Here’s a funny thing: the Mirror reporting on more horrible behavior from Katie Hopkins, to wit calling an autistic nine-year-0ld rude names. But I noticed something particular about it…
The headline:
Katie Hopkins stoops to new low as she bullies autistic nine-year-old girl over weight and calls her a ‘t***’
The story:
You might not have thought it possible, but Katie Hopkins appears to have sunk to a new low as she has called a nine-year-old girl ‘a t***’.
The outrageous columnist was tweeting throughout Channel 4’s new show, Born Naughty?, where nine-year-old Honey was diagnosed with mild autism.
“Honey can’t complete the autism assessment as she is too busy being a complete t***. But the s*** mum assessment is complete #bornnaughty,” Katie tweeted.
See there? It appears that “twat” is too rude (in the sense of “obscene”) to spell out. But how can that be? I’ve been told that it’s not even mildly rude in the UK, that it’s actually a different word from the US one, which we can tell because it’s pronounced differently. I’ve been told that even the queen says it.
But if that’s true, why does the Mirror asterisk it?
The Daily Mirror isn’t exactly a high-brow publication, either; their readers can almost certainly stomach the word spelled out in full, especially given how totally un-rude (and ungendered?) it is.
It’s a regional thing. In the south of the country is a fairly innocuous word. In the north it’s equivalent to the C word.
I grew up in the south (mostly in or around London) and quickly learned the difference when I moved to Sheffield (in the north).
But either way it still means female genitalia, right? Yet I’ve been told it has a different meaning…though never that I recall with an explanation of what it did mean, other than a word of mild scorn – about like “twerp” perhaps.
AFAIK (Australian here) is always means female genitalia, but it is like “dick”, as in “don’t be a dick”. The insult level is quite mild. Wanker would be a fair substitute.
Where I come from, a twat is a silly person, a bit of . Generally a mild term. often used self depreciatingly. “I’m a bit of a twat”. Not as bad as a dick, which is a real nuisance of a person, and certainly not as bad as a prick, or a total arsehole or a Right Cunt, or a fucking nob-head. I’ve seen all manner of people use all of these descriptors freely, from feminist to fascist,
All of these words, when used in a different context, also refer to anatomical parts, And they also mean different things in different parts of the world to different cultures and can be misunderstood on the internet. A bit like the satire in Charlie Hebdo.
Good comparison, it’s very like the Charlie Hebdo difference.
(in the sense of “obscene”) to spell out
I know you don’t do it, but … why on earth do people think it’s “OK” to say something “obscene” if you obfuscate it? It’s not like when someone says “A-hole” that my brain doesn’t jump down exactly the same mental pathways as if they had said “Asshole” (or whatever) “Jeeze” “Shucks” “Darn” etc… It’s just incredibly stupid.
I do think words can harm, but when they are directed at a person who can be harmed by them. I.e.:
“The word ‘twat’ is a misogynistic insult that people shouldn’t use”
as opposed to
“(Person) is a twat”
in which case I’ve actually managed to say more about me than about them.
Insults draw whatever power they have from invidious (particularly: unfair) comparisons often embedded in the insult. At its root, the comparison is either fair or unfair: “That Marcus! He always looks like he slept in his clothes!” Uh. Ok. That’s true. So it’s hardly insulting. “That Marcus! He’s less articulate than even Donald Trump!” Um, I don’t think so. So that insult is an invidious comparison, which is a short way of saying “It’s a lie.” So I can ignore it because if all someone can come up to hurt me is to throw a lie at me?: I’m good!
Marcus – I’ve never understood it. Also, it’s always given me the crawls – I hate coyness. I always do spell it out.
I’m sure you’re more articulate than Trump, since it’s hard to be less articulate than him. Perhaps if you tried to be less articulate you could achieve that goal. Practice, practice, practice.
