Pepper:
No, no, no. The words are not deadly. If someone doesn’t beleive black people are real, it makes no difference whether they call them “Sir,” or “Nigger.”
What words are appropriate is merely fashion and preference.
These often change. The prejudices and attitudes behind them remain.
Amen, Scylla.
While the “power” arguments with respect to using the c word may have some merit, in my 42 years on this planet I have heard it used much more frequently by women (usually when they are exceptionally angry) referring to other women than by men referring to women.
Does this make it more less OK than a man using the word? Don’t know.
Hmmm. Since my most common angry expletive lately seems to be, “You reprehensible pig fucker!” I wonder what that says about me.
Well, Fallen, you defnintely get high marks for the use of “reprehensible.”
I have the word cunt directed toweards a man.
–John
I understand what you’re all saying. No problem here with any of it. I was just giving my perspective. Nothing personal.
Oh, and Diane, being beat up by several people at once is a VERY dehumanizing experience. You wanna know what it’s like to feel like a caged animal? I can tell you. I’m not minimizing rape, but I can’t imagine it being too much worse than what I went through. To this day, 10 years later, I still occasionally look over my shoulder. I have nothing but sympathy for rape victims. I just think that you’re overlooking the fact that I was violated in a violent and traumatic manner also. Just not sexually.
But I’ve had enough of this discussion. It’s making me relive too many bad memories. So I’m out.
I once referred to a female here (in the pit) as a cunt. I feel bad for having said it and I apologize. However, not to validate or justify my action, it was in a moment of anger–thus, my judgment wasn’t the best.
The bottom line, as gracefully stated by others is, words are just words. Plain and simple. It’s the implicit meaning derived from them, within context, which exposes the true essence of the remark.
A little PC is a good thing (IMO), but where’s the limit? It seems that someone will always be out there to take offense to a word or statement. Eventually, doesn’t it get just a little silly?
I’ve been called a “cunt”. In fact, I’m often called a “cunt”. I usually retort with “Cheap floozy!”
Oh yeah. I use harsh language. 
i have referred to a guy as a cunt… do you want to hear the story that goes with it?
Shhh!! Quiet down, everyone, Auntie Anya is gonna tell a story!!
cunty, cunty, cunt
cunty cunty cunt cunty,
cunt cunt cunty cunt.
There. A cunt Haiku.
Note I didnt say something like “Diane, you are a cunt”, which would be offensive. (as well as untrue.)
I use language freeley. Anyone who has met me will know that. It dosent make me any less smarter. I can articulate perfectly with anyone who cares to articulate with me.
Diane, you have met me. Did my use of language have any negative impression upon you? Language isnt dirty, it is how it is intention that hurts more.
Yes Twisty - that’s all we’re saying. Nothing wrong with the word in and of itself. I hardly think that you can describe oldscratch (or indeed me) as one of the blue-rinse “Say it with ‘heck’” brigade. We’re not taking offence at the fact that it is a naughty 4 letter word.
Just the way it can be used.
If you want to use the word cunt in everyday life and in any random situation that you might find yourself in, then knock yerself out. It is specifically the situation in which a man refers to a woman as a “cunt” that is worrying. Worrying not because of a knee-jerk reaction to nasty swearwords. No - it is worrying because in that situation it speaks of underlying attitudes and is a way of perpetuating and validating those attitudes.
Ya see? Nobody is berating you for your vocabulary. Nobody is telling you that you should clean up your language. We’re merely asking people to bear in mind the power of language and tailor it accordingly in certain situations. If you don’t fall into that category then that is fantastic - and I don’t think that you do. But there are plenty of people on these boards who do seem to be misogynistic in the fullest sense of that word. We validate and reinforce those people everytime one of us calls a woman a cunt.
pan
Kabbes, I know thats what you all are saying.
Here’s one for you. how about “All Men are Bastards”?
Hey ya, Twisty! Go buy me a painting before I come over there and lick ya! (Ahhhhh, if I were only 20 years younger.)
Having met me, you know that I have no fuckitty, fuck, fuck, fucking problem with off-fucking color fucking language. I guess I should clarify my thoughts a little better before I am mistaken for a proper young :::cough::: lady.
