Thursday, April 01, 2004

Evidently eloquence has become a thing of the past in my blog.

Please accept my profuse apologies. I must admit, the quality of writing has not been my highest priority as of late. I'm surrounded by deadlines, expense reports, responsibilities, and personal turmoil. I think I might be growing up, and my feelings on that subject are a bit ambiguous. Maybe my reversion to juvenile speech patterns reflect my scattered frame of mind. Or perhaps I lack the time required to write epic tomes about my personal viewpoint. No matter the case, profanity has become a regular inhabitant of this web journal.

Cursing fascinates me; in our society, people tend to frown upon the use of certain "taboo" words. Christians quote the Bible in their condemnation of cursing; for example, Matthew 15:11 states, "What goes into a man's mouth does not make him 'unclean' but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him 'unclean'." Christians claim that cursing is an indicator of a person's frame of mind - by using certain "unclean" words, men carry out the will of the Devil, not the will of God. I tend to agree that cursing can demonstrate the state of one's psyche, but I'm a bit wary of saying that all cursing is a form of Devil worship. That argument totally ignores the context of the word usage. For example, a "Hey bitch!" can be construed just as lovingly as "Hey sweetheart." Tone of voice and intentions play a large role in the meaning of a word.

Why do we assign such importance to mere sounds? If you think about it, fuck is just one letter away from duck. However, the historical associations with fuck cause society to classify this word as vulgar. By continuing to treat specific words carefully, do we really just imbue them with special powers? Isn't cursing just a social construction? By using profanity in every day conversation, am I really just behaving like a social rebel? I'm recognizing a stigma as I refuse to adhere to society's standards regarding the "norm." In fact, I should be lauded for using "profane" language in my personal journal. I'm breaking down stereotypes!

In the end, I have one thought: Who the fuck cares?