I’m another Londoner and “twat” wouldn’t set off any feminist alarms and isn’t that obscene. I grew up thinking that it was a variation on ‘twit’ and it wasn’t until I was told about Robert Browning’s mistake in thinking it referred to nun’s headgear (he knew it from a Seventeenth Century poem that rhymed “cardinal’s hat” with “nun’s twat”, detailed here). I get an odd pleasure from its being a pretty good translation in denotation and connotation of the French “con” (and presumably “cono” in Spanish).
Most tabloids here a very coy, even asterisking words that wouldn’t raise an eyebrow in 6:30 Radio 4 comedy.
Two observations:
1: it is – or should be – clear that tabloid newspaper culture in the UK is really, really odd. Anyone with a mind to can give endless examples of the ludicrous conventions in UK tabloid content. The cliche is the phrase “BAN THIS SICK FILTH!”, to be accompanied always with copious lurid (but crudely censored) examples of said sick filth so the readers know exactly what it is the newspapers’ editors don’t want them to see.
Surely the finest example was a juxtaposition in the Daily Star in 2001, where on one page there was a story about the Brass Eye “Paedogeddon” special being repeated (a comedy satire on the media’s hysteria about paedophilia), and ON THE OPPOSITE PAGE (i.e. right next to it) was a photo of the then 15-year old singer Charlotte Church in a tight top headlined “She’s a big girl now” describing her as looking “chest swell”. In the context of this, asterisking swearwords (but still printing enough of them so you know what’s being “censored”) seems entirely consistent with their brand of have-your-cake-and-eat-it finger-wagging puritanism.
2: there’s a transatlantic linguistic disconnect here quite different than the disingenuous “but cunt isn’t as rude in England” nonsense apologists try to trot out. The evidence, across multiple media, will show that cunt is, in England, the single rudest most taboo word in the language, and anyone trying to tell you different is a … dishonest person with an agenda. Have a listen to the excellent Helen Zaltzman on the subject: http://www.theallusionist.org/allusionist/c-bomb
But the same evidence, if you deign to look at it, will back up your apparent multiple sources telling you that twat really is much, much milder. You can choose to ignore those sources, and that evidence, of course, and persist in feigning confusion.
But the truth here is that the asterisking going on is nothing (or at least very little) to do with how rude the word is, and far more to do with the frankly weird culture of the Daily Mirror and its ilk.
Twat is a *lot* milder than cunt, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t rude at all. They also obfuscated shit, which isn’t considered a strong swear either.
The Mirror like The Sun call themselves family news papers so asterisks many word that grown ups, and lets face it children find innocuous. B*gger, t*ts, A**e, S***, s**t, t**t, W**nker are just a few examples.
They do this at the same time as showing t*ts on page 3 and employing t**ts like Richard Littlejohn.
I think “twat” is a lot more ambiguous in both origin and general use, but I’m always a little suspicious of people who say they haven’t even heard of its apparent genital association even if they’re convinced its true origin is different.
I can never understand why people are so determined to use words that they know are problematic, especially when they’re not particularly intending to shock or annoy the politically correct. Is the use of any particular word over a perfectly reasonable substitute really so important?
The asterisking is ridiculous. I’ve even occasionally found myself actually having to work out what the censored word was. It reminds me of when they used to over-dub swear words in movies, although that was just hilarious.
It has been going on a long time though (not usually with asterisks). From at least the 18th century, possibly longer. I expect other factors, such as obscene publications acts and press self-regulation agreements (which perhaps meant something once) have something to do with it.
It’s about time we grew up, admitted the existence of naughty words and acknowledged the difference between use and mention.
I think others have said it too, but to reinforce: ‘twat’ is considered rude but it is pretty mild in the UK. It does mean female genitalia, but that doesn’t mean it is any stronger than ‘dick’ which it is pretty much interchangeable with. Means ‘idiot’ more or less. The tabs are super prudish about swear words, but it would be acceptable to use ‘twat’ on the BBC, for example.
@Bluntnose:
It’s complicated, isn’t it? There’s the issue of comparative severity, where everyone knows the rules but nobody understands them (I don’t recall being told that “cunt” was especially bad, I must have picked it up from other people’s reactions and they must have picked it up from….) then there’s the issue of which gendered insults are problematic. And those concepts are related in ways that aren’t always clear.
