Ginmar over on her blog, aboout the inadequacy of language:
The issue of language is one I’ve wrestled with. I don’t believe an anti-feminst woman deserves the fruits of any feminist labor, and that includes language. Hey, fuck yourself all you want to, but fuck me and mine and you’re dead. I think if you’re actively anti-feminist, you should have to deal with it, too. Of course, in reality this would last about as long as it took for such a woman actually ran afoul of the patriarchy, in which case, past experience makes me wary that they’d ask for and accept help, then turn and kick my teeth in. It’s happened. However, it’s a complicated issue, and I won’t pretend otherwise. We need better insults. We need accurate insults. I frankly think ‘gay’ ‘pussy’ and so forth ought to be culled from the language; I don’t think there’a any redeeming them. Nor is there any equality in referring to a guy as a slut. No, I don’t care hat your intentions are. You cannot change the culture yourself, and in fact being called a slut is a compliment to a guy—at women’s expense. What is a slut, anyway? Why is it an insult? Asshole, if she just had sex iwth you, you’re an ungrateful—-what do I call him that doesn’t insult his mother?—–little shit who deserves something I can’t immediately think of because I don’t have the fucking vocab for it. I mean, you got laid, send flowers, asswipe. Or could it be that having sex is not the end-all goal for this type of guy? Could it be the conquest—salaciously related to his buds over beers—-is the whole point?
Duh. But anyway, I propose a language olympics. I don’t think it’s cool to call Ann Coulter a trannie or whatever. She’s scarily deluded, frightfully, deliberately vile, hateful, bigoted, exploitive, and an eager inciter of hatred. But calling her a man insults her by insulting her appearance and frankly, if she’s anorexic I feel sorry for her. I wouldn’t wish that on anybody, not even an enemy. What I would wish on them is a pithier dismissal than the one I had to resort to above.
I really, really want a word that sums up the sort of whiner who shows up and bitches, “But some women DO lie about rape!” Yeah, sure, like I give a shit. Did you know most pedophiles are straight white guys? How come when rape gets discussed the minority gets brought up, yet when pedophilia gets mentioned, the majority is hidden?
Well? The last time this came up, I believe over at Pandagon, someone nominated a term from some other language that translated to “sister-fucker.” What do y’all think? Where are the good insults? Is it enough to be merely scatological, or do we need to find some way of conveying the sheer moral bankruptcy of people like Ann Coulter? And if so, how?
what’s wrong with scarily deluded, frightfully, deliberately vile, hateful, bigoted, exploitive, and an eager inciter of hatred?
Ad hominem attacks may feel good, but they rarely explain or advance a cause. They distinguish many blogs’ perspective as adolescent relative to the MSM.
“Dickhead” is one of the few masculine-gendered insults that doesn’t carry with it a hint of admiration.
Brooklynite, we also have “prick.”
I humbly suggest the word “kunk.” (It’s the double ‘k’s!) Kunk sounds disgusting and can fit multiple parts of speech.
Plus, I made it up.
Brooklynite, I agree that “cock” sometimes has a hint of admiration in it. I’m not sure that’s true of tool, prick, schmuck, or unit. Also, bastard, but that lacks the bite it once had.
I have a friend who’s the product of an out-of-wedlock pregnancy, and he doesn’t much like the word.
“Prick” definitely has “magnificent bastard” undertones, at least in some contexts. Put it this way — I can imagine a guy saying “yeah, I’m a prick,” with a bit of swagger. “Yeah, I’m a dickhead”? Not so much.
Good point on “schmuck,” though.
I have a friend who replies to being called a bastard by going ‘No! I’m only half a bastard! ONE of my parents was married!’
One of the wonderful things about profanity is also one of its big disadvantages–it’s vague. You can use it to mean what you want it to–it rarely means its literal meaning. “Fuck up,” “Give a fuck,” “Fucking Expensive;” none of those have anything to do with sex (conversely, “I’m fucked” and “go fuck yourself” do).
So we end up using profane words in ways that have nothing to do with their original meanings–yet, since the two most profane things in our culture are sex and excrement, we end up using profanity that’s based on sexual attitudes at least half the time, and those attitudes are regressive and repressive.
“Cocksucker” is homophobic, “Pussy” is misogynist, “Bastard” expresses (in its absence) the value of patrilineage. Profanity requires naming something that is offensive or revolting–there’s not much that’s considered offensive or revolting among the sex-positive–body parts are good, preferences are good, the majority of activities are good. Perhaps that’s why “Sister fucker” has appeal–it references one of the few sex acts that we still consider unacceptable–although it could also be said to stigmatize incest survivors (as well as construct the female as the passive recipient of the obscene sex act).
Really–is it any more sex-positive to call someone a “Prick” than a “Cocksucker?” It would seem to boil down to “A penis is an obscene thing–I call you a penis, hence you are insulted.” Do we want to label half the genitals on the planet obscene?
