SWEARING: Fun For All The Family

WARNING: VERY, VERY SWEARY 
and not very grown-up

Emergency Exit: HERE

I've probably covered this before. Fuck it.

If you hadn't guessed, I really like swearing. I love to swear. Unlike many, many people who do it a lot, I'm very good at it. Just the other evening, in fact, a young man complimented me on my ability to deliver the word 'C**t'¹ with the necessary verve to do it well². I thank you, young man. And, speaking of small boys, my pre-teen son pointed out to me yesterday that I had taught him all the swearwords he knows³. This is true. He also pointed out that I had done so at bedtime, usually after we’d finished reading the daily portion of Narnia.

Fun and Educational

Well? What better way to learn them? We sit together giggling like fools and rolling lovely short vowels around in our mouths. Short vowels; chopped consonants. There is poetry in swearing, and therein lies its pleasure. Ok, he has heard me say them in anger, and I regret that; he chastises me for it. But he fully understands the difference between a well-placed profanity for humorous effect, and a diatribe of obscenities spouting from pure ignorance. Fuck me, the lad’s a sharp one⁴.

Here comes the point: there is poetry in swearing, and that is why it is pleasing to the ear. Here are some examples of my reasoning (I should point out at this stage, I feel, that I have conducted no research into my theories; I have consulted no Learned Linguists, nor have I pored over peer-reviewed papers; I haven’t even typed ‘nob’ into Wiki or Google. ’Sjust wot I fink. So there. I’m the fucking Pope):

SOMETIMES ONLY A SHORT VOWEL WILL DO. We know that Fuck, Piss, and Shit have their origins in Anglo-Saxon times. I don’t know if Anglo-Saxons shouted those words when they hit their thumbs with hammers, but the native tongue seems to require a short, punchy sound when such a thing happens. So knock yourself out. Latin and French aren’t going to do the job. And besides, ‘C**t’ was good enough for Chaucer.

Fun and Educational

POETRY PLEASE “Assonance means getting the rhyme wrong.”⁵ No, but ‘swan’ and ‘stone’ is a bad example. Assonance (the rhyming of the vowels but not the consonants) is immensely pleasing to the ear. I’d give you some other examples, but I can’t be arsed to come up with any – it’s late. But so often the rhyming vowels, the echoed syllable, form part of the pleasure in saying words like ‘motherfucker’; ‘bellend’; and ‘bollocks’ – which is particularly lovely as one’s tongue has to roll round that delightfully onomatopoeic -ollo- combination in the middle. It even resembles the male genitalia when written down. It’s an absolute gift.

Furthermore, the proof of this theory lies in the propensity for creative compound swearing. Admittedly we have moved on from the tame and tabloidesque ‘studmuffin’, but who hasn’t laughed immoderately when a much-esteemed social media acquaintance accuses one of ‘cockwombling fuckmuffery’? The little scamps.

Poop-chute. Bunglec**t. Jizz-Wizard. Fucktrumpet. Not very grown-up; don’t care. 

SEXIST? MOI? There are numerous objections to the use of references to the female genitalia in pejorative terms. Again, that’s not an argument I wish to go into. However, whilst no-one is in doubt of one’s meaning when one refers to another as a ‘twat’, one may be equally sure that, had one said ‘prick’, ‘dickhead’, ‘cock’ or ‘nobstick’, no compliment was intended either. 

Nobstick. See, that’s funny.

Fun and Educational

I FUCKING LOVE FOOTNOTES

¹ There is no hypocrisy in the asterisks. 'C**t' tops the official Ofcom list of words found offensive by the British public⁶, and though I use it, I don't do so on stage or social media. I don't intend to cause offence, believe it or not. I know where to draw the line. Sort of

² ‘Pussy’ is another one. Very few can say that word at all. They’re so afraid of it that it comes out as ‘Pissy’. For fuck’s sake, People. If you’re that afraid of it, don’t even try

³ Within reason. I’m a Lady. He’s got plenty more to learn yet

⁴ He has never, ever sworn in anger, in my hearing. What he says with his peers is his business. He keeps it out of the house

⁵ Frank, in ‘Educating Rita’, by Willy Russell

⁶ Now, that is actual research. I downloaded the .pdf and everything

Live And Let Live. Grow and Let Grow. Something About Kissing.