Part of the way we parse it all out is to do with the familiar usage. But that’s part of the problem, isn’t it? For example, “pussy” and “bitch” are not generally considered as severe as “cunt” or for some reason slightly less severe than “twat” but I don’t understand why.
“Pussy” is always about a person acting in a ‘lesser’ way than a ‘real man’ would and so references what is supposed to be the most contemptible part of a woman. Contemptible presumably because vaginas are assumed to be more or less interchangeable and the only part of the woman – apart from auxiliary sandwich-making ability – that’s of value. Yeah, I feel as tainted writing this as you do reading it.
“Bitch” is always about women acting in ways some men think women are not supposed to, even (perhaps even especially) when it’s applied to men.
We all know this, but my point is that gendered insults are not very much like icebergs. In both cases we all know perfectly well that there’s a lot more going on underneath, but we don’t pretend we don’t know it when it comes to icebergs.
So we have “cunt” being particularly bad because it relates a particularly unspeakable quality or action of a person to the only part of a woman perceived as having value. That’s, apparently, the worst thing you could be.
Then we have “pussy” relating ineptitude at or disinclination toward an arbitrary set of activities… to the only part of a woman perceived as having value.
Not the worst thing you can be, in this case. Only *part* of you is like the most contemptible part of the less-than-male women…. You can recover from being a pussy… in the eyes of the people who want you to act more like them.
That’s what I mean by it being complicated and by everyone knowing the rules without understanding them.
As for “dick” and its like, equivalence with female gendered insults is also complicated. We often call people a dick for doing things many men admire such as promiscuity (in males but not females), treating sexual partners poorly (again, somehow ‘admirable’ in only one sex), ruthless, or assertive behaviour (you get the message) and so on.
Dicks are considered admirable by many, even when they misbehave. And when they aren’t, dicks (and their owners) are excused as just doing what dicks do.
And there are also colloquial names for penises such as “cock” which have no negative connotations I know of (quite the reverse). Is the same true for vaginas?
There are insults to do entirely with penises. A person’s penis might be accused of being “too small”, for example. Or unable to “perform”, as much of the spam I get puts it. This *might* be a gendered insult in a way superficially similar to “pussy”. It’s reducing a man to his genitals.
But I’m still not sure they’re the same. They seem like insults designed to encourage men to be more like an arbitrary image of what men should be, rather than those designed to insult arbitrary images of what women shouldn’t be.
They’re both absolute bullshit, but one is worse.
As for “dick” and its like, equivalence with female gendered insults is also complicated. We often call people a dick for doing things many men admire such as promiscuity
Not really, ‘dick’ is always perjorative whenever it is applied. As are all the cognates, I think, including ‘cock’. I think the meaning and weight of swear words are arbitrary. All ‘unmentionable’ words are recruited to the task but the weight they carry is pretty much randomly decided through usage as far as I can see. So we can disparage a man for effeminate weakness with ‘pussy’ but, on the other hand, disparage him for excessive aggression or violence with ‘cunt’. It is interesting that these words all have some expletive power in other European languages but are not equivalent in strength or meaning.
sonofrojblake @ 11 –
That’s one too many times you’ve called me a liar. Good-bye.
And I once again had no clue what word that was supposed to be until it was, you know, actually written, which I maintain is the biggest problem with this (asinine) resurgence of censoring quotations. Were it not for Ophelia’s disambiguation, I would still have no clue. “Twat” is not a word I ever use and is one I rarely see – it’s simply not likely to occur to me that it even exists as a word without actually seeing/hearing it used, much like “parsimonious” (I say “frugal”) or “adroit” (I say “deft”), or, conversely, how others might view my common use of “discourse”, “semiotic”, or “ontology”.
I, for one, prefer ‘s*miotic’.
Do Americans use twat as a verb?
She twatted him (punched)
I was twatted(drunk, very)
Nope.
@Bluntnose:
I think we’re close to agreeing. I suck my teeth a little at your appeal to randomness but I’ll certainly agree that the badness of words *seems* fairly random from the outside, regardless of their actual impact.
