On Apr 11, 2007, at 7:59, Joy Beeson wrote:
I wish! There is many an occasion when &[EMAIL PROTECTED] would be the
best way to express my feelings -- but the only word with
any force left is "nigger", and "nigger" in no way substitutes for
"damn".
I've reverted to innocuous phrases like "rats!". Just utter them "con
brio" <g> My son, when he picked up the Big Eff Word at school, used it
promptly and got suspended for foul language (at age 7, it scared the
"um..." out of him <g>). Thereafter, he came up with something like
"oompah". No relationship to any known cursewords at all, but, *the
way* he said it made it clear what he meant. The fact that it drove his
teachers wild -- nothing to hang a complaint on -- delighted him so
much, that giving up really bad words was no hardship :)
Ah, well, there's no way the yahoos can take the force out
of "wooden swearing".
What's "wooden swearing"?
Susan Reishus,
I agree that parents who yell abuse at one another -- even without the
dirty words -- are, likely, raising a confused and insecure child; I
remember it from my own childhood. But I can't remember, ever, in my
33+yrs of marriage, a fight my husband and I had, within or without our
son's hearing. Both of us are highly verbal and "disputatious" and we
prefer to use logic, with each waiting one's turn to speak. I'm more
contentious than he is and even I will leave the room, rather than
fight, when I see I'm not making any headway with my *reasoned*
arguments (so, OK; a log or a rock will get a good kick once I'm
outside cooling off <g>). The reason I gave up "bad language" before
our son was born was not to conform to other people's opinion about me,
but because I was using foul language where other people take a breath
to mark a comma and, in mid-twenties, recognised it was both childish
and excessive.
Finally, Joy Beeson wrote:
(When I first heard of e-mail, I never thought of using it to
communicate with someone who was sleeping in the next room!)
One of my all time favourite comic panels had a picture of two
computers, back to back, with a woman (presumably wife) sitting in
front of one and a man (presumably husband) sitting in front of the
other. The (presumptive) husband is typing:
"what do you mean, we never talk anymore?"
--
Tamara P Duvall http://t-n-lace.net/
Lexington, Virginia, USA (Formerly of Warsaw, Poland)
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