Oh fuck me, I’ve come over all ranty again.

It’s Movember: the time of year when – first and foremost – the campaign to raise awareness of prostate/testicular cancer¹ gets its biggest slice of the attention-pie all year. That is, after all, what Movember is for, and I hope that actual fundraising takes place, besides all the moustache baby-steps and hirsute guffaws. I’m all for it. Anything that makes a difference; bonds men together; makes people happy and adds fur to faces – those are all boxes to be ticked in my opinion (woo – there’s that word again, Mu’s favourite). After all, I am heavily involved in the Bearding Community and I have seen first-hand the good that Beard Clubs do, not just in raising funds for charities but right down on a personal level. Beards Help Their Brothers.

 

Some lovely Bearded Gentlemen. The Wessex Beardsmen, in fact.

Naturally, SocMed fills up with the usual memes relating to moustache growth; beards; shaving; not shaving; the superior ability of the one faction to ‘get pussy’ compared to the propensity for the other faction to actually have one, or be one, or something equally droll. These are met with laughter and/or derision, depending on the point of view – nay, the OPINION – of the other users. 

A new one this year was along the lines of (um), “She Says She’s Doing No-Shave November – She Better Get Ready For No-‘D’ December”. I’m not posting the meme here, for fuck’s sake, you’ve seen it enough times. I gather the implications are

• ·        that the Girlfriend of the Male in question is planning to stop shaving one or more body areas from which she is habitually inclined to undertake hair removal;

• ·        the Male is repulsed by the prospect of the Girlfriend acquiring a month’s worth of hair growth in said areas;

• ·        the Male proposes, presumably as an intended punishment, withholding sexual intercourse (the “D”, if you will) for the month following

It is unclear whether the Male intends to continue engaging in intimate acts with the Girlfriend during the month of November, nor is it clear whether the Girlfriend will revert to her usual state of depilatory satisfaction in time for the apparent penance of ‘No-D December’.

I am struggling with the logic here. Surely the Male will punish himself twice:

 - firstly, by forcing himself to have to commit acts which, though normally pleasurable, will disgust him (but not her, presumably) because he is having to do them with a lady of a very slightly more hirsute appearance during November;

 - then, for the month following, by which time the Girlfriend has become smooth and therefore, to him, desirable once more, by declining to engage in said acts despite the offending follicles being made bare of their growth in accordance with his preference?

Entirely gratuitous Jimmy Niggles shot. What? My blog...

Now, I know what you’re thinking. Mu, you’re thinking, Stop over-thinking it. It’s just a meme, and not a very good one at that. Well! Clearly I am not the only one to over-think things. ‘Swhat the Internets is for! This meme appeared in a ‘Closed’ Facebook group where, it must be said, nearly² all of the members are of sound mind and sense of humour: warm, kind, tolerant, and always happy to laugh at the ridiculous. The passion which unites us is for The Beard, and we don’t seem to care whether it’s on a man or a lady: all are welcomed with love and respect. It’s great.

However, this meme proved divisive. Debates began. Insults were thrown. True colours showed. Members left. Others laughed. I won’t repeat any of it – it’s all filed under YHTBT³. But it got me thinking about Feminism. Again, not a debate I plan to open, but I will say this: it is possible to be a Feminist and still shave your legs. Not every woman – not every Feminist – sees hair removal as a symptom of male oppression. If you are happy with your reasons for shaving – or for not shaving – great. That’s all you need. I don’t care if your reason is ‘Because my boyfriend prefers it’: if that’s your choice, that’s fine with me.  Why does it even need to be ‘fine with me’? See previous blogs where OPINIONS are concerned! Stop reading! You don’t need to care what I think! I barely give a fuck myself! There are bigger issues to be tackled by the Feminist movement than the choice of body hair removal. But to the men who buy into this ‘No-D December’ nonsense⁴, ask yourselves a couple of questions:

• ·        Do you think women’s body hair is gross because your friends say so?

