Re:Scunthorpe Sans – a self-censoring font
by throwaway_pdp09 on Sunday May 10, 2020 @12:37PM
(#23133945)
It's intent. I went to a boarding school, kids lived in 'houses' with housemasters. They were pretty good, not as dickensian as it sounds.
Depending on the housemaster, and provided you didn't make a habit of it you could call them wankers or more, occasionally get away with calling them a cunt. All relaxed.
But if you intended to offend then far lighter swear words would be taken much more seriously. You could get into trouble just for using the word 'bloody' if it was not meant in jest. Odd, but it worked in my view.
Yup, intent is more important than the actual words.
An acquaintance has taken to using a feature or piece of wardrobe as an insult, e.g. "Baseball cap" or whatever.
There's also a story that I can't remember fully (my girlfriend knows it) where "prairie hat" became an insult.
One of my childhood friends kept calling his brother names. He was told off and told he couldn't do that any more... He promptly changed to call his brother by the name of cheeses.
His brother certainly instantly recognized that "gouda" etc. was just as clearly an insult as any of the other things he had been called, and got just as angry.