THE
WORD
I was there, live and in person, when “golly” surrendered, without a shot, to “OMG.” Oh, My God.
Likewise, when “Geez” transformed into “Jesus H. Christ.”
Darn it, after that, “heck” didn’t have a chance. “Damn” and “hell” reigned supreme for quite a season.
Then people stopped referring to the “butt of a joke” and screamed at you to “get off your ass.”
Time passed.
It seemed like “give a shit” would hang around, but the times, they are a’changin’.
Here comes “what the fuck.”
“Fuck” is like an old friend who got lost in the wilderness but came back into the house, was ready to sleep on the sofa and willing to throw in a few bucks for pizza.
It stuck closer than a brother.
It became a noun, an adjective, a verb, an interjection—and I do believe I have even heard it used, from time to time, as an adverb: (“…he said fuckily…”)
This disturbs many people, who yearn for the time when language was carefully watched by censoring forces who desired that anything untoward would not cross the ears of young children, or even mature adults.
We most certainly know that Rhett Butler would never say, “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn,” if he was able to let Scarlett know that he didn’t “give a fuck.”
It is not the profanity of f-u-c-k that makes it particularly nasty. Although overused, it is not the foulness of the word that creates a problem. It’s just that on the journey from “golly” to “fuck” we got angrier.
We’re not using the language to be clever or cute. We’re using the word because we’re more pissed off than we used to be.
We even tease with a friendly “fuck” to remind people that just beneath the surface is a bubbling oil, ready to spill out and burn anyone in sight if they dare cross our path.
It would be absolutely fine if we could “fuck this, fuck that” and “fuck the other” if it was accompanied by a smile instead of gritting teeth.
It may be necessary to back off the language just to give us the chance to regain some civility. Because you can tell me I’m dumb all day long and I may not like it, but if you tell me to go fuck myself, we’re at war.
So let us not be childish.
First, let’s not be Puritans, pretending that language can be controlled and taken back to an 1853 purity.
But also, let’s not be so idiotic as to assume that the rampant use of more and more “fucks” in our society does not mean that we’ve lost control and no longer have the ability to deal rationally with each other, without tempers flaring.
So the F word is “fuck”
This is not because it’s particularly profane, but because it is a precursor to violent behavior.
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G-Poppers … May 25th, 2018
There is a very wise adage which states, “The imaginations of a man’s heart are evil continually from his youth.”
With that in mind, it may be completely ridiculous, if not mean-spirited, to think that any one of us is ever going to be free of rage or minus indiscretion. Yet we choose to isolate off harassment, chauvinism and improper sexual behavior as if these are worse than the nastiness and evil spewed from the mouths of people to support their case in the name of their cause.
Consider this: are we actually going to be able to find a man living on Planet Earth who has not had a slip of the tongue and stumbled into a bone-headed moment? Is it realistic to believe that, in search of romance, flirtation might become abusive and hurtful?
Granted, we need to teach our young men and women, from an early age, how to conduct themselves in addressing their sexuality, and ultimately pursuing the time-old tradition of mating.
But G-Pop believes it must start with anger, for sexual harassment and rape are merely lust which has traveled from unwanted interest to violence. And much of the anger that evolves into mayhem and murder is uncontrolled lust for the possessions, life and goods of another person.
Our churches, our schools and especially our homes need to be training grounds, to turn anger into questioning and a desire to find answers, and channel our lusts toward respectfully approaching the space, person and dignity of the individual we might be considering for a relationship.
What all of the accused men have in common is that they have blurred the lines between anger and lust. They don’t know how to flirt without being intimidating and they don’t know how to confront absent a condescending attitude.
There is nothing wrong with the “Me, Too” movement. It is enlightening and it is opening up a conversation which is well overdue. But simultaneously, there needs to be an “All of Us” movement–which confesses that when our anger and lust are not balanced and in check, we can become dangerous to anyone who crosses our path.
G-Pop wants his children to know that anger and lust are the motivators that God has given us to achieve our wishes. Yet with this, as with all freedoms, comes the responsibility to balance matters with kindness, gentleness, equality and mercy.
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Tags: anger, responsibility, condescending, equality, G-Poppers, kindness gentleness, lust, me too movement, mercy, rape, sexual harrassment