@$^%#!* Enough Already!

When did swearing become accepted in our society? Linguistic anthropologists can probably tell us exactly how swearing evolved over the ages, but that's not what I'm asking. It's just that I seem to remember swearing as being far less omnipresent when I was younger. When did it become accepted, even fashionable, to swear? Jesse Jackson's recent "whispered outburst" of the N-word did make the news, but no one is lobbying Congress to have his mouth washed out with soap. When Vice President Cheney told Senator Pat Leahy to ... well, you know ... and on the Senate floor no less, it barely prompted people to shrug. When did it all change?

Look, I'm not a prude. Those who know me would confirm that I am neither modest in speech nor in behavior. In fact, I'm not modest in any sense of the word. I swear I'm not.

But I do digress, I swear I do. See, what I wanted to talk about was swearing. I mean, cursing. Look, it doesn't bother me if someone who stubs their toe chooses to volley a few choice words at the offending object that just destroyed their favorite metatarsal. It's only human to cry out when in pain. After this year's performance in the stock market, I'm sure that lots of people are crying.

Even without broken little piggies, I have no inherent problem with swearing. Vulgarity does has purpose and value. I just think that there's a time and a place for cursing, but in recent years, the time seems to be always and the place everywhere. Whether watching a movie or a so-called comedian, you find yourself inundated with pound signs, at-signs, exclamations points and asterisks. Do you $@%!# know what I #%@!$ mean?

Now really, can anyone tell me why a comedian feels the need to curse to be funny? Why did the %#$!@* chicken cross the %*@$!# road? After your eardrums heal from the onslaught of the question, I suppose any answer is funny?

Another question - is there some kind of contest out there for how many times one can curse in a single movie? Years back, I saw "Scarface" and I must admit, I enjoyed the movie. It was violent and graphic and extremely vulgar. In under three hours, the f-word was uttered (yelled, actually) 207 times. That was probably a new world record. Well, move over Mister Montana and say hello to my little $#!#@ friend! The champions of tongue thrashing have removed all limits of LID (Linguistic Imprecating Density). The three box office hits (Casino, Running Scared, Goodfellas) together boasted a total of over 1000 "utterances", and the movie F*** had the f-word 857 times in just 93 minutes. That's one $%#!@ every 6 1/2 seconds!

And vulgarity is by no means limited to movies and comedians. Have you recently strolled through a comic book store and read some of what sells as "comic" literature? Yes, I'm talking about comic books. You know, those low-brow "graphic novels" we used to buy for twelve cents (now they cost upwards to $3) with cute little characters like Archie and Friends? Now, if you can get by the exaggerated depictions of nearly bare anatomy and explosive violence that saturates some comic books, you still have to deal with explicit language that could make even a Vice-President blush.

But perhaps the true vulgarity lies in the flip side of this issue, the veneer of acceptability that engulfs our world today, much like taking a pedophile and dressing him up as an arsonist for Halloween. I'm talking about mock censorship of vulgarity while violence and cruelty are blithely shown as a matter of course.

Consider the network's airing episodes of "The Sopranos." While merrily showing explicit violence, the network took great care to replace any swearing with clever euphemisms. Somehow, it just doesn't fly when Tony is pistol whipping someone and yelling, "Forget you! Forget you! Forget you!" Do censors believe that we'll "forget" what's really being said?

And when Jesse Jackson's tirade was aired on network television, do you know what word they censored? The N-word. No, no, the OTHER N-word. What was aired was Jackson saying, "I'd like to cut his (bleep) off!" I thought, "Crikey, he wants to cut his nose off? His necktie? What does he want to cut off?" Enquiring minds want to know!

Where the $#!@% was I going with this anyhow? Oh yeah, I'm $#@! fed up with all the @%!$# swearing! I mean, what's the @$!#% point? As Bette Midler once said, "Forget them if they can't take a joke!"