February 5, 2014 • 51 mins
Swearing and use of profanity is has long been a considered a masculine habit, while women are the "experts of euphemism." Cristen and Caroline unpack the sociolinguistic danger of women swearing and whether the profanity gender gap is closing at home and in the workplace.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Stuff Mob Never Told You from how Stop
works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Caroline and I'm Kristin and Kristin. To start off today's podcast,
I have a joke. It's not really a joke, but
I'm going to set it up like a joke. Okay, ready, um, So,
a blonde and a brunette walk into an Indian restaurant
(00:26):
for lunch, and the blonde says to the brunette, you know,
I'm really teaching my daughter that it's bad to curse.
And the brunette says, why that's I mean, that's good,
but why And she's like, The blonde says to the brunette, Well,
you know, it's just not lady like. You know, she's
(00:47):
not a true lady if she curses, it's not a
ladylike thing to do. The brunette tells the blonde, Oh,
I totally agree. I have two boys, and I think
it's way more acceptable for them to curse, especially like
on the football field. I mean, that's totally fine. Okay.
So what I've just told you is an actual true
(01:07):
story that I overheard at an Indian restaurant at lunch
one day where two women were discussing the upside and
downside of children cursing according to their gender. Yeah, my
next question was going to be, and so what did
the redhead you say to the blonde and brunette? Because
I've heard similar things like that in terms of talking
(01:30):
about little girls and being lady like and the lady
like behavior. And I'm pretty sure that I was also
told as a girl to watch my language because ladies
don't talk in X y Z kinds of ways. So
how did you react? I shoved some non into my
(01:51):
face and I just kept eating my curry. I was
not going to intervene in this situation, like tap tap tap,
excuse me, what do you mean by a true lady?
And so instead you decided, hey, this is a great
podcast topic, which it is because swearing, cursing, profanity, whatever
you want to call it, has so many gendered elements
(02:14):
to it. It's so fascinating once you start to unravel
that ball of yarn it is. And the more that
Kristen and I read about this topic, the more I
found myself kind of looking inwardly because I tend to
have a sailor's mouth. I curse all the time, I
think the F word is like one of the most
(02:35):
satisfying words to say. The m F word is my
my go to curse word at work because I managed
to stop myself after the first two syllables, therefore not
actually cursing. UM, so that that's a good route to take.
But um, Yeah, it was kind of interesting. I felt
like there was a little bit of a mirror being
held up at me when I was reading this stuff,
(02:55):
because everything we read is like, you know, cursing say
masculine linguistic attribute, and women who do it are viewed
kind of negatively. Yeah, and not only that there's the
masculine element, but there's also this power element of cursing
that we'll get into as well. And that's what really
(03:16):
struck a chord with me in thinking about my own
cursing behavior because Caroline, like you, I don't have to
tell you that I have a salty mouth as well
and have a penchant for the F word because there
is something particularly satisfying about saying it and sometimes no substitute,
no euphemism, will do. For reasons that we'll get into.
(03:41):
Um and don't worry, this is gonna be a clean podcast,
so for listeners out there. I think this will be
for men and women alike something to think about while
about your own cursing behavior too as you're listening to this.
But first, a little bit of history in terms of
how long we have been swearing. Answer basically forever. Yeah,
(04:04):
I mean, I'm sure there were cavemen who grunted, you know,
when they stubbed their toes things like that. But if
you look at the etymology of the word curse, like
to say a bad word, to swear profanely, that comes
from the early thirteenth century. And something that I didn't
realize about the origin of even talking about saying bad words, uh,
(04:25):
is that to curse or to swear to you swear words.
Swearing was a huge deal back in the day. Yeah.
