*I can stand when people blaspheme and say Ch*** as if its a swear word*

[Serendipity30]

I can stand when people blaspheme and say Ch* as if its a swear word do people think its cool?? People say they are tolerant of peoples faith but situations like that make me wonder I literally wince when people say it. I refuse to believe I ABU

We wouldn't like it if eg our child's name was casually used as an expletive

"Oh Tarquin Warburton" - That could work you know!

As far as I'm aware, not many people use the name of Mohammed, Allah, buddha [sic] etc, as an expletive, not just because in the west we have not learnt culturally to do so but because we know it would be deemed hurtful and offensive to those who sincerely believe in those deities if we did. Some want to be hurtful and cause offense.

I couldn't disagree with your more on this point. The reason I don't say "Oh Buddha on a bike" when I stub my toe, is because when I grew up, I was not surrounded by the Buddhist culture. I was immersed in a Christian culture and unconsciously copied people around me (school / home /friends etc) and they all said "oh Christ". It has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that that intentional hurt is meant, it is purely a mental reflex action. If I grew up in a local environment where everyone said "oh fiddlesticks", then I would probably be saying that now instead!

The problem is, god made us imperfect, and you have to expect this sort of thing to occur.

Using someone's name as an expletive? Why not ask Ada or Nora, who are commonly used in conjunction with 'fucking'?

We say 'Fucking Ada' a fair bit around here. No-one's objected yet

And FWIW, I used to live in a Muslim country where 'Allah, Allah!' was commonly used to expressed disbelief (much as we'd use 'my god...'), as well as in other more volatile contexts.

Or poor old Gordon Bennett.

Oh yes, poor old Gordon Bennett!

dad, you are agreeing with me re we have not learnt culturally to do so

Haven't read the entire thread but have realised one thing - I say 'Ye Gads!' all the time and I rather enjoy it.

Also I met a Buddhist once who said 'Oh my Buddha' lots.

Springydaffs, I agree with much of what you say. I do appreciate that I should not dismiss an entire religion simply on the basis that the human representatives of that religion are often such tossers. BUT some part of me whispers that god sent a flood once to express his disgust with humanity, so what's holding him back now?

Reg and I could build another ark.

Or is it that the Old Testament is not the word of God? Two alpha courses later, I am none the wiser.

But I agree, god can take it. And I remain sceptical about being lectured on offensive behaviour by the religious. I think there should be more removing of logs from thine own eyes NOT because I blame religious people personally for the atrocities committed in the name of their faith but because they need to take responsibility at least to recognise and condemn bad behaviour.

I am not convinced enough do, but kudos to those who prove me wrong.

Lady Clarice, I will commute your sentence to a few thousand years in limbo.

Er, thanks?

I don't think I'm really going to hell or limbo anyway, because it's all a load of bollocks I'm quite a good person and Jesus wants me for a sunbeam.

BUT some part of me whispers that god sent a flood once to express his disgust with humanity, so what's holding him back now?

He promised not to, and invented the rainbow as a sign that he'd never pull that stunt again. Maybe he belatedly realised that drowning all the dinosaurs wasn't a nice thing to have done

Grimma, well that makes perfect sense, why couldn't they have just told me that?

They sent two course leaders to my table the last Alpha course I did as in think I was a deemed trouble maker for Asking any Awkward Questions.

Dunno - its the sort of thing I knew at the age of about 5 when at Sunday School they'd tell this nice story about how Noah rescued lots of animals and then God kindly promised not to flood the earth again and made a pwetty wainbow.

Yeah, nice.

But THATS the kind of god I can look up to - not this wishy washy ooo well let's interpret the Bible in whatever way fits with our prevailing mood, let's draw a little curtain round Leviticus shall we?

No, I want smiting. lots of smiting. I wouldn't be going around saying Jesus H Christ if I was at risk of smiting would I?

Interestingly my mother told me that my first words were 'Jesus Christ!'. She had three children under three at one stage, so I will leave you to imagine the tone of her utterances.

To the OP - YANBU. I wince too, especially when it's said by children.

But many "expletives" such as struth (God'struth), jeez, crumbs etc are in place of saying God, Jesus or Christ. Not that it mkes them right, I just find it interesting that people have obviously wanted to use the proper names but found a way of saying them without actually saying them. IYSWIM.

Won't be long now - all the signs are there

they've been saying that since maybe a couple of months after the first Whitsun, you know

CreepyWeeBrackets business plan is relying on it though

I once read that most swearing could be categorised as either religious, sexual, or scatological. I don't know how culturally-specific that is, or whether it's just English.

But swearing, using Christian concepts, goes hand-in-hand with the churches' influence over Britain for 2000 years. I could hypothetically swear by Odin, Ra, or Demeter, but it would have no meaning to me in a moment after I'd stubbed my toe.

Religious swearing has to draw on the concepts you are culturally at home with. It's not that people are too scared to use the concepts of other religions, because they think non-Christian theists are more touchy.

It's that Christian imagery is part of their life.

But I thought the flood wiped out everyone apart from Noah and his family? And then they had to incestuously repopulate the earth?

So is he going to be a bit more specific now and only target the baddies?

But I thought the flood wiped out everyone apart from Noah and his family? And then they had to incestuously repopulate the earth?

Yes. According to a bible literalist I came across once, Adam and Eve had daughters which the bible didn't bother mentioning, so their grandkids were produced incestuously, so presumably the same pertains post-deluvian.

I thought it was that other tribes were around at the same time... not sure how this equates with Adam & Eve being the first people...

Post-diluvian there were Noah & his wife and their three sons and their wives. So not incestuous. But also there would have been other tribes because the flood was across the known world, Ie the Mediterranean basin & Middle East.

So god did not claim dominion over the unknown world? Had those tribes not been buggering each other and thus incurring his mighty Wrath?

I think I will go back to my lovely fantasy about me and Reg on the ark and how we are gamely going to have a bash at repopulating the earth.

YANBU. You do not have the right to censor other people's free speech just so that you won't be offended.

If people don't believe what you believe, there is absolutely no reason for them to modify their speech to fit in with your preferences. So please stop trying to use your delicate religious sensibilities to control other people's behaviour. If people saying CHRIST offends you, well, BE offended. It won't kill you.

but why do you have to say offensive things in the first place. would you go around saying '..... allah'. I don't think so because it would offend people but why it is acceptable to take Jesus's name in vain.

Is it because christianity is deemed white and western?

People cannot go around making homophobic or racist remarks and some people may argue that this is there right to free speech to use derogatory terms.

It should be a more level playing field.

No, alemci. That question has been asked and answered several times already in this thread. It's cultural, innit?

It's got bugger all to do with homophobia or racism either. As others have pointed out, you don't choose your race or sexuality, but you do choose your religion and have to accept that other people probably don't live by the same 'rules' and don't hold the same things as 'sacred'.

alemci - its just familiarity. People on the thread have noted that muslims do say 'allah' like people from western countries say 'god'