People to seem to swear casually a lot these days. Swear words have an outsized impact compared to their literal meaning and I wonder if overusing them hurts our ability to express true shock and disgust. On the flip side people also tend to overuse positive words like awesome, amazing, etc. The holocaust was fucking awful, your junior developer’s code was just bad.
I've always seen taking away the actual punch of the words as an unintentional benefit. To be quite honest, I think someone can more concisely and personally convey shock and disgust without using any 'swear words' at all.
I'm in my 20s and everybody I know regularly and casually uses profanity, even the R-rated stuff. Older people of HN: is this anecdotally something that decreases with age, or is our generation genuinely more profane?
I would think having kids/friends who have kids would cut it down.
Does it decrease with age? Hard to say. At over 60, I think at times I'd do well to moderate my language. But is true that what once seemed liberating can become tedious. The word that perks up the message when used occasionally bores when it appears in every other sentence.
Yes, in general one tries to keep language G-rated around children.
12 comments
[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 33.6 ms ] threadhttp://viz.co.uk/category/rogers-profanisaurus/
I would think having kids/friends who have kids would cut it down.
Yes, in general one tries to keep language G-rated around children.