We're looking at a Brief History of swearing, which is
a book by Melissa More and she divides swearing into
what she calls two spheres of the unstayable. And the
(04:46):
first one that really came around were religious swears, and
this is especially taking God's name in vain. Uh. And
then you have the sexual or excremental types of swearing,
such as the S word. Right, And she says that
these two types are kind of at the root of
all of the bad words that we say today. Okay,
(05:08):
but going back to the religious, the holy, the swearing
that actually goes way back in text records to ancient Latin,
and blasphemy against deities predates cursing in reference to sexual
or scatological behaviors, because religion was the central part of
our lives, right, So saying something like sounds, which would
(05:29):
be short for God's wounds or by God's bones, would
have been horrendously profane. Yeah, sounds sounds like something that
Scooby Doo would say, right. Yeah, today we wouldn't think
of it because think of how common it is to
just say, oh my God. Right, that even would have
been bad to say, right. And I mean, I was
(05:49):
telling Kristen that I did get a bit of an
education reading about this, because you know, I was raised
that saying oh my God was so bad that you
did not say that in the house and you didn't
say in front of my dad. Um, But I didn't
understand that. You know, things like when you talk about
the Covenant, you know, when you talk about God's promises
or swearing to God or making an oath, that that
(06:12):
is so serious, and that when you take God's name
in vain, you are essentially promising something false. You're kind
of bringing God or whatever deity into your lie essentially. Yeah,
and more describes why the whole emergence of it being
bad to take God's name in vain, to make those
blasphemous slurs, was important, especially for building the foundations of Christianity.
(06:38):
She writes, in the Old Testament, God is fighting a
war for supremacy with other near Eastern gods, and he
wields oath swearing as one of his most powerful weapons.
And right there from the get go, we have that
we're powerful coming up. Because in a way, this is
one way in which you could say that, you know,
religion is setting out a rule, a social rule, saying hey,
(07:00):
don't don't do this people kind of you need to
abide by these religious rules, respect your God, and he
won't smite you. I know I've I can't believe I've
avoided being smoked, being smoked the whole time. Well, So
as we move forward though, into the eighteenth century, and
we move away from maybe taking God's name in vain
or or religious swearing being the worst possible thing you
(07:23):
can do we get the rise of kind of body
consciousness and hating our bodies and hating our bodily functions,
and being scared of everything that comes out of our bodies.
And so we get this rise in kind of body shyness,
but also the use of euphemisms. Yeah, and so by
the end of the nineteenth century, More says that swearing
began to indicate not only those religious oaths but also
(07:46):
those obscenities. Um. But also by this time too, well,
by this time we have a lot of gender specificity
with swearing behavior because earlier injuries before in fact, it
was had been established that women, especially who were considered
(08:07):
the more who were considered the purer sex, the morally upright, uh,
you know, kind of counterparts to men. We're certainly not
supposed to use these words, right. In fifteen twenty three,
a piece titled on the Instruction of a Christian Woman
(08:28):
includes observations about what is appropriate language for women to use.
So already, I mean, that's coming from somewheres that didn't
originate eighty three, So obviously it's already being laid out
formally that women are supposed to talk a certain way
and not tread into bad, scary territory and from fifteen
(08:48):
twenty three all the way up to an Indian restaurant
in two thousand and fourteen, right, And I mean, you
know that conversation that I overheard you out, It was
like girls shouldn't curse, and you certainly should not curse
in front of girls, but boys or should be allowed
(09:09):
to do whatever they want. It's way more acceptable to
curse in front of them. And and I heard, you know,
in that conversation the brunette telling the blonde basically that
you know, well, it's just a fact of life. You know,
a boy will curse on the football field or curse
in the halls of school. Um, but if a girl doesn't,
she will be looked down upon, people will think she's trashy. Well,
and unfortunately, there might be some validity to that point,
(09:33):
although that's not to say that that's necessarily a good
thing or a thing that we should simply condone and say, Okay, well, yeah,
the girls just just don't do that, But guys, go
ahead and do what you want to do. But first
we we got to figure out why we do this
in the first place. Because there's a linguistic theory that
humans very first words were swear words because of their
(09:58):
emotional nature. It's interesting that there is such a gender
divide in cursing behavior because it's such an inherently human
thing to do. It's like in our DNA almost Yeah
and More talks about She gives some examples of of individuals,
well known individuals who you know have experienced whether you know,
(10:20):
dementia or or you know, general speech loss for whatever reason,
who still are cursing because it's it seems to be
kind of deeply ingrained in some part of our brain
that maybe when the rest of our brain has been
affected by some disease or some injury, we can reach
down into those pits of the brain and still managed
to throw out a well placed for a letter word.
