to think the use of the term C****** is really not necessary

[merrywidow]

Well ?

LOL Lochness... I would, but I "can't". Tee hee.

Toria - you should realise what other people think when you use it. Not everyone will think it, but a lot will.

Thanks, MyLife, its affectionate isn't it?

I'm not a total prude btw. Say the f word far too much. Not proud of it. Though I don't put it in print.

I totally get the moist thing. Yuk! Also hate the word fanny.
Although I would never judge anyone for using either of those words just because I don't like them.

Blackswan, how do you know a lot will?

Depends on the context of use surely?

If I was to call par example my daughter a cunt then yes you would be correct in your assumptions.

If I had called the person who drove through a massive muddy puddy at great speed so it splashed over both of us whilst exiting the surgery car park, a cunt, I think it would get a different reaction.

It's absurd to conclude that someone is uneducated based on the words they choose.

Linguistically speaking, all words are equal. No word is inherently more or less valid or valuable than the rest. People make word choices for all sorts of reasons; you can't know. It is deeply presumptuous to conclude that you do know.

Saying that use of a particular word makes someone sound "uneducated" is silly nonsense. It does no such thing, not in an objective sense. Maybe you do draw that conclusion yourself; but if so, you're just revealing the narrowness of your own education.

But my point with my friend was that everyone has words they dislike, if I worried I was going to offend someone everytime I opened my mouth I'd never speak! I'm clearly not alone here, and TBH, people can think what they want about me. I work with several people who think I'm vulgar for having tattoos, I have twelve piercings in my ears and my nose is pierced. I used to dye my hair various bright colours (it's currently a chesnutty red, the most sensible I've been in years) Already I've offended about half the demographic just by leaving the house. My use of one word over another does not make one blind bit of difference IMO.

Anyone who gets offended by my choice of swearwords (I don't swear like a trooper btw, but I do swear when, for example, I stab myself with a screwdriver at work) is probably going to be offended by lots of other things I do in my daily life so I don't concern myself. What would be the point?

As an aside. Where I grew up Twat'ead was a common insult, no worse than fanny, fud or knob, but if I lived where my uncle grew up, in the North of England, I'm pretty sure I'd have been slapped for it.

DirtyMartini I often add innit to sentences to wind up my grammar pedant husband

And BlackSwan, why is writing something down worse than saying it? (genuinely interested)

I wanted to ask the same thing of BlackSwan.....

Perhaps it's the permanence of writing it down. Or because I can see how bad it looks. All comes down to shame at using a bad word?

I hardly think I'm out on a limb to suggest lots of people would find the c word unpleasant and confronting, or at the very least would think it reflects poorly on the person saying it. To me it's like saying fuck a thousand times in a sentence, it's just attention seeking and common.

There, I wrote it down.

ah, so is it attention seeking or uneducated then?

just wondered, as if I'm trying to draw attention to a seriously unacceptable situation I will use the word 'cunt'. Then you'd get the point I was really rather unhappy about it, wouldn't you?

So job done.

It doesn't give any pointers as to my actual level of education.

I do understand that saying it is spontaneous whereas posting it is considered. I swear aloud a lot more than I swear in writing. Unfortunately children have meant my swearing aloud is based on meaningless alliterative phrases.

Uneducated. Uneducated doesn't necessarily mean you lack a formal education. It can also mean you don't know better...say, than to use such a low word. Geddit?

Sure, lots of people would think that. But lots of other people wouldn't think it at all.

It's just something you don't like - that is completely fair enough. That doesn't mean, though, that there is something inherently reprehensible about it. It is subjective, and that's fine. There is no right or wrong re vocabulary, providing one gets the meaning right (unlike, say, grammar, where it's fine to be prescriptive).

I guess where we disagree is on the idea that you can draw reliable conclusions about someone on the basis of their decision to use the word.

I think you would probably find BlackSwan that a lot of people do find it offensive, and those that use it are aware of this fact.

And its use in the context of ' well I'm going to say it anyway as I don't care what you think' attitude, is by nature inconsiderate of others sensitivity and that can be deemed ignorant, which then gives rise to the thought that the person is less educated

Sure. No right or wrong. I just don't like it. True.

yeah, of course i do

just wanted a bit of rise out of you [innit]

go on, call me a cunt, i've been one all night

"you don't know better than to use such a low word"

OK, I give up because that's just silly.

YAWN

CUNT

If you were my friend, and you used 'c' with any kind of regularity, our friendship would be short-lived.

But I think that scenario fairly unlikely. Don't you?

Yes, YAWN. To bed.

night all

Ok, my last post on the matter as with the nature of this we will always have to agree to disagree and I'm getting tired now.

Being deliberately obnoxious will, of course, piss people off. But I'm not. And I imagine the majority of the people on here who use the word on a regular basis aren't. Speaking only for myself, I don't go around calling everyone under the sun a cunt just to see the reaction. But I do refuse to censor myself just in case I might offend someone.

Yeah, exactly Toria - context is everything. You can use a lot of innocuous words in terribly offensive, cruel ways, and by the same token there are lots of inflammatory words with bad associations (like cunting, or even something like "nigger") that people out there in the world can and do find positive, witty or neutralizing uses for.

Right, I'm off too, half asleep.

I am sorry for all of you that think its acceptable or funny. The English language has a huge choice of words in its repertoire. Can you not think of anything better or have you been watching too much day time tv and reading 'Hello'? Do you not want your children to grow up articulate and respectful?