What Is REALLY Wrong With Todays Youth?

[Suicane75]

Just got done playing Halo2 on XBox Online for the first time. I swear to god there are kids on there who can't be more than 11 years old throwing around the F Bomb left and right. I've played games online where it was just text but actually hearing the voice of a pre pubescent kid spouting out this language really gave me pause.

[Pyser]

i dont know why, but i expected spring break pictures or something like that from you in this thread. carry on.

[Franklinnoble]

Originally Posted by Pyser

i dont know why, but i expected spring break pictures or something like that from you in this thread. carry on.

That would have been awesome.

Carry on.

[GoSeahawks]

Tell me about it. I don't even play Halo online, but a friend of mine does. Every time I go to his house I hear these squeaky voiced kids throwing aroudn the f-bomb and the "N" word like its common trash talk.

[SirFozzie]

What's wrong?

The internet shithead theory as proposed by Penny Arcade.

Normal People
Plus High Stress Activity
Plus Complete Anonmynity
=
Internet Shitheads

[SFL Cat]

makes sense to me!

[tanglewood]

It's called amelioration. As words become used more commonly, they become more acceptable until eventually the word loses all impact and isn't considered a 'bad word' anymore. In the age of mass-media and globalisation, especially to younger generations, this process is greatly accelerated.

[rkmsuf]

Originally Posted by tanglewood

It's called amelioration. As words become used more commonly, they become more acceptable until eventually the word loses all impact and isn't considered a 'bad word' anymore. In the age of mass-media and globalisation, especially to younger generations, this process is greatly accelerated.

But the reason they use it is because it is a "bad" word.

[Raiders Army]

Originally Posted by tanglewood

It's called amelioration. As words become used more commonly, they become more acceptable until eventually the word loses all impact and isn't considered a 'bad word' anymore. In the age of mass-media and globalisation, especially to younger generations, this process is greatly accelerated.

If my kids ever gave me that excuse for swearing, they'd still get the soap.

[Noop]

I like to *bad word* say *bad word* and tell you to go *bad word* yourself. Its a *bad word*ing great word.

[tanglewood]

Originally Posted by rkmsuf

But the reason they use it is because it is a "bad" word.

Of course. But when everyone is using it so much that it becomes implicitly accepted by general society (I don't think that shit and fuck are too far away from that, they have become pretty common on late night television and certainly on cable. Nigger has certainly semantically shifted among the 'hip hop' generation.) those who seek to say 'bad words' will move on to others. There is always a stagnant period where there are no new bad words to fill the gap that is being vacated by the previous generation. Another possibilty is that due to the internet and the greater freedom in acessing and inventing 'bad words' that the whole concept of swearing will become diluted. Probably not, societies always invent taboos if only so that they can break them, but we wouldn't be able to tell for some years anyway.

Besides, fuck has had a pretty good run of it at over a century now. Isn't it time for something else to take over the mantle?

[Desnudo]

I think the first group of kids hanging out and throwing rocks at mastadons were probably using words like fuck when their parents weren't around.

[rkmsuf]

Originally Posted by tanglewood

Of course. But when everyone is using it so much that it becomes implicitly accepted by general society (I don't think that shit and fuck are too far away from that, they have become pretty common on late night television and certainly on cable. Nigger has certainly semantically shifted among the 'hip hop' generation.) those who seek to say 'bad words' will move on to others. There is always a stagnant period where there are no new bad words to fill the gap that is being vacated by the previous generation. Another possibilty is that due to the internet and the greater freedom in acessing and inventing 'bad words' that the whole concept of swearing will become diluted. Probably not, societies always invent taboos if only so that they can break them, but we wouldn't be able to tell for some years anyway.

Besides, fuck has had a pretty good run of it at over a century now. Isn't it time for something else to take over the mantle?

I hear what you are saying but I just think the 11 year olds referenced use it to be a "badass" of sorts. Without the implied taboo there would be no need to repeat it over and over. That's the reason they repeat it...because they can and it's "taboo".

If it was mundane they'd be using the non mundane terms.

[Pyser]

Originally Posted by tanglewood

Besides, fuck has had a pretty good run of it at over a century now. Isn't it time for something else to take over the mantle?

Like what? Can new curse words really...form? That'd be fascinating. Like the FCC announced tomorrow, no-one can say "Viver" or else be subjected to a huge fine. Then I guess Viver would be a curse.