(10:42):
And that's because swear words are actually produced in different
parts of the brain compared to regular speech. Because what
you and I are saying right now on the podcast
Caroline is being processed through the left hemispheres of our brain,
and it's known as a higher brain function, this language processing.
(11:02):
But if you and I were to start cursing up
a storm on this podcast, we would probably be activating
the limbic system, which is known as a more ancient
part of the human brain. And this is where expletives
are stored, right, And it's basically brain circuitry that is
(11:25):
linked to emotion and is just as Chris and said,
evolutionarily ancient. And it's buried deep inside the right half
of our brain. And it makes neurological sense that that's
where swear words originate from, because that's also the part
of the brain that regulates things like fear response, fight
or flight are autonomous nervous system and for that reason.
(11:47):
Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker was talking about this to Scientific
American and he essentially compared human swearing behavior to that
of cats, saying, quote, I suspect that swear ring taps
into a defensive reflex in which an animal that is
suddenly injured or confined erupts in a furious struggle accompanied
(12:07):
by an angry vocalization to startle and intimidate an attacker. Right, So,
if you sit on a cat accidentally and the cat
gets really angry and reaches up and swats it you
and runs away, like cat just cursed you, Kristen, Yeah,
just Mr Whiskers, It's set a four letter word at you.
(12:27):
Because it was like, dude, don't sit on me, I'm here,
and so yeah, I mean, if you think about it,
like that makes a lot of sense. When when when
certain things drive you to curse without thinking about it,
it's usually because you're scared, you're anxious. All of a
sudden something startled you or hurt you, and so you
react by, you know, screaming a bad word. Well, and
it's also fascinating to look at the physiological effects of
(12:52):
swearing because our it's a total brain body connection going
on when we swear as opposed to just casual, clean conversation.
Because when we swear, for instance, it induces greater skin
conductance than other words, which indicates emotional arousal, and so
(13:12):
our heart rate also goes up and it might have
a pain mitigating effect. Yeah, I love this study. This
was published a Nerror report back in two thousand nine.
People who held their hands in icy water, the people
who swore held their hands in the water for an
average of forty seconds longer. So there you go. If
(13:32):
you unleash a string of course words versus just chanting
something random and neutral, you can withstand pain better. But
there was one caveat to that study finding, which was
that with repeated use, that pain threshold actually diminishes, which
is why you might want to put a limit on
your swearing, because if you're dropping F bombs all the
(13:55):
time in a way, it do you sensitie as you
and probably your audience to the power of that word. Now,
I yeah, this is exactly right. Uh. You know, researcher
Caroline did a little bit of studying on this topic,
and I did. I had a day where, um, not
what you can to details, but something was really taking
(14:18):
me off, and I unleashed like a string. I think
I said more F bombs than I said actual subjects
and verbs, uh in in my sentence. And uh, you know,
the other person in the conversation was stunned, rightly so,
But I don't know, maybe in my string of expletive use,
maybe I was trying to exercise a degree of power
(14:39):
over the person across the table from me. More does
call curse words quote the most powerful words we have
with which to express extreme emotion, whether negative or positive. Sure,
that's kind of a no brainer to read, But there's
also linked to that this old theory that women swear
(15:01):
as kind of a linguistic power grab. That the only
reason we would really want to violate those longstanding gender
norms that we are supposed to speak like good ladies
and and be clean and euphemistic and no no f bombs.
