Thread: Excessive profanity in books
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Old 10-30-2010, 02:01 PM   #207
WT Sharpe
Bah, humbug!
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Quote:
Originally Posted by slayda View Post
IMO there are no profane words. There are words that might be used in a profane manner. To explain; at the age of 30, while walking in a city park where they also had an on-going dog show, I heard over the loud speakers, "The showing of the bitches will be at two o'clock." I actually cringed & ducked but it made me think about words...
In recent years one of our neighboring cities passed laws making it a crime to utter certain words in public. Another passed a law forbidding the use of those words on bumper stickers. I briefly considered using King James Version Bible verses as bumper stickers that would have been a direct violation of the ordinances of both cities.

Spoiler:
I could have used the King James Version of II Kings 18:27, Isaiah 36:12, I Samuel 25:22, Deuteronomy 23:2, and many others, or I could have used I Samuel chapter 20 verse 30 from Kenneth Taylor's first printing of The Living Bible (the words were changed in later editions). While the King James Version has Saul saying to his son Jonathan "Thou son of the perverse and rebellious woman, do not I know that thou hast chosen the son of Jesse to thine own confusion?", The Living Bible (1972) cut straight to the chase: "Saul boiled with rage. 'You son of a bitch!'"

My wife has one of those first editions.


Quote:
Originally Posted by slayda View Post
...Early in this thread a posted mentioned that in years past we would never say a woman was pregnant but would use some other wording to essentially convey the same information. Was the word "pregnant" profane? Was the fact that she was pregnant & in public profane? Since it was OK to discuss it (using other words), the state of being pregnant & in public wasn't what was profane.
It was Lucille Ball, I believe, who made the quip (quoted from memory), "When I first began in television, you couldn't show a pregnant woman on TV. Now you can show how she got that way."
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