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Re:Naughty words: What makes swear words so offensive? by tluyben2 on Tuesday March 08, 2016 @06:47AM (#11244713)
I cannot think of any word my friends or me would find offensive which is why I have to take care not to say the wrong things when in other countries. I was raised in the Netherlands in schools where we had plenty of religious discourse and we all (my friend group) became atheist, so anything using the lord's name in vain wouldn't bother me at all; it doesn't even register most of the time. And then most of our parents didn't want to shield us much from the big-bad-world, so swearing US humor and UK humor were normal as well. I really didn't know until I met my aunt from Canada for the first time when I was 9 or 10 that 'fuck' is not normal in some circles. Note this was the early 80s; no internet, very limited communication besides few BBS's + magazines + tv + local (Dutch, no foreigners) events. I don't see anything wrong with it; some words are just 'stop words' but to respect other people's feelings I try not to use anything that I know is considered 'bad' in those circles.

It always amazes me that rich/educated people swear a lot and poor/uneducated people swear a lot but in between (middle-class) everyone is ultra polite. At least that is what I found from the limited (as one person of course experiences cannot be very broad) set of meetings in NL/UK/US.

Re:Naughty words: What makes swear words so offensive? by kedean on Tuesday March 08, 2016 @11:34AM (#11246303)
>It always amazes me that rich/educated people swear a lot and poor/uneducated people swear a lot but in between (middle-class) everyone is ultra polite

Makes sense though. The poor don't have anything to lose by offending someone else, and are likely the people who would be most offended by some curse words in the first place. The rich don't care because everyone else looks up to them for their money anyway, who's going to call them out? The middle class have everything to lose if the wrong person is offended by what they say.