become", (literally "to put oneself (into some state maybe)"). so I edited the translation

Profanity: objective?

I think someone should note in the article that profanity is not an objective concept. Profanity is a completely subjective social construct, which changes from culture to culture. There is nothing inherently wrong about saying fuck or shit. Will a Russian or an Egyptian understand you if they overhear you saying "motherfucker?" Most Americans don't understand a German when he says "scheiße" or a Mexican when he says "mierda." The only evil in these words is an arbitrary, created evil. When Americans undergo coprolalia or a Tourette's episode, they don't curse in Lithuanian or Kazakh. There's really no reason for anyone to be offended by these words which aren't offensive in and of themselves. Like I said, someone should probably acknowledge this in the article. Pinocchiopiate 06:48, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree. I might add something Larklight 13:35, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Etymology

I notice the Sanskrit word "yabhati" (fuck) looks very like the word "jebat" (j pronounced as y) used in various Slavic languages with the same meaning - is this a Proto-Indo-European word? How about a section on the etymology of swear words?

Two remarks

One: I just ran across an article called Foreign profanity. Now, the way I understand it, English wiki is supposed to be something of a mother wiki to the others, and there is a rule regarding Anglo-American focus. So calling it "foreign profanity" because it's not English is a no-go, according to that rule. But that's not my main qualm with that article. The article is a complete replication of this article, minus the explanations. It's basically a long long list. It was created less than a month ago. The reason for the creation of the article is said to be that this article has grown too large. For the time being, I'll just blank out that article and revert it here, until a better solution can be found. For starters, somebody who speaks Portuguese could trim down the list of Portuguese words to an essential 5 or 10 entries, since there already is a list at Portuguese profanity. That ought to make the article much shorter.

Two: It hurts my eyes to see expressions like "the C-word" and "the S-word" in the article, not to mention the entire cleansing of the translations of all Serbo-Croatian words. While a non-speaker of the language can somehow presume what the "*@#&" part in "Goni se u pičku materinu: Go up your mother's *@#&" is, there is no way to figure out this one: "Seronja: (&#$%*, liar)". I'm reverting the article. And please, anon user 70.129.253.107, I realise you think you're making the world and the internet a favour, but please, don't. This is an encyclopedia, a collection of information. What you're doing is censoring information. It's insulting to anyone with at least half a brain for you to presume you know what is best for them. Please stop. TomorrowTime 01:12, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Arrgh! TomorrowTime, things have gotten somewhat messed up. See the next section for my explanation of what (I think) happened. For now, I am going to revert the Foreign profanity article which you had redirected here. MarkBrooks 17:17, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, on second thought I probably shouldn't have outright blanked that article. But I still maintain the article name should be changed, and in the long run, the article abandoned for articles like Italian profanity and Portuguese profanity for the respective non-English languages with their own lists there, save a few remarkable examples that can be kept in Profanity. Openlander is right in saying that this article has gotten too big to handle. It's just that I don't agree 100% with how he decided to tackle the situation. I overraected after feeling insulted by 70.129.253.107's cartoon swearing (%$&!) I found here (oh, the sweet irony...), and I'm sorry if I made your life harder, it wasn't intentional. Incidently, I know a thing or two about the languages of ex-Yugoslavia - I'm not claiming to be proficient, but if you ever have problems in that field, feel free to ask me. TomorrowTime 17:46, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the best approach is to have a page for each language such as Spanish profanity (see the category Profanity by language), delete the Foreign profanity article, and to keep the lists of profanities out of the main article. MarkBrooks 18:04, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Reversion

User 71.65.93.54 (Talk) is a disruptive vandal who reverted this article to an old version with the edit summary "Revert to prior edition". I'm unsure which revision the article was reverted to, but it was prior to Openlander moving some sections to Foreign profanity (on 2006-12-23 at 19:51:50 EST). The fact that content was added and not removed, along with the edit summary, may explain why no-one appeared to notice this vandalism. I am reverting again, to revision 98244991 as of 2007-01-03 15:18:55 EST by Gaius Cornelius (edit summary "Fix Capitalisation Typos: english → English, using AWB"). Any edits from the last three days will have to be looked at again. MarkBrooks 13:03, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Interlanguage

I'm not really sure what the point of this section is. It is perhaps appropriate to just briefly state that whereas in one language profane utterances are regarded as inherently offensive, in other languages similar utterances may have a completely different meaning (and cite one or two examples). The section as written is just listing a bunch of random examples the repeatedly make the same point but add no additional intellectual value to the discussion. Also, this section and the "Profanity in other languages" section seem to be trying to make some of the same points further adding to the question of why the Interlanguage section exists.

This section should be removed IMHO. --Mcorazao 21:01, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

History

Also, the history section is not really a history of the development of profanity. It is simply a brief discussion both of some random historical instances of using profanity and a discussion of some of the sociopolitical aspects of using profanity. As such the section is really mistitled (and a bit incoherent at that). --Mcorazao 21:01, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Fi*a

Hi! I made a minor edit changing the Italian word for "cunt" from fica to figa, because the second one is far more common then the first one. Thank you for your attention to this useless edit. Hades87 08:33, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

"WARNING - The following information may be offensive to some people.If you are easily offended then please scroll past this section or leave the site"

Definitely removed this... I don't know who put it in but Wikipedia isn't really censored. I mean the article on profanity is obviously going to have some profanity in it. Kind of like warning people that you might see a picture of a penis in Penis :P The entire article could be offensive to someone.. Hopefully I'm not overstepping any boundaries here people. Mrtea (talk) 16:27, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Someone seems to have been entertaining him/her-self by adding unusual "official looking" disclaimers in that part of the article. dr.ef.tymac 16:57, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

I think you did the right thing by removing that warning. I too think that it's rediculous has no place on Wikipedia. --Mears man 16:59, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

I think a warning similar to the spoiler warning might be good to have on Wikipedia, although not here, since I want the section to be split out entirely. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by NetRolller 3D (talk • contribs) 18:48, 26 April 2007 (UTC).

Split out profanity examples into List of English profanities

I think that the "Common examples" are not really encyclopedic. Reading back in the history of the article reveals that it was added by an anon, possibly meant to be vandalism, however it was not considered to be vandalism by subsequent editors. I think having a list of profanities (with definitions that better fit into Wiktionary than Wikipedia) in the article is like having lots of comments in the Comment article or integrating a computer virus into the article Computer virus. On the other hand, such a list is worth keeping (we even have a multi-language list of profanities!), so a good compromise would be splitting the list out into the article List of English profanities. --NetRolller 3D 13:55, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Can this page please be protected?

I think this page should be protected because it gets vandalized so much by anonymous users Cratbro 21:21, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

"verbal abuse" redirects here.

Verbal abuse is quite a different topic from profanity. Verbal abuse can occur without profanity; profanity can be used in a non-abusive way. Is there no better article toward which to direct "verbal abuse"? --63.25.251.198 12:53, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Agreed, this is a complete mess. Furthermore, Verbal Abuse links to a band. I think the best course of action is to create a stub article which I shall do now. -- Fursday 17:29, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

The WP:CENSOR tag at the top of the article

Isn't that supposed to be a talk page tag, not a main page one?--0rrAvenger 16:22, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I dunno if it's "supposed" to be just in a particular place, but I find very appropriate where it is now.--BMF81 18:29, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Hell?

I'm really not sure, but I certainly don't think that hell qualifies as a curse word.