Swingin' & Missin'

[editorial note: This posting will be classified
 "Not Safe For Work."  As stated on previous
 occasions, we normally try to minimize outright
 crudity of language on this site.  In this case,
 however, such crudity is the very germ of the
 discussion.  You are hereby advised to don some
 sort of protective eyewear before proceeding.]


"Well Aren't You Just the Sweetest Little Cuntcake."

"Shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker, and
 tits, hah?  Shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker,
 and tits... and 'tits' doesn't even belong on the list!"

"I... personally... prefer... the word...
 ...'pussy' hear me out!"


commentary by michael j wright

Credits for the quotations above...
The first comes from James Alexander, author and (I assume) artist of Memos to Shitty People: a Delightful and Vulgar Adult Coloring Book, which was a recent gift given to a woman I know well from a woman I wish I knew better.

The second quote is from an infamous George Carlin routine known by the titles "The Seven Words You Can't Say On Television" or more simply "The Seven Dirty Words."  Carlin did not compile the list himself.  He merely parroted a memo produced by the Federal Communications Commission.  The FCC is one of those sinister, semi-secret agencies of the Federal government that engages in freedom-robbing overreach by --ugh!-- regulating things, and nixing radio station call-letters like WHOR or KUNT, both of which would likely feature a music bloc known as the "Hot Wax Weekend," or their marketing department wouldn't be doing its job.  (Strange, is it not, that "wax" still manages to be evocative even though the substance's use as a recording medium died around the same time as the last Cubs world championship?  Go fig.)

The third is from comedian Kathy Griffin.  It is worth noting that she was not expressing her preference over the dreaded c-word, but rather her preference over the clinical term "vagina."

Now then, on to what raised my hackles...
You may of course go see for yourself the, ugh, meme we'll be discussing, or you can, heh, skip all that hopscotching around and just read about it here as if you possess impulse control.  The image is of a woman in a coffee shop reading E.L. James's 50 Shades of Grey.  The book dominates the foreground of the photo; the woman's face is out of the frame; there is a (I assume) caffeinated beverage nearby.  Get the picture?  The text overlay (I'll spare you the all-caps rendering) reads:

"If American women are so outraged
 at Trump's use of naughty words

 who in the hell bought 80 million
 copies of 50 Shades of Grey?"

Hear that?  That's the sound of someone taking a vicious hack and completely missing the pitch.

In a way, a swing and miss like this was inevitable.  For some time now our society has been polarizing itself along socio-political lines, like tiny iron flecks migrating toward red or blue magnets, to the point where we are developing two distinct dialects of American English.  It was one thing, once upon a time, to disagree, even passionately.  That is the way of a democratic republic: we argue, then we vote.  You can look it up in the book.

Now, though, we find it both hard and difficult to even understand each other.  Yes, I did that on purpose.  It is a poor example, but I'll use it anyway.  One side uses words like "hard" while the other side uses words like "difficult."  The blue team speaks in polysyllables, which the red team increasingly finds either confusing or pretentious, and in both cases suspicious.  The reds prefer short, blunt words, which the blues see as (hold on, now) inherently imprecise and indicative of an ignorant ideology in regard to important and intricate issues.  Basically, the blues feel the reds are trying, verbally, to perform surgery with a plastic spoon, while the reds think the blues are silly, and possibly dangerous, for trying to eat soup with a scalpel.

Still, despite all this, I find it difficult hard to believe I have to explain the actual source of the most recent exasperation outrage that is toward Donald Trump.  Perhaps the people who try to make this argument, such as it is, are being deliberately obtuse: avoiding the issue of what Trump said by falsely fixating on how he said it.

Yet I sally forth...

"If American women are so outraged
 at Trump's use of naughty words..."

You will want to mark the time and place at which you encountered the following argument, Dear Reader, because I --of all people-- am about to advise not getting bogged down in semantics.  Hard to believe, I know.  I feel faintly like a guy who has just stepped out of a tilt-a-whirl.

It isn't Trump's "naughty" words that have gotten people upset; it is the sentiments ideas he expressed with those words.  Oh sure, some of his critics will try to score bonus runs by pointing out the vulgarity of the terms he used, but that is mere steak sauce on the red meat of his profane attitudes regarding women and sex, and his sense of entitlement to same irrespective of the other person's interest in or willingness to grant such attentions.

In... well, in other words, a man who groped a woman's breast without permission is every bit as much a creep as one who unwantedly "felt up her tits."  A man who swats someone's derriere is being, chances are, just as inappropriate as one who "smacks them on the ass."  A man who, in the absence of foreplay and/or a medical license, firmly grasps the area of another person's genitals, or even talks about doing so, should be slapped in the face by whomever is closest.

I could escalate these examples, but modesty fucking forbids.

"If American women are so outraged
 at Trump's use of naughty words..."

People are not outraged by the naughtiness of Trump's words.  They're not even surprised.  What they are appalled by is the notion of a 70-year-old man who still has the emotional attitudes of a particularly crass 15-year-old boy, and the blind arrogance to believe he truly is the absolute shit.

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P.S.... I, personally, prefer the term "tallywacker."  Enjoy the playoffs.