Mark Twain said:
“Under certain circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer.”
On the other hand, I’ve been using increasing amounts of profanity these past years, and seriously need to go on a potty-mouth-free diet in order to cleanse my system, so I’m fortunate in having read the first few books of the hilarious Space Team series by Barry J. Hutchison, where the universal translators don’t translate imprecations, so now I can say things like:
What the fonk?!?
I’m also fortunate in finding The Good Place to binge upon on Netflix. Their universal translator doesn’t do imprecations, either, so now I can also choose to say:
What the fork?!?
It’s good to increase one’s vocabulary. It gives one choices.
This post is part of Linda G. Hills weekly blog hop, One-Liner Wednesday. If you have a one-liner or just like them, follow the link.
A WRITING PROMPT FROM ME TO YOU: Someone must suppress warranted profanity.
MA
Anklebuster
June 24, 2020 at 8:12amMy all-time favorite from the Universal Translator is “Mickey Fickey”. A commercial actor used it and it shocked my funny-bone more than the original imprecation would have shocked the FCC (whose members, apparently, devised the Universal Translator during an episode of Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood.)
Cheers,
Mitch
Marian Allen
June 24, 2020 at 9:13amsnort
Dan Antion
June 24, 2020 at 10:07amMy best friend uses “what the foop” and “what the faruk” but only “foop” is made into other forms line “fooping idiot.”
Marian Allen
June 24, 2020 at 10:26amRemember Ironsides? “Flaming” was his go-to, as in “flaming idiot.”
Dan Antion
June 24, 2020 at 11:35amHa! You’re right.
John Holton
June 24, 2020 at 12:45pmI was reading a book on the Python programming language, and they had a line, “Profanity is the language every programmer understands.”
Marian Allen
June 24, 2020 at 1:16pmOhmygosh, I love it!
Ally Bean
June 24, 2020 at 1:29pmWhen Eleanor Shellstrop says ‘”holy forking shirt balls” I laugh every time. I say it now, too– because she’s a good role model.
Marian Allen
June 24, 2020 at 3:47pmspits coffee all over the keyboard
Alicia Butcher Ehrhardt
June 24, 2020 at 9:47pmI suppress a lot of profanity when I write – as I engender situations which require it.
If I didn’t, the effect when I DO use it would be diluted. Which is what happens when every other word is mf in the mouths of the current generations.
And I will use an m-dash – and let the reader fill in: “What the f–” or equivalent.
Most adults have enough vocabulary to fill these spaces. If they don’t, good for them.
It’s the GWTW method.
Marian Allen
June 25, 2020 at 8:52amI cuss a lot more in person than I do in fiction. A lot of my characters use mild profanity, but very few of them dive very deep into it. Some do, because that’s how they talk. Part of that abstemiousness was due to my mother: She liked for me to read my stuff to her, and I got tired of skipping words or replacing a bad one with a mild one; it was just easier to write more creatively.
Alicia Butcher Ehrhardt
June 25, 2020 at 12:39pmStill bringing you up, eh?
Marian Allen
June 25, 2020 at 12:50pmMom passed two years ago, but she’s still bringing me up. Probably always will be, and I’m glad to have her here in my head with me. 🙂
Alicia Butcher Ehrhardt
June 25, 2020 at 7:22pmMine isn’t in there enough, because she had many years of not really being with us before she died, but she and my maternal grandmother are both in there forever. For good.
Marian Allen
June 26, 2020 at 8:04am“For good.” Well said, my friend, well said.
RAAckerman@Cerebrations.biz
June 25, 2020 at 9:02amThe Good Place didn’t start that- the SyFy channel used those years ago- Continuum or Caprica- about a decade ago.