Another View On Vulgarity

Another View on and the Using of Vulgarity

(Factored from a page with another view)

Sometimes it is the best way to illustrate, especially when used with discretion and respect for others

But sometimes, a vulgarity is the best way to illustrate the offensiveness of a situation or the emotions and reactions of people. It can even have a positive, humorous effect. So offensive language should not necessarily be banned from the wiki, but those who choose to use it should use it with discretion and maintain a sense of respect for other wiki participants.

It is better use vulgarity because it will eliminate confusion and can be assumed to cause no ill effects to capable readers

Also, for topics of discussion that have vulgar names (examples: the BrainfuckLanguage, or the FuckedCompany web site), or if one is quoting another person verbatim, there is no reason not to use the original words. Use of euphemisms or obscured spellings would simply create confusion. It is assumed that wiki readers are capable of reading such words without ill effects.

Deletion of a page using vulgarity is not respectful

Some history on the situation that led up to the following comment: Someone wrote a page. Someone who disagreed with the content of the page simply put the word "bullshit" at the bottom of the page as a response. When someone noted the inappropriateness of that response, the disagreer simply deleted the entire page.

The page you labeled as BS didn't seem foolish, deceitful, or boastful, although there is certainly room to argue with its premise. Deleting it wasn't very respectful. If you disagree with something, please explain why--don't DisagreeByDeleting or respond with an insult.

The use of vulgarity was disrespectful, and the deletion of the page by someone who disagreed was disrespectful, but there is no direct link between the two. While it is true that deleting content simply because it is vulgar is disrespectful, the comment was used out of context.

Vulgarity is better at description of the realities avoided as unpleasant by the mainstream

The thing is, slang language (not only in English) is sometimes very precise. Thus it makes it even into art works (from movies to novels, even poetry). It pinpoints realities sometimes ubiquitous in real life, which mainstream language has turned away from, because maybe the realities are awfully unpleasant to the mainstream society. However reality is there, waiting to be named. For example: bullshit, fuck.

Vulgarities are the better choice at naming realities

How do you name the realities that are simply named by the slang? Avoiding the slang is avoiding the reality. Maybe sometimes people don't "make love" they simply fuck. Indeed. Note that the less vulgar 'have sex' has completely different connotations, precisely because it is non-vulgar. They don't talk only "foolishly" or "boastfully" or "deceitfully", they are just bullshitting you.

Example at hand: the reality is that a considerable number of those 20000 pages are just plain BS. Sometimes it is BS that comes out of ignorance and/or without bad intention, but nevertheless BS. Wiki has tolerated it, maybe because of boredom, maybe because of SilenceImpliesFatigue, maybe they slept away in a slow weekend, nevertheless the honorable wiki society put up with it. It can't put up with the word, however. The thing that you invoke 20000 pages (all of them, that is) is an argument that a word like BS can be used. If BS exists BS can be named as such.

Here's where we run into problems: what do you mean by "they are just bullshitting you?" That could mean a lot of things: that they are lying to you, that they are talking about things that they don't understand, or that they are trying to provoke reactions from you. Wouldn't it be more informative to describe exactly what the problem is?

Sometimes, a vulgarity is simply the best word to describe the situation. It certainly shouldn't stand alone, but sometimes there is no better way to say it. I give, as an example, the opening to Pearl Jam's "Why Go"

 She scratches a letter into a wall made of stone
 Maybe someday another child won't feel as alone as she does
 It's been two years and counting since they put her in this place
 She's been diagnosed by some stupid fuck...and Mommy agrees!

For the life of me, I can't find a better way to describe the emotional impact.

Calling or dismissing something with the term vulgar is viewed by some as despicable, foolish and snobbish.

And more, the attitude of dismissing something as vulgar, (like what happened in this page), it is in itself despicable. Vulgarity comes from the Latin vulgus, which meant the crowd, the ordinary people. For one to say something is vulgar is to put oneself into a higher ground from which to look down upon the words spoken by the crowd. Who has such a high moral ground, and given by whom, to look down upon common words and the people who use them. It is only a foolish and snob attitude.

The use of the term "vulgar" to describe such words comes from the time in the past when the "common people" were illiterate and uneducated. The implication was that the uncommon educated people were better at expressing themselves.

Modern Interpretation: But the terms no longer mean the same thing. The label "vulgar" is not important--if we label the words as "obscene" "offensive", or "profanity", is it still foolish and snobbish to object to their use?

Some seem to object to others' objection to the use of vulgar, slang, obscene, offensive, insensitive, inappropriate language as interference of one sort or another. Court cases and opinions have upheld the right of the use of some (but not all) of language usages mentioned as being the violation of free speech. But the presentation here is individual opinion, not a legal brief or dissertation.

The attitude of intolerance toward slang and vulgarity is in itself bad and vulgar

Using unpleasant or slang language has not been the choice of the mainstream society. The problem with the "mainstream" society is that it doesn't tolerate slang (including wiki), but it tolerates the realities described by slang. This attitude is in itself more vulgar than the vulgarity of slang, and it is a BadThing.

Vulgarity is used in the business world and by a majority of the people in differing contexts

Sorry, I don't have time, and you don't have time. We tolerate it, or rather we tolerate the fact that we can't really do too much about it. You just refuse to name it, and when the surrounding world is throwing BS at you (or are you the lucky guy who never faced such a thing?) you call it in a nice way. That's not necessarily a thing to be commended for. It's only an alternative, rosy view of the world. As for me, I'm not the only black sheep that doesn't follow social rules of language, I've met lots of my colleagues (i.e. SoftwareEngineers) and native English speakers who use it on a regular basis. I imagine that if we do a poll we'd discover that people who don't use the word even in social contexts are a minority. Still, it seems to be the minority who makes the rules, so why don't you make a list of forbidden words then?

The simplest of Turing-complete obfuscated languages has a vulgar name so vulgarity should be appropriate

OK guys, what about BrainfuckLanguage? That simplest of Turing-complete obfuscated languages... All the usual methods of obscuring certain letters would render it unfriendly to being a WikiName.

As that is the official name of the language, I see no reason not to use it in the wiki. There's no reason to refrain from using "bad words" when they are germane to the topic of discussion. What is objectionable is intentional rudeness, especially when it does not help any discussion. There is a big difference between talking about the BrainfuckLanguage and referring to a person as a stupid fuck or saying that their ideas are bullshit.

All I ever needed to know about "bad" words I learned from George Carlin.

What the fuck is this shit topic about? It's a bunch of rambling dumbasses who have no fucking clue what's flying our of their cum-filled mouths like winged monkey dicks.

CategoryCommunication