On Tue, 21 Mar 2023, at 13:59, Seymour J Metz wrote: > And bum is equivalent to the a-word.
Yes of course, but there's still a difference in severity been (say) calling someone an a*s/ar*e and the other ... though there is (in Scotland, and for all I know elsewhere too) a vernacular way (maybe commonest in Glasgow?) in which referring to eg "that bunch of people" over there as "they c*nts" is much less offensive than saying directly to your pal or shouting across the street "you're a c*nt". In this sense "they c*nts" is no worse than "those blokes". (NB I'm not precious about using the word but some people's email systems especially on corporate systems might not like me using it in full.) -- Jeremy Nicoll - my opinions are my own. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
