Posted on 09/23/2010 4:10:41 PM PDT by don-o
It’s not getting any better, bump.
I had a drill Sgt in Army Basic Training (back when it was hard, ha ha) who, unlike the other Sgts, never cussed or swore. However, he could make you feel about 1 foot tall with just a few words.
LOL
English is a wonderful language, full of expressive constructs, as the author of your tag quote well showed.
Yep! I've tried to use that Sgt I had as an example - (not always successfully) that you don't need to drop the F bomb every sentence to get a point across. The guy left a big impression on me.
Thanks Hack. It can be done. Thing is to first recognize when we are doing less than our best as far as expressing our thoughts in our writing or our speech.
Thank you, Don-O, for your reference to this thread on another thread. I really, really appreciate your thread, which I had not seen before now.
I have said nothing on the profanity issue here because the culture of different boards varies and it's not my place to set the rules. I live outside a large Army installation and I am not unfamiliar with coarse language. Hacksaw, Arrowhead1952 and ViLaLuz are quite aware of the phenomenon of young 18-year-old privates who think they're big guys now that they got away from momma and learned to shoot bad guys, so they got a tattoo and a pottymouth to go with it.
I will never forget the time a retired Army master sergeant interrupted me and chewed me out for something I had just said.
His point was that there was no excuse for profanity. It may make us feel mean and tough, but it doesn't convince people we're right and may easily do the opposite.
I suppose I could also add the example of a somewhat left-of-center reporter for one of my competitors. We had a certain elected official whose board I had been covering for years, and he routinely swore in public at those meetings. All the rest of the reporters, including me, had gotten used to it over the years. But suddenly when his coarse language became cursing, she spoke up and rebuked him for taking God's name in vain.
Not only did he shut up, he was shocked -- obviously nobody had **EVER** challenged him before on his language and he had no ides what to say.
It's been several years now; the reporter has moved on to another job and the elected official lost a bid to return to office, but the rest of the reporters who cover that particular group still talk about how all the rest of us "jaded old guys" had gotten used to gutter talk from the elected official and it took a young reporter in her second job out of college to say what we all should have said years earlier.
The anonymity of the internet has not improved manners, and I think much of that is due to a lack of accountability for our actions.
Thanks for posting.
Thank you darrellmaurina. I also think swearing and cursing can become an ingrained bad habit. All it does is knock down the credibility of the owner’s tongue.
We’ve both been here a long time.
I think you’re only remembering the good times and not the bad.
There have been major flame wars with lots of ugly words here over the years. It seems to come and go in waves. If anything it seems more mild today than 10 years ago, particularly due to having moderators which we didn’t use to have.
Sometimes I curse in a foreign language and nobody knows...(except a few)
What I’m seeing today is more and more of the F word. And I am not talking about flame wars, which can be conducted in standard English.
General George Washington’s Order Against Profanity
The General is sorry to be informed that the foolish and wicked practice of profane cursing and swearing, a vice hitherto little known in our American Army is growing into fashion. He hopes that the officers will, by example as well as influence, endeavor to check it and that both they and the men will reflect that we can little hope of the blessing of Heaven on our army if we insult it by our impiety and folly. Added to this it is a vice so mean and low without any temptation that every man of sense and character detests and despises it.
It’s the Jon Stewartization of America. I always wonder about the “cool” guys who have small children, and their mouths are full of the meanest, nastiest filth.
Could we put the term “Epic Fail” on your list of swear words that should never be used on this forum?
What list would that be? The posting rule states "no profanity." If you want to discuss what constitutes profanity, have at it.
Heck freaking flipping right. With Obama it is just a way of venting. it does not make anyone any less intelligent. As a matter of fact it makes the curser that says FUBO more intelligent with common sense as they can SEE the takeover and Obama purposefully creating class and racial war fare.
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