But once fuck and shit are allowed on network tv, save a few variations and the C word, I think we are done with swearing as a society.

[Bearcat729]

Don't all XBox games have that voice mask feature so that if you don't turn it off you sound like a 6 yr old kid?

Not that I doubt that a kid uses these words, but I think that what your hearing are some adults.

[weinstein7]

I'll bet you they won't play this thread on the radio.

(First one to get the reference wins a gold star.)

[spleen1015]

One thing I don't understand about cussing.

Fuck is supposedly a bad word. Shit is supposedly a bad word.

So instead of saying, "Holy shit", you say "Holy crap". Don't you mean pretty much the same thing?

"The fucking dog just shit on the carpet."
"The freaking dog just pooped on the carpet."

Why is one more acceptable than the other when they both mean the same thing?

They're just words to me.

[Desnudo]

The history of the F-word:

"[Fuck] is a very old word, recorded in English since the 15th century (few acronyms predate the 20th century), with cognates in other Germanic languages. The Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang (Random House, 1994, ISBN 0-394-54427-7) cites Middle Dutch fokken = "to thrust, copulate with"; Norwegian dialect fukka = "to copulate"; and Swedish dialect focka = "to strike, push, copulate" and fock = "penis". Although German ficken may enter the picture somehow, it is problematic in having e-grade, or umlaut, where all the others have o-grade or zero-grade of the vowel.
AHD1, following Pokorny, derived "feud", "fey", "fickle", "foe", and "fuck" from an Indo-European root peig2 = "hostile"; but AHD2 and AHD3 have dropped this connection for "fuck" and give no pre-Germanic etymon for it. Eric Partridge, in the 7th edition of Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English (Macmillan, 1970), said that "fuck" "almost certainly" comes from the Indo-European root *peuk- = "to prick" (which is the source of the English words "compunction", "expunge", "impugn", "poignant", "point", "pounce", "pugilist", "punctuate", "puncture", "pungent", and "pygmy"). Robert Claiborne, in The Roots of English: A Reader's Handbook of Word Origin (Times, 1989) agrees that this is "probably" the etymon. Problems with such theories include a distribution that suggests a North-Sea Germanic areal form rather than an inherited one; the murkiness of the phonetic relations; and the fact that no alleged cognate outside Germanic has sexual connotations."

http://www.snopes.com/language/acronyms/fuck.htm

[rkmsuf]

Originally Posted by weinstein7

I'll bet you they won't play this thread on the radio.

(First one to get the reference wins a gold star.)

My initial thought was Public Enemy but just a guess.

[st.cronin]

It's not Public Enemy, I don't think. I used to have the LP. Dead Milkmen or They Might Be Giants are my guesses.

[st.cronin]

Or maybe Monty Python?

[weinstein7]

Originally Posted by st.cronin

Or maybe Monty Python?

Winner. Although the multiple guesses kind of takes the excitement out of it

http://arago4.tn.utwente.nl/stonedea...ics/radio.html

[st.cronin]

Heh. I got the tune in my head immediately ... just couldn't remember which LP that cracked me up as an 11 year old it was.

[Blackadar]

Fuck this thread.

[tanglewood]

Originally Posted by Desnudo

The history of the F-word...

It has been around a loooong time, but had pretty much died out by Georgian and Victorian times. However it was brought back into fashion by the Prince of Wales in 1902 when he was shot whilst waiting at a train station in Belgium. His exact words were "Fuck it. I've caught a bullet." Reported in newspapers across the world the next day. Instant swear word.

[sterlingice]

Barker: How could you foolish Americans bring the wrath of scorn by mass-chanting the word of wretchedness?!
Chef: Aah, yeah. We didn't mean to.
Barker: Didn't you realize "shit" is a curse word?!
Stan: Well, yeah, but I don't think that "curse word" meant... curse word.
Barker: Ha! Leave it to American to think that "no" means yes, "pissed" means angry, and "curse word" means something other than a word that's cursed!!

SI

[Cringer]

What is wrong with todays kids?

They learned from todays adults. Like the one I saw standing next to his car jerking off along the highway Tuesday night. I am not sure where you come up with something like that, but I bet he said 'fuck yeah' alot when planning it.....