Why is our population so fond of swearing?

[krazykidd]

Honestly tho, cussing every two words destroys the original purpose of swearing in the first place. Curses are meant to be used with some form of caution and "respect", not to describe how fat someone is, or how mad you are at your parents.

How do you know what the 'original purpose' of swearing was, or how they are 'meant' to be used? What makes you think our population is abnormal in it's fondness for swearing?

Really ? This is your argument? How does anyone know the original purpose of anything? Either a) they were there when it happened or was conceived or b) research . I mean comon i'm pretty sure you are smarter than your post leads on .

OT: swearing puts emphasis on what you are trying to say . If i was to say , i am having a bad day , you would think that my day was bad . Now if i say , i am having a fucking bad day , you realise that my day was not only bad , but i was probably having a really bad or a terrible day .

This emphasis does not become less the more i swear , like if i say : Fuck , i am fucking having a fucking bad day , you are likely to think my day has gone to hell and is no longer redeemable . And so on and so forth .

 

[ChupathingyX]

They're sentence enhancers.

Plus sometimes they just make something more funny or are used to relive stress and/or vent.

That and at least in my experience nearly everyone has become so desensistised to them that they've become common place in our society and saying some thing like "That's fucking shit!" will be met with the response "Fuck yeah!".

 

[BrassButtons]

Really ? This is your argument? How does anyone know the original purpose of anything? Either a) they were there when it happened or was conceived or b) research .

What research? We can't even be sure what the first swear words were. Language predates writing. We can't really discuss original swear words, because they likely arose before writing (and thus before there would be any record for us to study). So we can't say how the first swear words were used, which means we have no idea if swear use today is similar or different. The OP is requesting explanations for things that may not even be occurring (increased use of swears compared to other populations and usage of swears in ways other than how they were originally intended).

 

[spartan231490]

This is hilarious. Firstly you talk about having respect for language. You then proceed to type "tho" rather than "though", and use the offensive slur "fag" which is far worse than saying "fuck" (which you avoided) because it is actually targetting a particular group.

See, I would say that a term which is offensive to everyone is worse than a term that is only offensive to a small portion of the population. Perhaps that's just me, but it seems logical.

Cursing is more common because cursing doesn't mean the same thing it used to. Language is dynamic, and curses are rapidly becoming something more akin to prepositions than their original form. They don't really have any meaning any more, except two things. If you're angry, they're just a way to blow off steam, to calm down. If you're not really angry, they just emphasize the next word.

Previously, they all started out as simple words, with meanings just like any other, that were a bit offensive for one reason or another. Then, they became "bad words," considered rude in polite conversation, and inappropriate for children to hear. Because of the infrequency of their use, these words then gained even more weight, intended to show extremes of emotion, when your control was so eroded by emotion that you couldn't control yourself any longer. Perhaps because of this stigma, our generation started using them to seem more adult, or more tough, until they became ingrained in our vocabulary. Perhaps it is some other random reason.

Disclaimer: I'm not an expert on the English language, this is an opinion I've formed from reading classic literature from different decades.

 

[manic_depressive13]

This is hilarious. Firstly you talk about having respect for language. You then proceed to type "tho" rather than "though", and use the offensive slur "fag" which is far worse than saying "fuck" (which you avoided) because it is actually targetting a particular group.

See, I would say that a term which is offensive to everyone is worse than a term that is only offensive to a small portion of the population. Perhaps that's just me, but it seems logical.

But fuck isn't offensive to anyone. The fact is that targetted slurs are more hurtful because they often reflect social attitudes and they attack an aspect of someone's identity which that person can't change. For this reason "******" and "fag" will always be more offensive than "fuck". It's just common sense. "Fuck" doesn't mean anything. It may be used for everything from emphasis to crudely describing sex. The other slurs have years of persecution and discrimination attached to them, and some of these attitudes pervade in society even to this day. I can't believe I'm having to explain this.