Whenever I call my best girlfriend on the phone, I don’t say “hello” or “hi”, I usually greet her with one of her pet names - “Howdy, Skank”, “Heeeeeeya, BEEEE-ATCH!”, “Hey you stupid cunt!” or my all time favorite “Yo! Twyla Twiddly Twat!!”
Almost all of my oldest son’s friends are black (as are most of the girls he dates). I am never offended when I hear them call my son “Cracker” or when he calls them “Nigga”. They constantly tease each other about white boys having no asses and not being able to see their black friends in the dark. Knowing my son’s respect for all people and knowing that is only done in jest between very close friends, I am okay with it. However, if I were to hear my son ever use the word any other way, I don’t care if he is 6’4", I would knock him on his ass.
I think it is pretty comical to hear guys call each other “bitch” or “cunt”, even when they are angry. I like how the gay community have taken control of the words “fag” and “queer”. I confess that I have referred to another female as a “cunt”, so yeah, I am the pot calling the kettle black, I admit it.
In thinking about it, I guess the only thing I have a problem with are the hateful or disrespectful feelings behind certain uses of “nigger” and “fag”. It may not make a lot of sense, but hearing a man call a woman a cunt makes me cringe. Maybe I am a little old fashioned in my old age, but I was raised to believe that there are just certain things a man with any sort of class doesn’t call a woman no matter how pissed off he may be. Again, it’s really not the word itself, but the hate and distrespect that comes from certain uses. I think I want to still believe in true gentlemen.
Twisty - I cringe whenever I hear “All X are Y”, whether X is men, blacks, gays or martians and whatever stereotype flavour-of-the-month Y happens to be.
I will say, however, that the phrases that carry with them a history of violence of power-subjogation of one group by another give me particular pause.
pan
I don’t normally correct typose, but in this case understanding is aided by me saying:
it should be violence or power subrogation, not of.
Thankyou for your patience.
pan
Furthermore I would now like to invoke a variety of Gaudere’s Law.
Ahem.
oldscratch, you pinko commie bastard! Trying to ban free speech in an attempt to hurry along your little revolution, aren’t you? (I mean that in the nicest way).
I know exactly how you feel, and what you mean, having heard my share of the type of insults meant to hurt in the same way. The idea of putting someone down, making them seem subservient, is nothing new, nor is it limited to any given group. No matter who you are, you have had to face things meant to belittle you. Maybe some of us more than others, but everyone goes through it.
So you are a good Joe for trying to show people how this could effect others, but you are naive if you think the type of pain you are trying to stop will ever really stop. People will always find way to hurt each other with words and deeds, and each one of us has to deal with that reality. The words you pointed out may be especially hurtful to you, but there are plenty of other words that are just as hurtful to someone else, what can be done?
BTW, nice poetry!
My best friend,Miriam , who is obsessed with fixing me up, had introduced me to guy named Rich. After having talked on the phone several times, we went on a date.
We fooled around in his car and i went down on him, then he took me home. I’d called him a couple more times, and he had said he had hurt his back, and was unable to go out that weekend.
My best friend keeps asking me how the date went, all the while making blowjob jokes, then I find out he has told several people we both know that I went down on him.
Same day, just before dinner, he calls, and tells me he thinks we should not see each other any more. For some reason my shyness is a problem for him, and is unwilling/ unable to go out with me anymore, He kept asking me if i was going to be ok, and this irritated me.
I called Miriam and let her know what had just gone down.
I talked with Miriam the other day, (4/24) and she, Jean and Mikki had read him the Riot act, because after deciding he was not interested in seeing me, after trying to explain this, that then Rich had asked Miriam to set him up with another woman she knew.
Then I said he was a cunt with a lot of chutzpah to ask to be set up with another girl aftre me. I do not care to be sorry for giving him head. I was sorry he was a classless, graceless putz, and I was sorry he had not chosen to return the favor. I was sorry that he was so pathetic to need to tell others the details. I was sorry to see that his small dick had influenced his personality so much and that i considered him to be a dumb cunt, beneath scorn.