To not see why 'cunt' is a worse insult than many others?

[HeathcliffMoorland]

I never hear anyone outraged at someone being called a cock/dick/scrotum...

If there's something I'm missing and someone can tell me why I'm BU, I will happily change my ways.

Funny that 'Call me Dave' Cameron got so much criticism about using the T word recently. Perhaqps a little north-south divide there that he didn't realise.

ALouise - I love that birthday card!

"I think we are not too far apart and it may just be two sides of the same coin."

Exactly, claig. You can be heads

Claig - you are wrong.

But I haven't got the time to argue with this alright so I'm going to do this once and if you don't understand, fine. Not the end if the world.

Your argument is this:

words and thoughts are the same.

1. Words = Thoughts

if we use bad words then we'll have bad thoughts.

2. Bad words -> bad thoughts

more bad thoughts leads to more bad actions

3. bad thoughts -> bad actions

bad actions make society more unpleasant

4. bad actions -> bad society

okay let's talk about 1. I think my problem with this is that when you are thinking you having one clear thought ie 'Frankie Boyle is a cunt' but if you said it out loud people might hear: "Frankie Boyle is a bit annoying" or "Frankie Boyle is the worst of the worst" or "Frankie Boyle is a horrible person, but in an oddly clever way." so hopefully you can see that what you hear people saying isn't necessarily what they are thinking. It could be better or it could be worse than what they have said. One of the advantages of swearwords is that we can't let people know that Frankie Boyle is the lowest of the low with an appropriately strong word.

@ claig

Hmm, at the risk of sticking my nose into a debate which is getting along nicely without me... I don't agree with you about Boyle et al being 'liberal' in their use of swearwords.

I actually see Boyle as deeply, reactionarily conservative in that way because he relies on the inherent shock value of a word like 'cunt' in order to be funny (well, 'funny'...). He relies on there being a taboo, iyswim. His comedy really shores up taboos and divisions, imo.

Also, whilst I agree that no one individual can change the language, we can individually make conscious choices about how we regard the language and use it. To my understanding, the word 'cunt' originally applies to female genitalia, and is a direct and powerful way of referring to them. It is much less offensive than 'vagina', which, as someone else pointed out, is Latin for 'sheath for a sword'.

I find 'vagina' offensive, and find it offensive that that is the medically approved term. It is also notable that many slang words for female genitalia are similarly offensive in and of themselves: gash, wound, etc. They all imply either that women's genitalia are inherently dysfunctional or that they exist primarily in relation to/ service of men.

Whereas 'cunt', I think, does not. It simply refers to the anatomical thing itself. Er, is that making any sense...?

Therefore, when people misappropriate it to refer to people and not anatomical structures, and make it 'the worst word ever, for the most obnoxious people ever', that is offensive, imo, as it takes what ought to be a direct, even celebratory referent for an important part of women's bodies and turns it into a deadly insult, a word we can't all use freely without taint.

That is where the real offense lies, for me.

words ARE powerful. I think Cunt is such a revolting word because of the insulting and misogynist way it is employed by men. Reclaim it as your own if you want ladies, but I will never see it as a positive word in the same way that I will never see nigger as a positive word

On a side note, penis means tail...

I'd rather sheath any day.

But men call each other Cunts Dorothy...how is that misogynistic! They also call oneanother nobs, dickheads and cocks.

Exactly, Shanahan.

The other day, I called a friend of mine a nob in jest, and she called me a cock right back.

Does that make us misandric?

Shanahan

I think the difference with 'bad' words relating to men's bodies is that they just don't have the same negative force. It is the fact that cunt is seen to be so bad which marks the way in which a simple word for a part of a woman's anatomy I think originally 'queynte' in ME has become the worst word in the English language.

Whereas the fact that you can call someone a cock without dire offense, and even affectionately, means that men's bodies aren't really stigmatised by the use of that word as an 'insult'.

okay, tired and that sounds a bit circular now but do you see what i mean?

2. you connect sexual swearwords eg cunt with having negative feelings about disabilities but that doesn't make sense because how you feel about people with disabilities is unrelated to whether you think swearwords are acceptable.

For example, I recently had a car journey with a grandmother to whom saying any kind if swearword would be absolutely the mist reprehensible thing to her. The entire journey she made racist remarks about gypsies. So her not liking swearing didn't stop her being racist.

There are laws with punishments for racist discrimination and hate talk, and racism is extremely unacceptable to most of the younger generations. But swearing is more acceptable. Can you see how swearing more has not made them more racist or discriminatory in other ways?

3. Not all bad thoughts lead to bad actions. We aren't just held back by social taboos, but also the law and the police which discourages people from committing crimes. Breaking some taboos (ie swearing) doesn't mean we will break more important ones (like not pushing people over on the street for the sake of it) because they are not connected. Wanting to be violent toward people and wanting to use a naughty word when you are annoyed are very different.

4. is theoretically fine. But since all the steps 1 to 3 aren't the argument doesn't hold.

Inga Muscio's book is amazing, all women should read it

where I live, cunt can also be used as a term of endearment (i kid you not!).

eg meeting a friend 'awrite, ya cunt!hows you?'

doesnt bother me-it is just a word.

"the worst word in the English language."

