No, this is NOT a “Hey, why does [group X] do [some act]?” kind of question.
I know that only a very small minority of those with Tourette Syndrome has phonic tics. When I’ve heard them uttered – the afflicted person always being white – often they include racial slurs.
Among minorities that have Tourette Syndrome which manifests itself in phonic tics, do they utter racial slurs against whites? You know … “Hey, great weather CRACKER! we’re having today, isn’t it? HONKY! DEVIL!”
I have Tourette’s however I am neither a minority nor do I suffer from coprolalia (involuntary swearing).
A FOAF is Asian and does have both Tourette’s & coprolalia. When she first met this fellow, my friend reported that his only verbal tic was saying “Fuck” a lot. She was around him for a long weekend and since his tics are evidently much more apparent than mine she was paying more attention to them. She never mentioned him coming out with any ethnic insults.
So that’s one partial data point. Given that most people with TS seem to be white and only a small fraction have the cussin’ issue it’s not surprising that you don’t see a bunch of black guys with TS yelling “Honky cracker!” but I don’t see any reason why it couldn’t happen.
I used to work in a large mental health facility and there was a black woman who had Tourettes. She didn’t utter racial slurs but (as with above) would yell “Fuck!” and other vulgarities (most of them sexual- “Dick!” was one she said a lot). I knew a white guy with Tourettes there who didn’t yell anything but barked (very convincingly- he sounded just like a St. Bernard I used to have).
The black lady also had OCD that manifested itself in compulsive cleaning of her own apartment and of other peoples. (Neighbors loved to invite her for dinner because she’d show up, decide the counters and floors needed cleaning, and before she’d left had cleaned the whole place; damn but I wish I had her number as I could totally use her services today and would even pay her going rate.) I think the OCD was a side item to the Tourettes (dual diagnoses of separate disorders are not uncommon) but I may be wrong and there could be a connection (certainly involuntary unavoidable actions are characteristic of both, whether it’s shouting vulgarities or whether you absolutely have to open and close a car door exactly four times before you can get out).
You just swear whatever comes to mind. Fuck is one of those used a lot. Whatever is shocking usually works. They don’t have to be swear words though, the mouth just blurts out things. Just reading Sampiro’s post is making me have compulsive behavior urgings right now. Argh! Not the verbal, just the repetitive movement and huffing (vocal tick).
Apropos of absolutely nothing, I had a roommate in college who had one phonic tic of squeaking, like a guinea pig. Yeep!
Obligatory Deliverance reference.
Interesting. When I see a television interview with someone with Tourette’s that manifests itself in coprolalia, though, the n-word seems to predominate. Could it be because shows are booking those with a more “television safe” form of coprolalia? “Fuck” and “shit” won’t pass muster with the FCC, but “nrnrn****r” and other slurs would? In the real world, the few times I’ve encountered those with verbal tics, it’s “fuck” or “shit”, with a smattering of n-words.
Ironically, it seems that the reverse passes muster with you, given which words you’ve chosen to censor.
So why it is always shocking words or swear words? Why don’t the tics involve nice, pleasant words like ‘flower’?
I have a buddy with Tourette’s and he chirps (probably similar to the squeak observed by NajaNivea). He is Mexican and while he curses like a sailor, none of it is involuntary.
You’ll hear more people that make uncontrolled noises than words I think. Sniffing, facial distorting movements, rapid eye blinking and repetitive movements are common. Who’s going to interview the person that randomly blurts out flower. The swear words attract attention, because the public is shocked by the words. They can ignore the kid that randomly says innocuous things.
What I was told by my roommate is that the swearing thing has a lot to do with words the person absolutely, definitely does not want to say, words they’re consciously trying to avoid. The word “flower” isn’t forefront in their mind and there’s no internal pressure not to say “flower” or stress connected with the word “flower”.
I don’t know if there’s actually any basis for that, or not, but I figured she was the Tourette’s expert in the room.
The guinea pig squeak came from her childhood, she said that there’s something like a formative period for verbal tics, and during that time she had a friend with a pet guinea pig–the sound imprinted on her. She described tics as “scratching an itch”–not that she was always unable to physically control them, but that if she didn’t do them, the stress would build and build and build until it was consuming. She had several physical tics, but only the one verbal tic.
It comes down to it’s a compulsion to do something. The longer you hold back the worse the compulsion gets. You can go from only a few mild symptoms to out of control in a short period, with the right conditions. The compulsions feed the other compulsions and you can get so messed up, you are at the point of physical collapse.
IME that’s right on the nose. I can consciously prevent the physical and verbal tics…for a while! Eventually the urge becomes too strong, or your relax and let go and there they go again. In some cases a substitute action will “scratch the itch” - I can clear my throat instead of making a funny little clicking noise (one of my tics). I saw an interview with an open-heart surgeon who has a pretty wild physical tic, it’s a set of gestures that looks exactly like a baseball player giving signs. He said that when he feels it about to happen during surgery he steps back and adjusts his watch, that satisfies the urge.
I don’t think it should be called “Tourette” Syndrome. That sounds like the diabolical urge to ballet dance. It should be called “Cartman’s Syndrome”.
My pshrink suffers from the Gran Mal form of TS. Gruesome when you see it up close. He can go to work and home. No place else.
A popular norwegian comic strip (Nemi) had this as a premise for a sunday strip once. The vocalist of a black-metal band had suddenly manisfested verbal tics as part of his tourettes. He was shouting “Flower!” “You guys are so nice!” and “Have a nice day!” from stage, in the middle of a long string of profanity-ridden growling. He was booted from the band IIRC.