But no word is *always* completely pejorative. There are circumstances where words like “cunt” are used as praise. “You lucky cunt”, for example, simultaneously expresses the displeasure that you yourself aren’t the lucky cunt and the pleasure that someone else is. In UK English, “you daft cunt” can be an affectionate sentiment.
In those cases, I don’t think the word is really being used as a pejorative. It’s being used as an affectionate or perhaps subjunctive term *because* it’s usually used as a pejorative. I think this is the sort of thing we Brits mean when we pretend that words like “cunt” aren’t gendered insults and are OK to use indiscriminately.
As for any equivalence between “dick” and “cock”, pull the other one.
They are both considered kind of obscene, they can both be used in more or less the same pejorative way, but they are not absolutely interchangeable in common use. Calling someone a dick is not the same as calling someone a cock. Referring to one’s dick is also not the same as referring to one’s cock. I don’t know why, but it’s the case. Nobody in porn says “dick”, for example, they always say “cock”.
OK, not nobody. People in porn do say dick sometimes, I overstated my case. But even in porn, “cock” often seems to mean something different to “dick” even when they are referring unambiguously to a penis,
A final word on “cock” and “dick”. My wife said that “cock” sounds to her like something that’ll do something to you while “dick” sounds like something you might do something with.
That’s the sort of thing I mean when I say the words are different even though they refer to the same thing. “Twat”, “cunt” and “pussy” clearly mean different things even though they refer to the same thing.
I’m not going anywhere with this, it just seemed an important, if obvious, thing to say.
That is true, but it is only true of ‘cunt’ which is unusual in the UK at least for being as often a term of affection or raise as it is a strong insult. ‘Dick’ can’t be used like that. If you call someone ‘a dick’ it is always pejorative. I don’t think that tells us anything at all about the subterranean canals of our cultural prejudices, I think it is pure chance.
I am a bit bemused by the idea that ‘dick and ‘cock’ have a significant difference for you. It may be a local thing but to my mind they are entirely interchangeable. Call someone a ‘cock’ and you mean he is a ‘dick’. I suppose that in a sexual context, where the word refers to ‘penis’ there is a small difference of emphasis, but it is pretty slight.
One last thing because I forgot to mention it. I think this is wrong, they all mean the same thing so long as they refer to the same thing, being female genitals. In that circumstance, in the bedroom, they can be used interchangeably. It is when they are not referring to that , in the bar or saloon for example, that they have different meanings, which is sort of my point. When we call someone (rather than some thing) a ‘cunt’ we are not referring to a woman’s genitals at all, it has become detached from its origins, it is, for all intents and purposes, a different word. Not to understand that is to fall into the genetic fallacy.
Bluntnose 28
My argument is the opposite of this.
Do we actually use cunt or twat in the bedroom? I have heard cunt used in porn but that tends to be the more violent porn that I’m even less interested in than average porn. Twat I don’t think I’ve ever heard used.
The only word of the three that I believe I’ve ever used to actually refer to an actual vagina is the American import.
Another word that was widely used to refer to a vagina as I started on my sex life in the mid 80’s was fanny, which seems to have been pushed aside in favour of pussy, but still can both refer to a vagina and be used as an insult.
@Danny: I’m definitely going to call vaginas “American Imports” from now on 😉 If I had such a thing as a seduction technique, that would probably help.
“Fanny” is still used quite a lot in the UK and is occasionally hilarious to the more puerile among us because it’s an inoffensive US term for the more-or-less equivalent “arse”.
@Bluntnose:
Then how come it sometimes is? “Don’t be a dick” can be used in games, for example, when someone is taking advantage of a mistake by someone else. In those cases it might mean something like “I’m a bit embarrassed that I fucked up, well-played in noticing it”. Or it might not. It’s not always that simple.
I’m all for using “dick” as praiseworthy. You can’t argue that penises are not optimistic, for example.
