The Banality of the F-Bomb: Once taboo, the word has become an unfortunate national habit

National Review ^ | 05/09/2019 | By HEATHER WILHELM

[SeekAndFind]

One of my favorite 1960s anecdotes comes from legendary broadcaster Larry King, who tells of attending his first roast at New York City’s Friars Club. There, French actor Maurice Chevalier dared to utter the F-word live on stage. King was practically blown out of his seat. “I thought I’d die,” he recalls.

Today, as King himself has noted, the F-bomb — once known as the ultimate forbidden verbal lightning bolt, the Utterance That Must Not Be Named, or at least the word of last resort to use when you’re really hopelessly mad — might as well be growing out of random cracks in the sidewalk. In 2019, the F-word is a throwaway. It is a sneeze. It is as common as dandelion fluff.

Does anyone else find this awkward? Mock me if you will — no doubt my quest is a lonely one — but I certainly do.

Just the other day, while I was communing with a wildly energetic and occasionally shouty spin instructor in my garage — I am the enthusiastic new owner of one of those Peloton workout bikes where you can beam into classes via an Internet-connected screen — I discovered that even the most winsome and cheerful Peloton instructor might one day randomly bombard you with the F-bomb. In my case, this happened right in the middle of an insanely steep fake “hill” climb and a cheerily judgmental pop song. (If the song had happened to be Ariana Grande’s regrettably catchy hit “Thank U, Next,” or perhaps Pink’s unedited “F-ing Perfect,” I could have absorbed approximately seven bonus F-words for good measure.)

I have since discovered that Peloton classes have labels and filters for explicit language, which is certainly nice of them. I somehow missed this the first go-round, because just as no one expects the Spanish Inquisition, I naïvely failed to expect that my workout bike would one day curse at me like my own personal Colonel Jessup from A Few Good Men.

Thankfully, my kids were out of earshot when that particular F-bomb dropped. Unfortunately, there have been plenty of others to go around. My kids were in exceptionally clear eyeshot on a different day, for instance, when we happened to pass a bored-looking young lady sporting a tank top that declared, “YOU MUST HAVE ME CONFUSED FOR SOMEONE WHO GIVES A [F-WORD].” The word in question was, of course, uncensored, helpfully available for every kindergartener in a 20-foot radius to see.

What is wrong with everyone? Have we lost our national “edit” button? (I’ll answer my own question, because the answer is obvious: Yes.)

The F-bomb has long been with us, but the growing tendency to cheerfully, unhesitatingly use it in any old circumstance is something new and alarming. Forget venturing into R-rated movies or edgy art galleries: Take your kid into a random gift shop in the Texas hill country these days, and you might find cutesy hand towels embroidered with swear words that would have made young Larry King faint. Beto O’Rourke, always game to roll on the bad-idea bandwagon, gained notoriety during his Senate campaign for letting an impressive parade of F-bombs fly. Self-help books with the F-word fly off the shelves, even though — at least in the humble opinion of this writer, who grew up in the famously repressed rolling fields of the American Midwest — “The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving a Rip” would make for just as compelling a title as “The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving a” — well, I’ll stop there. You know what word is coming next.

It gets worse: Just last week, Burger King, which is gross even without the help of swear words, launched a series of mood-themed “Real Meals,” questionable foodstuffs boxed with wonderfully poetic names like — you guessed it — the DGAF Meal. (DGAF, in case you’re still gloriously unaware, stands for “Don’t Give a [You Know What].”)

Weirdly, Burger King released these meal deals as part of “Mental-Health Awareness” month. That seems paradoxical at best, but since we’re speaking of mental health, let’s take this moment to get philosophical. My crusade against the public explosion of the F-bomb, you see, goes beyond simple manners. Much like, say, The Lego Batman Movie, it is far deeper than it appears.

In many ways, words can shape our very perception of reality. Edward Sapir, who helped develop the hypothesis of linguistic relativity in the 1930s, put it this way: “Human beings . . . are very much at the mercy of the particular language which has become the medium of expression for their society. . . . The fact of the matter is that the ‘real world’ is to a large extent unconsciously built up on the language habits of the group.”

It’s a radical idea, but what if it contains a grain of truth? What does our society’s thunderstorm of public F-bombs do to our greater sensibility, cultural or otherwise? When the worst swear word becomes commonplace, what do we use to describe the truly horrific? What happened to mystery and subtlety? For that matter, what happened to the fashion sense of people who regularly sport shirts that evoke memories of the early routines of Andrew Dice Clay?

It is no surprise, I suppose, that the F-bomb has become ubiquitous as our culture’s exhibitionism has gotten out of control. But here we can draw at least one consolation: Back at the Friars Club in the Sixties, the F-word was shocking and rare, at least when uttered in public. Today, it’s emblazoned in insouciant acronyms on the packaging of mass-produced Burger King meals.

Behold, America: The F-bomb has officially entered the realm of the hopelessly banal. Who knows? Perhaps if we’re lucky, Americans will get bored with using it — and that might just save us all.

[GingisK]

What makes you so sure that something must be said in that case?

[Lonely Bull]

In fact, I see it in print more on FR than I hear it in public.

I still hear it more than I see it here, but I see it here more than I once did. The S-word is even more acceptable.

[real saxophonist]

Certainly illustrates the diversity of the word.

[trebb]

Simple reason - the Left rules most of the airwaves and such profanity is merely a weak mind trying to express itself...

[mewzilla]

2 words: Cuss jar.

Draconian fines and donate the proceeds to charity. Often if you’re a frequent offender and the jar overfloweth.

Works wonders.

[SoFloFreeper]

Burger King, which is gross even without the help of swear words, launched a series of mood-themed “Real Meals,” questionable foodstuffs boxed with wonderfully poetic names like — you guessed it — the DGAF Meal...

I saw that. No class, Burger King. No wonder your brand is dying.

[OrangeHoof]

It’s not even the most reviled f-word you can utter today...

I do take offense in tv and movies where they are showing historical settings from the 1960s and earlier but drop f-bombs right and left like it was a 21st Century hip hop bar.

I think the word has lost all shock value just like the word “racist” soon will.

[skepsel]

Mark Twain and the Art of Swearing

“Most people should not swear. This is not a moral judgment but an artistic one. The fact is, most people don’t know how to swear any more than they know how to play the bassoon.

Both require years of practice and expert instruction. Yet virtually all the swearing one hears in the course of a day sounds trite, discordant, and uninspired. The lack of melody and imagination offends the ear more than the words offend the sense of decency.

Profanity should therefore be left to the skilled and well-trained professional.

” Continuing on, “There ought to be a room in this house to swear in,” he told a friend. “It’s dangerous to have to repress an emotion like that.” He observed that, “Under certain trying circumstances swearing provides relief denied even to prayer.” And continued, “If I cannot swear in heaven, I shall not stay there.”