• ·        Or because you watch a lot of porn?

Photo: Nash.  Meme: Me.

• ·        Or are you so ungrateful that the woman who lies down beside you actually desires you (whatever state you may be in) that you can’t look past a bit of leg stubble or even a hairy armpit?

If your answer is yes to any of these, seriously, grow the fuck up. Grow the fuck up. Body hair is unimportant. What we do with it is unimportant. Don’t use it as a tool for oppression, a symbol of liberation, don’t use it as anything. Shave it; don’t shave it; do with it as it pleases you. Respect the right of others to do with theirs as it pleases them⁵.

You know, though… I got to thinking. Again. If I were a man, yeah,

and I was having sex with a lady, yeah,

and I found she had hairy armpits, yeah,

that would be kind of cool. It would be like finding a little mini-beard in a place I wasn’t expecting.

A mini-beard! Amazing!

Women are beautiful. Men are beautiful.

Do you know what’s really amazing? Kissing. There should be more kissing. There just should.

¹The Movember movement also supports men’s mental health. I approve this warmly. Love. Respect. Kindness. Compassion. Everyone. Women and Men.

²I say Nearly. Clearly one or two of them turned out to be misogynist pricks. Or maybe they were misunderstood; Judge Not Lest Ye Be Judged. Thou Shalt Not Be A Keyboard Warrior. And all that shit

³You Had To Be There. That’s where it’s filed

⁴No, I know it’s not really a ‘thing’. But there are people out there who take memes more seriously than they should. For example, I’ve got a thousand words out of doing just that

⁵My own feminine horticultural arrangements remain, however, my business and mine alone. I will not be drawn on this⁶

⁶And no, I don’t mean it’s drawn on. Fuck’s sake. But you know, I do love a footnote

POTASSIUM. IODINE. SULFUR. SULFUR. EINSTEINIUM. Give Me. Til I Beg You To Stop

 

Fuck, that's beautiful (science.howstuffworks.com)

My friend Peter is witty, dashing and erudite - not to mention exceptionally highly-skilled in leatherwork*... in fact, now I come to think about it, he's quite a Catch, girls - but I am very cross with him tonight.

No I'm not. Not really. And Peter, I am sure I never could be. I'm just cross because I read your message too late and, as a result, discovered that I had altogether missed an occasion which will, in years to come, feature on my calendar of events with a glittering star. You see, ladies and gentlemen, today was 

MOLE DAY

Yes - Mole Day. It's a thing. From 6:02am to 6:02pm, those who appreciate SI units in the way they should be appreciated (firmly and without blinking) may sit in silence at their desks, wishing beyond wishes that someone would ask them why they look smug. So they could explain, with diagrams, and probably a flipchart, why Amadeo Avogadro is such a fucking dude. Geeks are hot.

flickr.com

I'm not going to explain it. I've put links so you can find out for yourselves. I just love the beauty of the logic which led him to conclude that, in order to compare like with like, that 'like' must first be defined. So he did it on a molecular level, because mere size, mass and volume were insufficient. And in doing so, he gave us the prettiest of numbers:
 6.0221412927 x 10²³.  
Avogadro's Constant. Or Avogadro's Mole. I love it. There, you see? Follow the link, Wiki will tell you what you need to know.

www.scienceteacher.com

That's more like it. I'm just trying to convince you that my interest in, and knowledge of, the Scientific World extends beyond the Infinite Monkey Cage and attempting to make rude words out of the periodic table. 

Well, Bismuth Tellurium Murium Yttrium Arsenic Sulfur, Molybdenum Thorium Erbium Fluorine Uranium Carbon Potassium Erbium Sulfur**.  Now go to the footnotes. Then peer-review me, because I'm clearly gagging for it.

*Peter made me this. Ha - made you look. Check out that leatherwork though...

photo: Nash

**Yes, I made one of those up. Had to. Never let facts get in the way of a running joke