See the point my wife made. She feels that “cock” seems more aggressive, something that does something to her and “dick” seems more like something she might want to pass the time of day with. I get a similar sort of sense of the two words. Could be regional, could just be me and Mrs Latsot. I guess we could test those assumptions. Presumably Youporn has an API?
I think your misunderstanding of this is what we’re talking about. When we use words like “cunt” to mean both someone unpleasant and vaginas we’re not obviously disassociating the two. We have both those things in mind when we use the word. We don’t use “cunt” when we talk about vaginas in polite society, do we? “Cunt” is a ‘bad’ name for vaginas, one we might be condemned for using to refer to vaginas and – what a fucking surprise – it’s also a bad name for people we don’t like.
How about when we call someone a dog or a cockroach? Are those just words devoid of any other meaning than a stock insult or do they use vast spans of cultural understanding to make it clear to absolutely everyone – including people outside that culture – what’s meant?
I don’t buy it.
It’s worse to be called a cunt than a dick and I think that’s the issue here. We can argue about whether it’s worse to be called a dick or a cock but that’s a distraction. I brought it up only to explain how complicated this business is.
We do, you may not. People vary in their comfort with ‘strong’ words, but every woman I have known has called her cunt a cunt.
Yes, but it means ‘don’t behave like an arsehole’. It isn’t very strong and there can be affection behind it, but it is clear that if you do behave like a dick, you are behaving badly. It is pejorative. You can’t say, for example, ‘he is one smart dick’, the way you can say ‘he is one smart cunt’. It just sounds wrong.
We don’t use it in polite society because, like ‘dick’ it is not a polite word. That does not mean we disparage the thing it refers to or that we are referring to a woman’s genitals when, say, we admire someone for being a ‘hard cunt’. How would that evenn work?
No, because they are not stock insults. They have only one meaning. But if I hit my thumb with a nail and shout ‘fuck’ I am not shouting ‘sexual intercourse’ by other means. It’s a different sort of thing, the word has a completely different meaning and function, from long use, than in its descriptive sense.
But it isn’t worse to be called a ‘twat’ than a ‘dick’ (probably the reverse) and yet ‘cunt’ and ‘twat’ both refer to the same part of a woman’s anatomy. So what is the issue? Isn’t it more plausible that the strength of the words is arbitrarily determined? Otherwise shouldn’t both words should have the same strength drawing on the same supposed social repugnance towards women’s sexuality.
@Bluntnose
Every woman you have ever known? What, did you fucking ask them all what they called their genitals? Every woman you have ever known? I know thousands of people, many of whom are women. I have never asked anyone what they call their genitals. I can’t wait to see the results of your comprehensive survey.
And yet you can say “he’s a bit of a dick” while still admiring him. And while expecting lots of other people to still admire him. You usually can’t expect the same thing while saying “she’s a bitch” or “she’s a cunt”. You probably can’t expect the same thing while saying “he’s a cunt”, can you?
Excuse me? For a billion or so people, yeah they are.
And I don’t have the slightest problem with you shouting “fuck” when you hit your thumb. That’s not what we’re talking about though, is it? We’re talking about how people refer to other people.
More plausible than what? I think you have to deliberately ignore several thousand years of horrible behaviour and several hundred years of worthwhile thought before you can call the mistreatment of a group of people “arbitrary”.
My cynical interpretation would be that precisely by asterisking it, The Mirror gives the impression that ‘twat’ is generally considered ruder than it is — and therefore that Hopkins’ offence, the selling point of the story, is even more egregious. The reader (presumably, any ‘average’ Brit, who thinks Katie Hopkins is a moron) just didn’t realise until that point how bad the word was…
I meant ‘known’ in the biblical sense. Although, come to think of it, many other women I know and have known call their vaginas cunts. You don’t usually have to ask, sex and sexuality tends to come up in conversation when you know people well.
Yes, but it means that you admire him despite the degree to which he is a dick. In other words, he is not a total dick, but insofar as he is a dick, you disparage him. You cannot call someone a dick in an admiring way, the way you can ‘cunt’ with certain modifiers.
Yes, you really can: ‘he’s a right cunt sometimes but a good laugh, you’ll like him.’