None of this applies to scatology (I don’t think we harm anyone’s liberation if we reference shit as disgusting), but there does seem something juvenile about it. Maybe because shit is endlessly fascinating to small children, and sex is more of and adolescent-and-above concern. There’s a reason kindergarteners call each other “Poopy head” and not “Cocksucker.”
So that leaves us the original category of the profane, from back when biological functions like sex and shit were just natural parts of life–blasphemy. There’s a reason this stuff is called “swearing” and “oaths.” Once upon a time, “By St. Anthony,” “Damn you” and ” ‘Slid” were considered strong words. Unfortunately, they don’t work so well anymore (not to mention being Christocentric).
To a certain extent, I’m with Carty–if you think Coulter is a vile bigot and a self-serving hypocrite, call her that instead of a “fucking asswipe.” But I’m also rather partial to obscenity myself (in a Mammet/Tarantino poetry-of-profanity sort of way), so I’d likely call her a “Fucking vile-ass, self-serving, hypocritical goddamn bigot.”
Not that that helps the situation any. I see the problems with using these words, but I don’t see acceptable substitutes.
You could always take the Dan Savage route, and start taking some of these examples of vileness and using their own names to coin new profanity.
little light, I’m fond of the new meaning Savage ascribes to Santorum, myself…
I like using “asshole” or “asshat.” The asshole is a part of every human, and it releases excrement. Which is natural, but really smelly and kind of gross. Thus not gendered or anything, just icky.
But then, I do find it quite strange to be discussing how to non-offensively insult someone. I mean, I understand it, but there’s a slightly detached part of me that’s shaking her head and chuckling.
““sister-fucker.””
LOL. My friends were teaching me some Bengali swears and one of them pointed out “you have mother-fucker but I noticed you never say sister-fucker – which is much more common in our culture”.
Here in the UK I hear a lot of excellent ones. “Bell-end” is a favourite of mine, and is the exact analogue of “dickhead” (it refers to the head of the penis, which looks like a bell, I guess?). I also like “chob” and “muppet”, which have no swaggering qualities and suggest that the so-named person is simply ridiculous. And there is, of course, the perennial favourite, “wanker”.
There is no “culling” in language. Try as you might, controlling language does not work. Sure, cite the Academie Francais all you want, but just because they can fine broadcasters for using ‘non-French’ words does not mean they have control over the people. It’s been proven that speech on television/radio does not really change the speech of its viewers/listeners anyway.
Even if it was decided by some powerful body that a word was to be removed from the language, how would one remove it? Ban it? From whose speech and from what speech acts? How would one enforce such a ban? Making something taboo just makes it more interesting, and would give a word more longevity in the lexicon. Reappropriate a word, redefine it? Yeah, maybe within a subgroup of the population, but as long as the Average Joe of the mainstream remains the same, he will not change his terms of reference or accept new definitions. Unless, of course, a new word for “woman who has slept with other men but won’t sleep with me” comes into usage, slut will still what slut means today. If the word comes into usage, ‘slut’ will simply fall out of usage. Ideas have to change before the words change.
“You could always take the Dan Savage route, and start taking some of these examples of vileness and using their own names to coin new profanity. ”
This is a GREAT idea. People are always trying to know the new thing or new word, and the desire to be ahead of the wave will drive the spread of the usage of the new term. THIS is the way to shift usage — use the tendencies of society, the tendencies people do not realize are at work, to drive a change of terms. You can’t force people to use new words, but you can always give them new lexical items to appropriate, and see if they take.
If one feels the need to be insulting, I think “shit-for-brains,” “half-wits,” “morons” nicely sum up La Coulter, Michelle Malkin, etc. without any reference to their genitalia or how they might use them.
You could probably argue that it would be more to the point to address the elements of their arguments which are incorrect, rather than descending to ad hominem derogation. But on the other hand, besides the fact that their particular genius is to pack so much falsehood into a one-hundred-and-fifty word piece that it takes you three thousand words to disprove it all, honest to God, it’s a waste of time even bothering to talk to complete blockheads like this Logically, systematically refute one of their arguments, or even show the falsity of a key assertion they claim is factual – so what? you might as well have addressed a brick wall, they’ll be republishing the exact same rubbish, with the words in slightly different order, next week. There’s no reasoning involved whatsoever, they don’t use words to convey ideas, they use them to club their opponents over the head.
I may be in the minority, but when I think of a “slut” I tend to think of behavior more specific than just “sleeping around”. I ususally think of it as describing a deeply insecure girl/person who uses sex to get personal reassurance – not one who is confident and seeking her own pleasure.
Words aside, I think there is a big differnece in empowerment between the two. Many “sluts” don’t even really enjoy the sex – they do it because they think thats the only thing a guy might value about them and the only way they can experience intimacy.
I’m rather fond of calling a nasty piece of work boy a “son-of-a-priest”, thus casting aspersions on the father’s character, for once.