The only reason we would do that is to try
(15:23):
to kind of exert some power flex our muscles. Right,
And but why is that equated with power? Because I
mean it's also equated with masculinity, and so women, being
the repressed, oppressed group of people that we are, maybe
we're all just cursing up a storm according to this theory,
to uh to boost our power seat. Yeah, I think
some of that is being said with sarcasm. I don't know,
(15:46):
what do you think about that? I don't because I
remember the first time I really started cursing was in
high school. There was one girl in my class who
knew all of the words, and yeah, I know this
is high school. Hello. I was a little bit of
a late bloomer. But I started kind of practicing cursing
under my breath and then I started staying out loud
(16:07):
and there was that power element to it. But like
I like, it felt like I felt like I was
rebelling in a way. Yeah, I think, yes, I would
agree with you. Personally, I feel like it's less to
do with I'm a woman and so I need to
somehow elevate myself up to being equal to men through
the use of the F bomb, but more so than like,
(16:30):
I'm just angry and I'm conversationally rebelling and I'm going
to let you know exactly how angry I am. Yeah,
I mean, and I don't think that you can discount
the power element. It just might not be as gendered
as saying the only recent women are cursing is to
try to emulate male behavior, because there's also one thing
(16:51):
that more another linguists point out is the socioeconomic power
element of it too, where cursing has generally been associated
with either lower class people more of a blue collar
type of thing to do, or at the very upper
echelons of society where they're standing is so secure that
(17:14):
they can swear and not be looked down upon, whereas
for good middle class folk, you keep it clean. Yeah,
I mean talking about women being the ones who supposedly
use euphemism over like an out and out curse word.
Linguists have found like they looked at one study looked
at um courtroom transcripts and found that social class, not gender,
(17:36):
was actually a greater predictor of the use of quote
unquote woman's language, which sounds horrifically offensive to me, but
it just means that this is the language that people
typically associate with women, being like lower on the power scale,
maybe using euphemism instead of the stronger language, etcetera, etcetera.
So why don't we dig even deeper into this gender issue?
(17:58):
Because one thing I was surprised to find in the
research on cursing, like the more scholarly research on cursing,
is how you cannot get very far away from gender
when you start looking for academic research on this um.
And one paper that we found was by Christie Bears Fagerston,
and it's called Who's Swearing Now? The Social Aspects of
(18:21):
Conversational Swearing? And this quote immediately jumped out, which is
that quote? By far the most thoroughly investigated aspect of
the socio linguistics of swearing is the correlation between swearing
and the gender of the interlocutors of social interaction. So,
in other words, it's swearing behavior and gender are almost
(18:44):
always inextricably linked. It seems like right. And one researcher,
one linguistics professor who is constantly cited and all of
these studies is Robin lake Off, who is a professor
at the University of California, Berkeley, and she said that
women cursing had long been considered dangerous because these words
quote express anger and act as a substitute for physical
(19:06):
expression of anger. So basically, whereas men have the power
to hit each other in the face at the bar,
women are just gonna throw some nasty words at you instead. Yeah,
this also does remind me of some of the research
that we found in our episode a while back on
women and anger, where it's not that we are less
(19:26):
angry than men, but we don't express it as outwardly
sometimes as men do. And then this also reminded me
too of growing up. My dad is a big guy,
and he's he has a loud and booming voice, and
he didn't curse all that much, but it was like,
if he was angry, you could hear it, whereas my
(19:48):
mom verbally expressive, though she is um, you knew things
were bad if you heard her curse. Even today, I mean,
we have like a very like close adult relationship, and
I can say whatever I want for the most part
around her, but even still, I mean, she'll like drop
her voice and say a curse word, and then it's
(20:10):
like that's when, you know, just immediately everyone starts crying. Yeah,
because that's like I mean, if if she is pushed
to the point of cursing, then she is angry. Yeah,
it's kind of My mom doesn't curse much. She Actually
I think my mom is kind of entertained when I curse,
and so she kind of curses along with me, and
it's like a girlfriend activity. But yeah, my dad is
kind of the same way, Like he never gets loud,
(20:32):
he never yells, but he will lower his voice to
