I'm glad I don't live in your world.

It sounds horrible.

You mean the United Theocracies of America?

You think any other English-speaking populace gasps in shock whenever someone dares utter the word "shit"?

What, you think they don't have any words that cause outrage?

I'm quite happy to let words retain their shock value without people like you trying to mainstream the words, and then be required to coin new ones.

Golly used to be a really serious swear, now it's quaint and old fashioned.

You think you are mainstreaming the words by making people OK with offensive words. (Not sure why you think that's such a laudable goal, but I guess it's your goal.) But that's not what actually happens. What actually happens is the word becomes less offensive in the first place.

> I'm quite happy to let words retain their shock value without people like you trying to mainstream the words, and then be required to coin new ones.

They're words. Why are you afraid of them?

> Golly used to be a really serious swear, now it's quaint and old fashioned.

What? Golly was never a "serious swear". That's why it existed in the first place -- because people were afraid of uttering a completely different word.

> You think you are mainstreaming the words by making people OK with offensive words.

This sentence is offensive. Far more offensive than "shit" has ever or will ever be. And not because any of its words are offensive, but because you presume to tell me what I think. And you are very, very wrong.

The idea conveyed is offensive. The words used are irrelevant.

"Vacuum" and "fuck you" are essentially the exact same phrase when pronounced phonetically. Why is one banned from TV and one not? Why do we make a big deal about one or the other? It upsets me that I have to censor the words I say based on the age of people around me (people under 12 or over 60 tend to require extra thought). Personally I started to swear around 6th grade or age 12, so it clearly isn't a particularly advanced linguistic skill. I'd just love if people got over "bad words" and let words be words so we didn't have to worry about it.

The definition of a bad word is a word that is censored.

As soon as you stop censoring the word it is no longer a bad word. So no one will be all that interested in saying it, and will invent a new bad word.

> The definition of a bad word is a word that is censored.

Therefore, in rejecting the entire concept of censoring words, the concept of a "bad word" is necessarily abolished as well.

This isn't about particular words, or a specific instance of censorship, it's about a principle.

Doesn't sound nearly as horrible as the censored world you propose. That fucking shitty world would be hell.

Carlin's Seven Dirty Words: Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cocksucker, Motherfucker, and Tits

This should be required reading alongside Shakespeare in high school. http://www.erenkrantz.com/Humor/SevenDirtyWords.shtml

A non-censored world would be much much worse - for you!

In such a world you could say all those things - and no one would care, and you would be sad that you were not able to say anything offensive.

Imagine a world where swear worlds did not even exist. That's the world you seem to want.

That would be such a wonderful world where people don't get their panties in a knot over the words used instead of the message.

Instead you seem to want a world where the message is ignored, the messenger is shot and everyone is offended because he used the word fuck.

> you would be sad that you were not able to say anything offensive

How did you come by the ability to read others' minds and tell them how they think and feel?

> How did you come by the ability to read others' minds and tell them how they think and feel?

About 10 years of practice.

It's clear you don't understand what I'm saying. Read my conversion with oblique63 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6017261

Maybe you'll get it, maybe you won't.

I already read it. There as here, your logic is bizarre and circular, your attitude defeatist, and your assumptions about other people arrogant and condescending.