It's not 'the worst word'- this implies that it is ineffective at signifying something, which is the only function a word has. It is (currently) the most appropriate word to shock and offend. It is the best word for a bad thing.

"Whereas the fact that you can call someone a cock without dire offense, and even affectionately, means that men's bodies aren't really stigmatised by the use of that word as an 'insult'."

I don't agree that this is necessarily the case. Words have dual meanings. You can call someone a twat without dire offence. Why is it different?

Good point about Frankie Boyle though.

LaWeaselMys, I agree that people may misunderstand the speaker's intent. When I use the term 'progressive', I mean it in a different sense to when Ed Miliband uses it.
But 'cunt' is such a strong word, that there is often no room for misunderstanding. In fact 'cunt' is not used frequently in polite society (a la Jane Austen) and therefore anyone who uses it is using it with emphatic meaning, which most people understand. It is a great word and can be used in certain situations, but there are times when it is inappropriate to use it. I think that its liberal use breaks the barrier that prevents its liberal use. I think the barrier is there to stop the dyke overflowing. If it is used liberally, it will bring with it many other offensive thoughts and possibly actions as the dyke overflows and everything gets swept up in the stream.

I don't think the word cunt is used liberally it certainly would not be allowed in film with less than an 18 rating, would never be on the BBC, might be on TV late at night but certainly past watershed, probably past 11. Not exactly children's viewing time, and adults can decide for themselves if they want to hear it or whether it's appropriate to use.

Please read the rest of my points and have a think about it.

If you don't like the word cunt that's totally fine, but I would really like it if you could understand why your argument doesn't make sense and that you would be more convincing if you could try and think about it differently and come up with another argument.

*never on the BBC apart from by accident and then Spoofed andlaughed about a lot.

Christ I sound condescending. Sorry, I'm just frustrated.

Cheers tethers

But - 'it is the best word for a bad thing -- er, given that I'm saying that 'cunt' refers to women's genitalia originally do you mean that fanjos are evil?

Sorry might be misunderstanding you there, hope I am...

btw, when I say 'worst word etc', I'm doing that in implied inverted commas, sorry if that's not clear. I mean 'worst' in the estimation of people who use it that way.

'I actually see Boyle as deeply, reactionarily conservative in that way because he relies on the inherent shock value of a word like 'cunt' in order to be funny (well, 'funny'...). He relies on there being a taboo, iyswim. His comedy really shores up taboos and divisions, imo.'

Frankie Boyle is a progressive, not a conservative. Conservatives seek to maintain teh standards, norms and rules of society and progressives seek to change them to create progress. This is from a Times interview with Boyle

'Citing Noam Chomsky and George Monbiot as influences, Boyle believes comedy is one of the last art-forms in which subversive, progressive ideas can be smuggled into the mainstream.'

Many progressives want to smuggle ideas into the mainstrean, to change the mainstream, to change society. Some of them are revolutionaries and seek to achieve this change by overturning society's conventions and destabilising the bourgeois Daily Mail type middle classes. To do this they often seek to extend boundaries, push limits and epater le bourgeois. Opening the sluice gates to offensive jokes and swear words is one way to shock and jolt conservative society and bring forth progressive change.

it will bring with it many other offensive thoughts and possibly actions as the dyke overflows

Forgive me, but I just spat out tea at the unintended pun...

Claig

Frankie Boyle can claim to be whatever he likes, doesn't mean he is.

I could say I was an anarchist and work in a bank while supporting the conservative party. I would obviously NOT be an anarchist, but nobody can stop me from saying it.

"But - 'it is the best word for a bad thing -- er, given that I'm saying that 'cunt' refers to women's genitalia originally do you mean that fanjos are evil?"

You are most definitely misunderstanding me

I am saying that the word cunt has a dual meaning- a bad person and female genitalia. This no more implies that fanjos are evil than the use of the word pussy implies that they are cowardly or twat implies that they are silly.

claig, I suppose that although Frankie Boyle asserts that smuggling progressive ideas into the mainstream is his motivation, were he (and others) successful, RevoltingPeasant is saying that he would be out of a job. In other words, his career (or at least his act) relies on him being unsuccessful in his intention.

LaWeaselMys,
'2) you connect sexual swearwords eg cunt with having negative feelings about disabilities but that doesn't make sense because how you feel about people with disabilities is unrelated to whether you think swearwords are acceptable.'

No I don't make the direct connection, but I do think there is an indirect connection and not just to disabled people. I see the increasing use of the word 'cunt' in more and more situations as a breaking of societal norms and as evidence of increasing disrespect for society. I think this disrespect will manifest itself as disrespect for other people in many instances. I don't see it as a discrete phenomenon, with no interrelationship to society and its norms.

Yes people can be racist and not swear. I am not saying that they will go hand in hand with every person. many of us swear but we aren't racists. However, there will be an increasing numvber of people who will become racist as they transgress society's rules and will not fear transgressing them in other senses. Swearing was a self-policing societal norm. But to prevent open racist comments, laws have to be created. Without these laws, the incidence of racism would be far greater. Removing self-policing and societal conventions and pressures, will mean that more laws will be needed to polic people's behaviour.

I think the essential difference between us is that you think that swearing is not connected to other actions in society. I think it is connected, because society had a self-policing policy against it. As that is steadily removed, society will feel its impact.