Offensive posters for sale at freshers' week

[ImJustMadAboutSaffron]

I'm a university lecturer. I have been out and about on freshers' week to different buildings and come across a poster sale that is on for a few days. There are several options for sale, Harry Styles, Blink 182, Stranger Things, Billie Eilish, Mabel, lots of different ones. But three I find really offensive, and I imagine some students would, too:

A Buddha with the wording "Don't be a Ct"
A poster with "Fk Off" in different coloured fonts
Another with the same words taking up the whole poster

Asterisks mine. Think I am repressed if you like, I don't care!

A poster with "Fk Off" in different coloured fonts

That's the poster for me!!!

Oops typo- meant to delete the word not! Should have said-

Probably cynical here but doubt the university would support their right to sell that type of poster. Should all be allowed be it Buddha, Jesus, Muhammad, Hindu gods, Father Christmas, etc.

I think that's what I was agreeing with, @WhatWhereWho - I obviously got the gist!

Let the young uns have their little rebellions!

Of course they're immature and need to grow up they're Freshers. Wee, brand new adults, most of them away from their parents for the first time.😆

@minipeony I think that is the fundamental rule of most religions, though, isn’t it? Just expressed with a bit more enthusiasm. I wouldn’t say it was mocking the religion. I wouldn’t buy it myself (I’m 55 and a bit past posters on the walls, and I get annoyed that Blutack leaves grease marks) but I couldn’t get too worked up about a bit of swearing.

I'm 35 and the Buddah one made me laugh. I would love that for my home office!

I honestly thought you were going to say much, much worse, like "rape" posters. You could buy the sort of posters you mention in the 1970's!

If the poster is designed by a Buddhist then fine

Indeed you did! But it's worrying how different things would probably be.

Is it though? Fundamental rule of all religions seems to be follow our rules some of which most definitely make you an arsehole.

As a lecturer, you must surely have seen Fresher's Week merchandise before? Students have been buying offensive posters for decades. It's kind of their role to challenge society, even if this is a very passive, mainstream way of doing it!

"Asterisks mine. Think I am repressed if you like, I don't care!"

There aren't any asterisks in your OP.

I think this is a phenomenon that many people miss with Gen z. Swearing, largely, means nothing. Even the c bomb. However, slurs are much more offensive to Gen Z than they were in my day ( gen x'er)
Of course, it's just anecdotal, based on my three teens and their friends, but it seems to be the case quite frequently.

There were when I wrote it. Mumsnet must have removed them.

A 3rd party selling posters with "Fuck off" written on them on university grounds does not, in any way, bring the university into disrepute.

That's just daft.

Yes it does if they feature a religious symbol

When you pressed post, the forum software interpreted the asterisks as formatting tags intended to place some text in bold.

The Buddha poster is definitely offensive. I'm a Catholic, and imagine a Buddhist would feel about this as I do when folks do likewise to images of Jesus. The other posters don't cross the line into blasphemy and mocking someone else's faith. As a culture we've lost the battle against profanity, so there's nowt we can do there. But appropriating an image from someone else's faith and mocking it is certainly offensive.

Fuck sake.
There are people fleeing wars just now.
It's a poster.
Get a grip.

This should be a poster.

I see what others mean about the Buddha poster potentially being offensive. I'm not sure it is though, really. What does "don't be a cunt" mean to the person who wrote it? Probably something like "don't be unnecessarily unpleasant to others" or "behave to others as you would have them behave to you " or "avoid creating unnecessary suffering for others".

Not to do any evil; to cultivate good; to purify one's heart - this is the teaching of all the Buddhas.
https://www.thebuddhistsociety.org/page/fundamental-teachings^^

So, "don't be a cunt" doesn't seem like the worst message to put in the mouth of the Buddha Gautama.

Yes, of course the poster is intended to shock by the use of taboo language. And part of the shock value is in putting such offensive words in a context where you really don't expect to see them. Buddhists wouldn't use such words, partly because they would understand that doing so could offend others and cause suffering to them at some level. But the actual message, looking beyond the choice of words, isn't far from Buddhist teaching.

On balance, I don't think this is necessarily inherently offensive to or about Buddhism, though that's not to say some individual Buddhists won't find it offensive. It certainly isn't "blasphemous" in Buddhist terms because Buddhism, in common with Hinduism, has no concept of blasphemy as it's understood in Abrahamic religions.

You’re a university lecturer who feels offended by studenty posters with swear words, but enthusiastically agrees that all students are snowflakes who would have a breakdown and sue for trauma on being accidentally misgendered? And also fails to understand the most basic text formatting functions on a chat forum they frequent? How encouraging

This os nothing new and it signifies nothing. Being childishly outrageous is part of being a student/young person.

I used to wear a T-shirt to uni in the mid 80s with a picture of a naked Jesus with a huge drooping penis and the words Jesus Fuck written across it. Posters with swear words on them were available, but I papered my room with pictures of my favourite bands and pages cut out from 2000AD. I loved ear splitting violent music. Fun times!

Its par for the course these days and people like shocking things. I think most won’t be offended.