a growl. And if he says just like a soft
so quote unquote soft for letter word, you're like, it's
all over. It's all over, the apocalypse, everything's crumbling. Oh
my god, run for the hills. And it's because though
of that longstanding notion of women having women and your
(20:55):
dad cleaner speech, that they're often described as the guardians
of language and propriety, the experts of euphemism. But there's
this interesting shift that happens starting in the nineteen seventies
and eighties where you see this correlation between the women's
(21:15):
lib movement and second wave feminism picking up steam and
women cursing more so, I mean, I can obviously see
where stemming from those studies that you would link power
grabs by women and cursing and cursing being a masculine
thing and women trying to ever take men blah blah
blah blah blah, all that whole narratives, right, I mean,
(21:36):
and again, like it studies like that, there's always the
thing of hey, correlation versus causation, Keep that in mind,
but it was nevertheless interesting to see these studies coming
out in the mid seventies looking specifically at that um
But one thing, though, when we're talking about men and
women in mixed company and cursing behavior, men will curse
(21:59):
less around women, right, because there's that natural assumption that
like almost ingrained assumption that women don't curse. Women have
a lower what's it called, like offensiveness threshold or obscenity threshold,
and so they they're they're fragile brains just can't handle it. Well,
that's the outside assumption. Whereas women really in self reports
(22:21):
aren't necessarily as definitives. We tend to think they would be,
and when women are around men, we tend to curse more.
It's like we're trying to meet in the middle in
terms of our gendered swearing behavior. But when you think
too about swear words, swear words to me is such
a hokey phrase. But what do you think about the
(22:43):
list of swear words that we have and the ones
that you hear so often? Uh. Faggerson writes that the
implication of swearing as a male domain can also be
found in the language of swearing itself, which includes an
abundance of terms for females and their body parts. Right. Yeah,
(23:03):
I thought this was interesting to an interesting link between
cursing and gender, that there's so many naughty quote unquote
things that you can call women in their body parts,
but maybe not as many about men and theirs. Yeah,
because even the swear words that might be more commonly
directed to men are typically just insulting them in female terms,
(23:28):
calling them things related to women. Right makes sense since
we can't curse on this podcast, right, and we do
as men and women tend to insult each other and
react to insults differently. Um. This was coming from Timothy
Jay's Cursing in America, a psycholinguistic study of dirty language
(23:49):
in the courts. He talks about sexual looseness or not
being loose enough, being the crux of the strongest female insults.
Are concerns, he writes, tend to surround intimacy, social desirability,
and security, whereas men's men's concerns tend to surround sex,
power and physical attractiveness. And so Jay theorizes that the
(24:12):
curse words that men and women tend to rely on
more often are filtered through those concerns, as he calls them.
But the whole sexual looseness or not being loose enough
thing in terms of like the types of swear words
or insults that are lobbed more often at women, is
so frustrating because it's either you are horribly frigid or
(24:36):
way to promise us, you can never really win in
terms of that, Yeah, I mean yeah and everything. As
far as men insulting each other, it seems to be, yeah,
like you said, you call them something feminine to insult
them the worst, or you insinuate that they're gay or
whatever to be to be the most the most insulting.
And I think that this is interesting because it ties
(24:59):
back to one of the sources we read talking about.
I think it was more talking about curse words in
ancient Rome. And one of the most vulgar swear words
or curse words in ancient Rome was the word for
performing oral sex on a woman. That was like the
most vulgar you could not get any more vulgar. Performing
(25:21):
oral sex on a man was not even on the
charts compared to this. It was just because the mouth
is viewed as this clean and sacred place, and then
when you talk about performing oral sex on a woman,
that's like the worst thing. Vagina's vagina's messing at all,
watch out. And this researcher Karen Stapleton also found that
men found it more acceptable for men than women to
(25:43):
use terms referring to female anatomy. So women aren't even
allowed to refer to our own female anatomy in any
sort of vulgar terms if we wish. But when you
go back to looking at how we curse as kids,
you know, talk about learning how to curse, like, I
don't even remember really when I learned curse words at all.
