Expletives Deleted: From Under the Rubble, Episode 21
Dr. Fleming and Rex Scott discuss coarse language From Under the Rubble.
Original Air Date: March 28, 2018
Show Run Time: 38 minutes
Show Guest(s): Dr. Thomas Fleming
Show Host(s): Rex Scott
From Under the Rubble℗ is a Production of the Fleming Foundation. Copyright 2018. All Rights are Reserved.
Your assessment of our senior senator is as accurate as Trump’s description of certain countries.
Dr. Fleming, I’d be interested in knowing how those certain words came to be regarded as expletives. Thirty years ago, the word “sucks” was regarded as an expletive, at least in my community. Now, it seems to be tossed around with no regard. My young daughter picked up the phrase “Oh my G**,” which she heard from a babysitter and an older family member. I instructed her to use goodness gracious, holy cow, jiminy crickets, etc. and that she should not use that phrase. Is it nearly as bad to use a euphemism that is widely known to stand for the forbidden phrase?
Everything depends of course on such factors as knowledge and common understanding. “Shucks” and “gosh” were almost universally regarded as acceptable and innocent. (When I was in highschool, the popular phrase was Jeemenetti and also Jeezum Crow.) They were even a tacit acknowledgement of decency. “Sucks,” while it has become all too common, is an indelibly graphic reference to a sex act that was once viewed as immoral even between married people. I don’t see how it can ever be accepted by people with any knowledge of language or reality.
Thank you for this interesting podcast. I am thinking of the word queer that was used in the earlier 20th century that was changed to gay. I thought this new word to refer to homosexuality made it acceptable in today’s parlance. It is to me a deliberate twisting of the mind to achieve an opposite end.
“I don’t see how it can ever be accepted by people with any knowledge of language of reality;” therein lies the key point, Dr. Fleming. The paucity of people possessing either, never mind both, explains why it has entered common usage. I have just returned from a short car trip of less than 20 minutes and heard the expression twice on different radio stations. I remember taking the FCC radio license exam in 1975, and it was clear then that any such reference to sexual behavior on the air was grounds for the loss of license. How far we’ve fallen.
“Queer” is still the word of choice among activist homosexuals who teach courses in “Queer Studies,” write about “Queer Nation,” and generally use the word as a term of praise.
Thank you. I didn’t know that.
When I was considerably younger, I used to discourage the use of “sucks” that is being discussed by replying to someone who said that this or that sucks by putting on a puzzled face and saying, “Uh, then it’s good, right?” I met with no success whatever. I wanted to allude to the enjoyment of lollipops and of drinking with straws, or at the most intimate, the nursing of babes. Alas, virtually no one picked up those allusions.
What about the English expression “sucks to you”?
Unfortunately, in speaking of throwing people on the ground, Dr. Johnson violates the NAP, where when somebody says something rude to you, you take a NAP and you feel better when you wake up.