Today’s State of Things was quite bold. It was a discussion of offensive language.
When I flipped on the radio in the car, they were discussing the word “nigger.” And saying it - not just “the n-word.” I was impressed at their chutzpah. But when I came in, they were already segueing to gender epithets. They talked about “bitch” and mentioned Bitch magazine. Then one person said something like, “When I think of something really offensive regarding women, it’s not ‘bitch’ so much as ‘cunt.’”
I laughed out loud. I couldn’t believe I was hearing this on the radio! And then indeed, Frank cautioned her that they weren’t allowed to say *that *on the radio, and referenced Jane Fonda accidentally dropping the c-bomb on the Today show of all places, and their immediate apology. (She was talking about The Vagina Monologues, not dissing someone, FTR.)
I thought it was interesting. It wasn’t mean-spirited and questionable like “Dr.” Laura, it was just frank and matter-of-fact. It was kind of cool.
Louis CK does a funny bit about how he is offended by “The N Word.” Note, he’s not offended by ‘nigger’, he’s offended when people say “The N Word.” He actually makes a good point about when you hear someone say “The N word” you’re mentally thinking ‘nigger’ at that point. So he hates newscasters who plant that word in his head. It’s a way for white people to say nigger.
Dang it I forgot the comedian from the sixties who said the only way to take the power from a word was to use it a lot.Then proceeded to make his point by saying kike kike kike kike…and so on making the words into gibberish noises. Kind of a good point I thought. Yeah it was Lenny Bruce
A few years ago NPR broadcast a completely uncensored piece from Iraq where soldiers cussed heavily. Although their imagination was somewhat limited to variations of the f and mf-word. NPR stated that “this next segments contains uncensored language” and rolled the whole thing. This, btw, was during the day, not late at night. So I guess there are exceptions to the FCC rules.