Just sort of appeared in my brain one day, Yeah,
I I they I just remember kind of absorbing them,
(26:06):
and then a couple of them being there and like
testing the grounds and using them, but having no idea
what I was actually saying. But one thing that my
surprise parents listening is that at least according to research
that Timothy J. Has done, mean, he studied cursing for
like thirty five years. He found that we start we
(26:27):
as boys and girls start picking up our first swear
words by the age of two. There's a good chance
that we know a swear word before we know the
alphabet right, and we're saying the same amount, whether we're
little boys or we're little girls. We were familiar with
the same amount. But by three and four, girls are
producing more swear words. But after three or four boys
(26:48):
began to clearly pull ahead. And this is a trend
that starts as early as five and continues into adulthood.
But this is a good point to keep in mind
that this isn't offering evidence that well, men are one way,
they're just cursing like sailors and ladies are, you know,
at home knitting lace doilies and whispering euphemisms under their breath,
(27:11):
But simply that this is a reflection of gender norms
and expectations, because think about it, at age five, you
have your kid already talking, you have your gender schema
already well underway of formation, and you're probably already teaching
girls to be like little girls and boys to be
like rough and tumble boys. And you probably have people
like the ladies you overheard at the Indian restaurant saying, Oh,
(27:35):
don't say little ladies don't talk like that, right, I mean,
I mean, how many times have we already, Brenda, how
many times have we talked in the podcast about having
your gender identity basically defined for you already at such
a young age. And so it's not that cursing is
outside of that. I mean, I think the way you
speak is very much tied into how you're instructed to
(27:57):
behave to act, to own that gender. Yeah, I clearly
remember being talked to. I don't know, I wouldn't call
it punished necessarily, but my mom caught me or I
was tattled on. I'm not sure for saying a curse
word that I had no idea what it really meant,
and I just thought it was funny. And but I
(28:19):
don't think she ever told me to not say because
I was a girl. But at the same time, though
I had no clue what was going on, she was like,
I knew I had done something wrong, and she clearly
was uncomfortable that I had said this F word. But
I mean, I guess, you know, she didn't really want
to explain to me poll helve you you know, the
Human Anatomy book and go into an in depth lesson.
(28:42):
But I do think that we need to be I
don't know, more accepting of the fact that kids pick
up curse words and not be so terrified of it. Yeah.
I mean, I have friends with kids who basically tell
their kids, these are grown up words. And when you're
around your your dad and me, you can say them
at home because you've heard us say them, but you
can't say them outside of home. So yeah, I mean,
(29:06):
because there's really, at some point there's going to be
no controlling that language. Um. But let's next look at
whether or not this swearing gender gap is closing today,
because Caroline, you and I have admitted now that we
off Mike on the podcast, we curse a lot quite
(29:26):
a bit, and my girlfriend's curse a lot as well,
and when we are around each other we are certainly
cursing not all the time, but you know it happens
a lot. So let's let's figure out whether or not
this whole antiquated idea of women being the experts of
euphemism has really gone by the wayside. And we're going
to do that when we come right back from a
(29:47):
quick break and now back to the podcast. So we've
looked at gender and swearing behavior in the past, but
what about the present. Are we cursing more as women
in our data day conversation? And also are we cursing
more in the workplace? I try not to, Hi, I
(30:10):
try not to as I don't try that hard actually
either actually to be honest. But anyway, we found this
study that when I when I first looked at it,
I thought there's no way this could be relevant or interesting.
