My take on profanity:

It's just words. They're only offensive if you think they are.

However, that doesn't mean that just because there's no reason they should be offensive that you get to disregard tact and respect. If you are around someone you know would be offended, hold your tongue. Lol pretty simple. But I feel no compunction about it when it's people who can handle it, like my friends, or here, or anywhere on my college campus. It's just not a big deal to me, though I realize and respect that it is a big deal to others. Our first duty is to each other after all.

Thanks otto.

The frack is from Battlestar Galactica (both versions) and frell is from Farscape.

As far as my cussing. I'm a former Marine. I learned to swear over my breakfast instead of pray over it. And if you ever ate a Marine breakfast, you'd understand that you either prayed it didn't kill you or sweared at it for tasting so bad.

I am currently writing a research on swearing. It has negative effects in three ways:

A. It offends some people
B. The results of swearing is an ignorance of vocabulary
C. It offends some people

Fuck.

Just been reading about such things in the Army (UK National Service days). Some very interesting comments, including a great reference to a mechanic whose language skills had degenerated to describing a mechanical problem as, 'The fooking fooker's fooked', in Scouse.

That sounds Irish!

You heard about the 90 year old man who was describing his days as a pilot in WWI to a crowd of middle schoolers.

"So there I was twisting and turning and trying to get the focker off of me when I hear his machine guns firing. So I pulled up hard and I tell you that focker could really climb. He kept up with me no problem...."

Every time he'd say "focker," the class would all gigle. Finally the teacher stopped him for a moment and explained to the class that a Focker was a type of German airplane. then she let the old guy continue...

"Well, I guess that's what he was flyin', I don't know. But he was one serious focker of a pilot, thats for sure..."

@Zaza, swearing doesn't necessarily result in an ignorance of vocabulary. It's only negative in that way if one lets swearing replace other words, but sometimes a swear is the word that conveys the meaning you're trying to get across the best. And as for offending people, the way I see it, being offended is entirely in the listeners' power and beyond the speaker's control. A lot of things you say will offend someone in the world. Things that offend one person don't offend another. Some things only offend people in certain situations. It's impossible to know. Isn't it better to instead focus on other things than not offending people?

I feel like God for being able to affect people emotively so greatly with a mere single word. The powers of convention, and defying them!

@Zaza, "swearing doesn't necessarily result in an ignorance of vocabulary. It's only negative in that way if one lets swearing replace other words, but sometimes a swear is the word that conveys the meaning you're trying to get across the best. And as for offending people,"

Replacements is every cranny of swearing used today. I'm sorry to say this to the frequent swear-users but profanity are words used in times of great pain or great anger. I don't mind a good 'fuck' if someone breaks their head or unfashionably breaks a bone. But how often does that happen? Apart from that, it's mostly ignorance.

"the way I see it, being offended is entirely in the listeners' power and beyond the speaker's control. A lot of things you say will offend someone in the world. Things that offend one person don't offend another. Some things only offend people in certain situations. It's impossible to know. Isn't it better to instead focus on other things than not offending people?"

If you don't care about what other think of you then you have a problem. I'm not talking about popularity or being cool. I'm talking about earning respect. If you don't care to respect others then you're not only disrespecting others, but you're not respecting yourself.