I still maintain that slang is good for you, but, sometimes, profanity is even better. Slang is playful and facetious, the story goes, the language by which groups hang together. Profanity, on the other hand, is supposedly coarse and mean. Well, that’s true enough, in some cases, but I’ve recently been reminded that profanity is occasionally the lighter alternative, that the relevant slang is what’s coarse and violent. Yes, I’m talking about sex, or, more precisely, the language of sex — not copulate or get it on, but the relative value of fuck and bang or nail.
“You and Me LFG”
Senator Elizabeth Warren, the planful Massachusetts Democrat, is not the presidential candidate who comes to mind when one thinks of political potty-mouths. (See Ben Zimmer’s 2019 Tucker Awards for examples of public swearing from Beto O’Rourke and Tim Ryan, who are no longer in the race, and from Donald J. Trump, who for the time being is.) So it was a bit of a surprise when Warren’s campaign adopted “LFG” as an unofficial campaign slogan and began selling “You and Me LFG” merchandise.
What de rass is bomboclaat?
When you go to Twitter to see if “sco pa tu manaa” is over and they just shifted it to “bomboclaat.”
After wishing all the people posting “sco pa tu manaa” would just go the fuck to sleep, I was really happy to see the “bomboclaat” meme circulating at first. We don’t see enough sweary Patois! Admittedly, I couldn’t see what was so “fuck, man” about some of the images, but… Continue reading
The 5th Annual Tucker Awards for Excellence in Swearing
With the calendar turning on another year (and another decade), it’s time once again for the annual Strong Language honors for excellence in swearing. For the past half-decade, Strong Language has been on the scene, tracking all the highlights in low language. (Check out our previous roundups from 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018.) As always, the awards are named in honor of the patron saint of Strong Language, Malcolm Tucker, the endlessly quotable antihero played by Peter Capaldi in the BBC political satire The Thick of It and the film followup In the Loop.
Lately, Capaldi has reunited with Armando Iannucci, the creator of The Thick of It (as well as the equally sweary Veep) in the new film The Personal History of David Copperfield. Even though a different Dickensian adaptation, BBC One’s A Christmas Carol, managed to slip in some swearing, Capaldi’s Mr. Micawber is obscenity-free, so we’ll have to keep the spirit of Malcolm Tucker alive ourselves. As Malcolm would say, come the fuck in or fuck the fuck off.
Watch your cussin’ language: Veronica Mars ups the ante on the swear jar
During her storied career as a stage, film, and television actress, Kristen Bell has received many honors and awards — she has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, at 6225 Hollywood Boulevard! — but, until now, no one has recognized her as the Queen of Television Euphemism. From her thespian throne, she ruled 2019, first as Eleanor Shellstrop in Seasons Three and Four of NBC’s The Good Place, a series in which profanity is automatically and ontologically replaced with euphemisms. Eleanor tries to say things like “motherfucking shitballs,” but they all come out like “motherforking shirtballs.” So, there’s no swearing in the Good Place, except that the Good Place is actually the Bad Place, so it’s hard to tell whether euphemism is diabolical or divine. Then, thanks to Hulu, Bell reappeared as Veronica Mars, grown-up private eye, in Season Four of Veronica Mars, another show in which euphemism is practically a character. Continue reading