It's called f K. Yeah, I swear cursing in gender
in my space my space, my space, and I just
had a little moment of like remembering college the sound
(30:33):
of a dial tone, a dial up modem, right it was.
It was very very warm and fuzzy feelings about my space,
except for when it won't load at all. Um. But anyway,
researcher Mike Fellwall found no significant gender differences in the
swearing on my Space for male and female users in
the UK between the ages of sixteen and nineteen. Yeah.
(30:54):
And while you might be thinking to yourself, why are
they quoting a study about my base, Well, this is why,
because fell Wall concluded that quote this is perhaps the
first significant evidence of gender equality in strong swearing frequency
in any informal English language context, because social media has
(31:15):
presented a new and unique database, essentially for academics looking
into swearing behavior, because otherwise they had to rely on
people's self reported swearing behavior or had to essentially creep
up on conversation like I did, yeah, and and overhear
people and keep tallies of how much they curse. So
(31:37):
this is pretty relevant data. But the thing is I
specified that this was u K teens. This is not
US teens. They're still was a cursing gender gap on
my Space for teens in the US. I wonder too, though,
and I want to hear from listeners in the UK
about this whether this is any reflection of differences in
(31:58):
culture in terms of censorship broadcast censorship, because the rules
in the UK are way less strict about the kinds
of things that you will see in here on TV
versus the FCC in the U S which is, you know,
you still can't say the F word the S word
UM on broadcast networks. So I wonder if it is
(32:21):
maybe part of that could be UM. But yeah, I guess.
And also just maybe it's a reflection of American prudery.
I that's what I would link. But I mean, but
it's one and the same. I mean, the FCC being
is reactionary and you know, heavy handed as they are.
It's kind of one and the same. UM. But as
of two thousand thirteen, moving away from the MySpace era
(32:42):
now into the age of Facebook, American men still do
it more Overall, there was a study conducted on Facebook
linguistics out of the University of Pennsylvania and Cambridge, and
it found that women use more of what they call
emotion words like it cited, love you, et cetera, whereas
(33:03):
men use more swear words and object references, so things
like I blank love my or not love my Nintendo
is blanking awesome. And similarly, a study from thirteen by
to Lunar Quick Surveys found that millennials are the likeliest
to swear repeatedly throughout the day. I fall squarely into
(33:27):
that category. But of all age groups, it's still men
at least, we were into this survey who are cursing
more in the US. But I think that millennial um
finding is significant because I do think there is a
distinct generational difference with our swearing behavior. Yeah, I mean,
(33:47):
this is common sense to say, but I mean, you know,
with every successive generation, things get more permissive. Things that
you know, our grandparents found to be completely obscene, uh,
you know, aren't so bad anymore, and we hear them
on television shows. So yeah, I mean the fact that
there was a New York Times article from a few
(34:07):
years back, but nevertheless, it was talking about the rise
of hearing the word douche on TV because it's just
another like funny but slightly taboo word that you can say.
And also the B word it's said all the time.
And that's on broadcast networks as well. Well. It's almost
like shows like that on those networks find the safe
(34:28):
curse words that they can say and then just say
them to death, and so that almost has an effect itself.
I would think that like, okay, well, you know, this
four letter word isn't nearly as offensive. It's more much more,
you know, soft and everything. So we can say this
a hundred times per episode. Well, and one thing that
might be becoming more publicized through TV shows and what
(34:48):
we're seeing reflected on screen is the fact that a
lot of studies have found that when women are talking
to each other casually, we curse more and we're filthy. Yeah,
we're totally healthy. And we found a study called get
this Taboo, Language and Sex in the City. Yes, there
have been a number of studies actually conducted on sex
(35:10):
in the City, but it found the most swearing when
the main characters Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte, and Miranda, we're talking
to each other. But it was interesting that when they
were talking to male characters on the show, the amount
of swearing went down and the euphemism use went up.
But male characters when they were talking still to the
to the gal pals, we're cursing more directly. Aren't imitating life?