Mistreatment of people is a different thing, we are talking about a certain group of words and how they work.
But it’s not entirely a different thing; that’s the point.
It’s not necessarily a different thing but it is often enough a different thing that I think you have to justify making the opposite case.
I’ve been doing that for years. I don’t want to do it from the beginning with every post.
I’ve also been encountering confident dismissiveness about sexist epithets from people who aren’t subject to them for years, and I get tired of it.
Well I won’t argue the toss if you’re not up for it, but on the evidence here I think it’s gard to make the case that ‘twat’ is a sexist epithet, in the UK at least.
You’re full of it, Bluntnose, and you’re aware of what you’re doing.
I am aware of what I’m doing, discussing something on the Interne Thanks for your vapid contribution though.
If you think Josh is vapid, you’re probably reading wrong.
That.
I get called a cunt most days and it doesn’t hurt me at all. Being all male and shit means that it’s just a word to me. I don’t have to think about what people are actually calling me or where it’s coming from. Yay me.
What offends me is when people justify using words that are pretty much designed to hurt people, especially when they’re really really bad at justifying. What offends me is *thoughtlessness*. Lack of self fucking awareness. It offends me even more than does cruelty, probably because I’m often guilty of it myself.
Josh is right, Bluntnose. We all know what you’re doing.
Ophelia @36
First, thanks for sorting my post out up there^^^^
Second
“I’ve also been encountering confident dismissiveness about sexist epithets from people who aren’t subject to them for years, and I get tired of it.”
And here I really feel for you, I can see how it could get tiring to be called, probably daily on social media, offensive genital slurs and to have to reply over and over that its not cool to use a woman’s body as an insult. I’m sure its also frustrating when you call someone out on it to be told that its not a misogynistic attack, because the words aren’t used that way in England, when you know absolutely and for fucking certain that the attacker is using the words to attack you because they are gendered and you are a women.
Christ! I’ve seen the reposting of the stuff MRAs put out and I don’t think I could deal with it. I’m lucky its not aimed at me and I’m not tied to social media in the way you are.
The thing is , when an American turns to a British person* and attempts to tell us how to use our own language I’m afraid the heckles tend to go up. We use the same words but as a pithy quote points out, Americans and British people (and for that matter Aussies, Kiwis and Yappies) use them in different ways.
On top of that , I don’t think Americans, particularly Liberal Americans appreciate the cultural power you have. Ok, you know that you stomp around violently, but also your culture tends to swamp local cultures. Its kinda disheartening when I watch films made in Britain, ostensibly for British audiences, using Americanisms like sneakers instead of trainers and gas instead of petrol to make it easier to sell into an American market, and this happens a lot and is increasing.
To bring it back on topic, I’d never heard the word pussy used to describe a vagina until the mid or maybe late 80’s, I knew the James Bond character Pussy Galore was some kind of smutty reference but didn’t know what. Its an American import that’s taken over our language. Then there’s the dread that British parents feel when watching an American children’s film, that a character might fall on his/her fanny and the 6 year old’s head spins round with a WUT!
So I suppose that’s the reasons you will get British people defending certain words. Yes we do know what the original meaning of the words was, but we do now use them differently as language evolves. Differently in different places. And we are tired also, of having our own culture side lined because its more convenient for Americans that way.
What I can offer you though, if its any comfort, is that we can be allies in demanding that fuck witted American dude bros stop using the words. I find it offensive when I hear our word, a word that I will happily use among my friend in Britain being used to attack women who use their voices for change. I am absolutely with you that when its used to attack women it is being used as a gendered slur, and I think its just as important to call out dude bros and MRAs and point out that when they use words like cunt, they don’t have the cultural context and they actually make themselves look pretty pathetic to those that do.
*just a side point, I’m Welsh not English so claiming the “english defense” actually shows the lack of cultural awareness that makes me bristle.
I’m not trying to tell you how to use your own language.
Danny, is it OK if I use your language? I didn’t realise I needed permission.
