Can Spike say this on TV?

Cafe Society
21

Ditto from Cecil.

22

Oh, and just to consolidate what Spike can say (in the USA):

  • bollocks

  • wanker

  • bint

  • bloody/bloody hell

  • bugger this/bugger off/etc.

  • plus the two-finger salute

These are all just quaint Britishisms to Yankee ears. The general impression we get here is:

  • bollocks (“B-S” or “bull” … though just like that, not “dirty”)

  • wanker (“loser”, “jerk”, “buffoon”)

  • bint (meaningless)

  • bloody/bloody hell (“freakin’” – just an emphatic, not dirty)

  • bugger this/bugger off/etc. (“to heck with this”/“get lost”)

  • plus the two-finger salute (we know it’s the equivalent of the single-finger salute, but it’s funny, rather than offensive, since it’s not something we use)

23

Very slow since the show’s taped several hours before airing.

24

The interpretations toadspittle’s placed on this stuff (i.e. mildly rude at worst) is pretty much how they’d be viewed by most people in this country as well.

funkynige will have to tell us his motivation for starting this thread, but I think there’s a general impression here that there is a more conservative attitude to “profanity” on American television than in the UK - at least on non-subscription stations.

It may help American posters to realise that there is a self-regulatory agreement among TV producers here that they avoid showing anything of an adult nature before 9:00pm and Buffy shows between 6:00 and 7:00 mostly.

BtVS is often criticised by British parents for being unsuitable for its teenage target audience, but I don’t hear profanity being cited in that criticism.

After the “nine o’clock watershed” by the way, the adult content (especially the language and sex, but much less so the violence) might shock an American audience. It frequently raises comment from American guests on our TV shows.

The only word that gets bleeped after nine is the c- word, and although there’s usually a prior warning, “fuck” is peppered around very freely. Even apart from TV I often hear Americans expressing surprise at how “foul-mouthed” we are.

25

You’re right. They must have just completely missed it.