In the US, of the 7 words Carlin said you can’t say on TV (shit, piss, cunt, fuck, cocksucker, motherfucker, tits) cunt is still the only one that has any real punch to it. It is about the only sex based swear word that people are uncomfortable with.
Do Australians, Brits, Irish, New Zealanders, etc. use the word cunt more freely, and is it as offensive as it is here? It seems more popular in the UK & Australia.
I’ve never heard mother fucker here in Trinidad, the equivalent seems to be mother cunt used in places you’d use MF.
I’m still not sure what it means(who or what is being insulted).
Pronounced muddacunt, used anywhere you would use MF in the USA.
Carlin [as if he’s some kind of expert in language. He was a druggy shithead who was sometimes amusing :rolleyes: ] also spoke of “context”.
In “context” cunt may not be offensive.
4th of July, 98 degrees out; “Are you hot, cunt”. Your girl will probably not let you get away with that.
Same day, 2 hours earlier. You’re making excellent love, she’s already cum twice and you say: “I love your hot cunt”. You just might score points with that.
Context
I don’t know about Australia, but it has started to become a lot weaker in the UK. It’s still an absolute no-no to me, but among younger people it’s much more common that it would have been, say, 15 years ago. You will occasionally see it printed in the Guardian (in context and quotes, not in regular comment!).
On the other hand, its synonyms “berk” (short form of the rhyming slang phrase “Berkeley Hunt”), “prat” and “twat” have been around for a long time as very weak, even semi-affectionate, insults, only slightly stronger than the French “con”, which is no longer even used for the anatomical meaning. David Cameron slightly put his foot in it (when seeking to laugh off some intemperate Twitter comments from a colleague) by saying “Too many tweets make a twat”, apparently without realising quite what he was saying. But then, Robert Browning once used “twat” in a poem, thinking it meant a nun’s head-dress.
A few days ago I watched the excellent prison drama Starred Up and was surprised at the generous use of the word in it. A quick look at a transcript of the movie shows it featured 47 times. The script was written by a prison psychologist so it’s a popular word in the English prison system.
I’d like to respond to your post, but you haven’t linked to your Doctorate in Opinions…so I’m dismissing yours. In an ideal world, I’d respond to your actual opinion, and in a less than ideal world I’d just chuck in some ad hominem to discredit your opinion, but I don’t know you at all - perhaps when you entertain huge crowds who’ve come to hear your opinion, I’ll find out enough about you to dismiss it. Oh, hang on - you don’t even take drugs?!! You’ve not made me laugh??! What kind of c…ontext are you?
Some observations from Merry England:
Several towns ago I used to pal around with an alcoholic Irish labourer who called everyone a cunt, as a term of affection. Make of that what you will.
As a performance poet, I often end a set with my ‘cunt poem’ - it explains at length and in rhyme the very many things that poetry cannot do, then concedes that it can still do one thing: it can shock. The stanza goes thusly…
“I could shock you…motherfuckers” [This never shocks anyone]
“With…‘I really like to hunt’” [This sometimes surprises some audience members]
“No? Then try ‘Sucking on a used tampon straight from your mother’s cunt’” *
[That works every time…]*
I recall reading somewhere, some long time ago, that your typical anglo-saxon would always have carried an axe or such, for routine tasks, protection against marauding vikings and what not. He would also have carried a sharpening stone, to keep his blade honed. He necessarily carried the stone in a small greased pouch, which he called his ‘cunt’ - whether that word became a metaphor, or already was one, is open to conjecture. When (and why) it became a taboo word is also up for discussion.
There’s a caste of feminists who are intent on reclaiming the word - one of whom once took great exception to that tentative etymology, since she required it to have always been a woman’s word for a woman’s part. Certainly, it seems that it’s women (on the whole) who decide which words are acceptable in any society - I recall with vivid clarity the first time I accidentally said ‘fuck’ in my mother’s hearing, and although she has seen the Cunt Poem in one of my collections we have never spoken of it…and never will.
I’ve always been under the impression that British men use it mainly as an insult against other men. I’ve never heard anyone in my circle of British acquaintances uses it in anything like the same way we do in the US. Also, as a woman it doesn’t particularly offend me any more than if someone called me a bitch. Maybe I’m just desensitized. I’ll sometime throw it out there without thinking and get some really shocked / dirty looks.
You don’t think cocksucker still had punch?