Latsot, I didn’t say Josh was vapid, I said his comment was. I am a careful writer as well as a careful reader. I think it would take a reading of enormous generosity not to take his sort of comment as mere empty snidishness, although you may know tat he is capable of better.
I think it is interesting, though, that both you and Josh assume that there must be a hidden agenda, that I (and presumably other on here who have made similar arguments) cannot simply mean what our words say (‘you know what you are doing’). The reason I think it is interesting is because to my mind it betrays a paranoia-inflected world view that I think has something to do with the tendency to think that words have a ‘deep’ or essential meaning that is detached from their actual usage, linked to their origins, and that contains power, usually for harm. I think of this as the ‘magical idea of language’ and it is deeply ingrained in the culture. I think magical language has kept its deepest hold on people who are most receptive to literature, poetry, art because they recognise the full force that language (and other symbolisms) can have and because they have a strong emotional attachment to the idea of art and symbols as having real force. I am sympathetic because I think of myself in those terms, but I think it is wrong.
As an anecdotal aside, Danny Butts is right that ‘pussy’ in its US sense is relatively new in the UK and still makes me smile a bit because of it. Its hard to remember that ‘Pussy Galore’ was considered a rude but sophisticated in-joke at the time, quite opaque to us as kids. The more recent sense of ‘pussy’ meaning coward seems to be very new and I have to admit that I still find it more natural to think ‘pussy cat’ when it is used like that. Which perhaps betrays another problem with essentialist ‘magical’ ideas of language. Which ‘root meaning’ is in operation?
Ophelia @43
Ok, I’m listening.
Given that you don’t want to limit the way that British people use British English (and I’d like to point out that I don’t use use certain words on the the non British blogs on this network, and this isn’t me playing the martyr, its me respecting boundaries).
Given that you accept that I am genuinely appalled by the attacks on women and want to do something, even in the small way someone shouting on the internet can do.
I’m curious about something. What if a whole bunch of non-British Anglophones told you that an epithet popular in the UK – “prat” for example – is a vicious racist epithet in the US, every bit as bad as “nigger.” Would you call that “when an American turns to a British person and attempts to tell us how to use our own language”?
I’m curious also, if prat did turn out to be a vicious racist epithet in the US every bit as bad as nigger, what would you expect we do with that information in the UK?
And how should we reach yo, say Ricky Gervais, calling someone a prat on Twitter?
I asked you.
Garbled, I meant to say ‘react to …’.
Ok I’l bite although I’m sure that it was rhetorical.
I would expect that in dealing with people of those Anglophone countries where prat is a word that is off limits, one should respect their boundaries.
Which complicates the Gervais scenario (is that a Ludlum novel?)
It was not rhetorical. I wouldn’t go to that much trouble for a rhetorical question.
“off limits” is so far from the issue here.
And then “dealing with people of those Anglophone countries” – you do realize that on the internet you can’t be sure when you’re dealing with people of those Anglophone countries, right?
oh look you got me,
America owns the interwebs.
That is the precise and exact opposite of what I said.
What a nasty chauvinist you are.
If you say so but then I think the comment is coming from a cultural imperialist so hey ho, ducks, backs, sticks whatever. Difference is, I never got personal.
So Instead of me postulating what these non British anglophone people think, I’m going to go one better and ask them.
I’m meeting a South African mate for a drink tomorrow night, we will probably be joined by Jamaican guy I’ve know for years. The south African doesn’t swear much but the Jamaican uses cunt as a pro noun .
Then, both the Australian and NZ Cricket team are touring the UK over the summer, so I’ll be meeting up with the people I’ve talked to over the years on cricket discussion boards and become email friends with to watch the games. Funny thing is, one of the greatest quotes from one of the best Australian captains contains cunt 3 times so I’m sure they don’t have a problem with it.
Thats the joy of being an Anglophone in London, the whole world is here in person and I get to meet them.
Its American Anglophones that are really the outliers.
So Where are you getting your “worldwide anglophone data” from? People who discuss feminism on the internet isn’t really the widest demographic.
You did get personal. Your @ 42 is full of personal.