And now, I will magically turn a Pit thread into a Great Debate - voila!
Some insults seem self-evident to me; some examples:
[ul][li]“Motherfucker” - Not a lot of people want to fuck their mother, and I certainly know I don’t. Seems repugnant to me, so using this to insult someone makes sense.[/li]
[li]“Bastard” - In the traditional sense of the word, no one wants to be accused of having their father run out on their mother, and really, insulting one’s mother, if intentional, seems like a good way to insult a person, so I can understand this one, too.[/li]
[li]“Bitch” - Again, in the traditional sense of the word, calling someone a dog is pretty insulting, so this also seems a 'natch to me (same with “son of a bitch”).[/li]
"Asshole" - Now, granted, there are lots of pleasureable things to do with your ass, what with that prostate gland that men have and all, but it being an orifice that excretes shit, I can certainly understand the insult, especially with some of the things that people say to deserve it.[/ul]
This is a pretty traditional, non-florid list, and of course there are others, which I’m sure you’ll all provide in turn.
However, there are some that confuse me, both for their original meanings and for their modern contexts; some examples:
[ul][li]“Fucker” - Besides the obvious, imaginative and wondrous uses of the various forms of “fuck,” I can’t understand why “fucker” would be an insult. We all like fucking - it’s fun, it burns calories, it relieves stress, etc. So why would calling someone a fucker be an insult? I’d be all like, “Hells yeah! Woo hoo!”[/li]
[li]“Cuntmuncher” - Now, granted, this might work if you were trying to insult a gay man, or even if you were trying to somehow (unsucessfully I’m sure) insult a lesbian (the self-obvious is hardly insulting), but using it as a general insult? Seems to me any straight man would be quite enthusiastic to admit that he does, indeed, munch cunt. (You can see the link below for a recent usage.) The indirect insult, of course, is that people who munch cunt are inferior and worthy of derision, so on this issue I’m sure lesbians and straight men are united.[/li]
[li](And here’s the link you’ve all been waiting for) “Cocksucker” - Again, this doesn’t work all that well as a general insult. Most straight men love cocksuckers, so why insult them? A lot of women love sucking cock, so I’m sure they wouldn’t be insulted. And gay men give and receive, so no insult there. That leaves lesbians again. If it’s as much fun giving or getting head as fucking, then it’s a useless insult.[/ul][/li]
Nonetheless, despite wordsmithing and deconstructing, these words are used as insults, are taken as insults, and offense is doled out like checks when you close on a house.
But I have a theory.
I’ll concentrate specifically on “cocksucker,” since that’s what so often gets bandied about (as seen in the thread linked to above). When a straight man insults another straight man by calling him a cocksucker there is an implied chain of thought there that, IMHO, should be addressed:
[list=1][li]Calling someone a cocksucker is meant to be insulting.[/li][li]Cocksucking is a bad thing.[/li][li]Cocksucking is something the insulter would never want to do.[/li][li]Gay men and women suck cock.[/li][li]The insulter would not want to be a gay man or a woman.[/li][li]The insulter is saying that the insultee is a gay man or a woman, or at least is no better than them.[/li][li]Gay men and women are undesirable because they do this bad thing.[/li][li]The insultee is offended because he has been associated with these bad groups and this bad action.[/list=1][/li]
Does this chain of thought take place consciously when someone calls someone else a cocksucker? Of course not - it just comes out from one’s lengthy list of epithets stored away for such emergencies, such as getting cut off on the freeway or getting too many sprinkles on your ice cream cone. But words, as we all know, are powerful things, and the baggage contained with these emotionally-charged words is there, like it or not.
Now, as a gay man, of course every time I see the word “cocksucker” I see it as an insult to gay men, for the above reasons stated. Yes, it could by those same reasons be meant as an insult to women as well, but (a) I don’t think that’s where the insult would have come from in the first place; (b) being a woman and/or being feminized and being homosexual have traditionally been (wrongly) intertwined; and (c) even if they are meant to be insulting 50/50, I can’t stand by and allow women to be treated so degradingly with such a broad brush, either. No matter how thin you slice it, the connotations that I see from this insult are worth challenging, IMHO.
Perhaps it’s not on quite the same par as using “gay” to mean stupid or uncool, as “cocksucker” is much more profane and vulgar, but I still see remarkable similarities. And I still think that if you use the term and people you didn’t mean to insult find it insulting, you ought to stop using it, at least in their presence.
I’m sure I’m opening myself up to unlimited personal attacks, and I’m sure threads will be linked to that point out my flaming hypocrisy, and I’m sure I’ll end up in the Pit over this, but I’m putting it out there anyway, if for no other reason as an exercise in language, the meaning of words and how people perceive other people.
Thank you.
Esprix