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Swearing is becoming more widely acceptable, linguistics experts claim (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 10 months ago by BrikoX@lemmy.zip to c/interestingshare@lemmy.zip

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Swearwords increasingly used for emphasis and to build social bonds, rather than to insult, say academics

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[–] candybrie@lemmy.world 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I think it's because that's the purpose of swear words. To be the bad words. It's how language develops. And there are benefits to having some bad words. It allows you to choose your level of formality, to signal familiarity or emotional state. They even apparently live somewhere else in your brain and swearing actually reduces pain to some degree.

[–] HipHoboHarold@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Which for me then raises the question of: Do we have evidence these were created to be BAD? I'm not necessarily talking about FORMAL. While I'm not a very formal person, I can at least understand the reason there is a more formal way of talking. But formal would basically just be a more proper way of using the language without any form of slang. Using slang would still be seen on another level from swear words.

So what makes the word fuck bad? Even when not in a formal environment some people will get upset over swear words, but not only people speaking in a casual manner. Why? What sets apart the word fuck from other words?

[–] captainlezbian@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

You can triangulate the issues if you look at a variety of languages. They’re linguistic taboos. In English and German they tend to be sexual or involve private biology in some way. In French they’re religious words that should be held in high regards being used in profaning ways. In Scandinavia it’s diseases one would rather not have. These are words that we set aside for some reason to not use in casual ways at one point and then we use it as an easy taboo to break