(35:38):
Sort of Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, I'm I know
that I'm like completely disgusting and open with my girlfriends
when we're having a conversation about whatever, you know, I mean,
but I not wouldn't necessarily say the same things to
guy friends exactly. Well, and I think that we're seeing
too that girlfriend type of language being reflected in publications
(36:02):
specifically targeting us as millennial women. I mean, there was
an entire New York Times trend piece that came out
in January about the rise of profanity in women's media.
I mean, if you go, if you look on any
lady blog like Jezebel or The Gloss or the Hairpin,
you're gonna see cursing even in headlines. Yeah, and you
(36:25):
have my attitude, but as someone who curses all the time,
my attitude about that is kind of like, that's a
little forced. Yeah, I feel like it can be forced.
I think that you have to keep in mind, especially
and this is just getting nerdy about writing in literary preference,
I do think you have to keep in mind the
power element of cursing and the desensitizing effect that it
(36:47):
can have, to where it's like, don't you want to
save powerful words for making powerful statements? Yeah? And then
it kind of makes me look at what at the
point they're making overall and being like, what is that?
Why is that even needed? Right? You're not enhancing it?
And I mean I'm I am the last person to
make the claim about well, people who use vulgar terms
(37:10):
just obviously have a poor vocabulary, because hello, let me
just read you my resume real quick. I have a
fine vocabulary, but I understand the power of a well
placed curse word, even when I do fly off the
handle and use them too much. That being said, I
think in in the written word, in the world of
the written word, I think it's okay to pull back
a little. I don't think we need to unleash the hounds,
(37:32):
like every time we write a blog about you know, cellulite, right,
I mean? And I can see how with blogging in particular,
there is a particularly conversational voice that you're often going for,
where it's it's almost as though the writer is speaking
directly to you. And I think there is some shock
value that some people try to employ. By what I
(37:53):
what we might think of is overusing curse words. But
even in more mainstream publications like Cosmopolitan Maggazine Marie Claire,
you are way likelier to see curse words, not only
within the pages, but even on the cover. Yeah, they
might have a well placed asterisk or something, but it's
still I think they're pursuing. They want to talk to
(38:15):
their audience the same way that their audience talks to
one another. Yeah, it was funny though. That New York
Times piece was called fifty Shades of Vulgarity, to which
some women our age wrote response pieces being like New
York Times, of course we're cursing. But when you as
two people who went to journalism school as we did,
and also reading the responses of editors at these magazines,
(38:40):
yet it's kind of a big deal that they are
employing more profanity because you wouldn't do that. They're letting
their hair down in the New York Times is just
clutching its pearls. It's right, I haven't New York Times
reaching for a scrunchee to put that hair back up
really quickly. Um. But in our day to day conversation too,
there is still, anecdotally at least this debate over whether,
(39:08):
if you are at least a straight woman, okay, whether
or not cursing all the time. It's gonna be a
turn off for guys. Yeah, there was a lot of debate.
One of the first UH websites I stumbled across when
I was searching for just you know, gender women cursing
all that stuff was like this whole message board. I
don't even know what it was on, but this whole
(39:28):
message board where men were like, yeah, bro, you know,
like I'm a like a woman and she's hot and
then she's like curses all the time, and I'm just like, oh,
I don't have any respect for you to which, yeah,
I mean, I think I think that was an AskMen
dot com message board, which there you go. Um, But
I was thinking about this, and in my previous dating life,
(39:56):
I did pay attention to how much the guy curse
on dates and how comfortable he was if I curse.
And I think honestly that if you are a woman
concerned about your cursing behavior, kind of like take the power.
Because for me, if a guy flinched when I dropped
an F bomb, listen, I'm not no, it wasn't a
(40:18):
deal breaker, but it usually was indicative of maybe the
fact that we were in a match because I'm not
gonna have to do I don't want to have to
watch my language right around you. Now. I I dated
a guy years ago who was like, wow, you kind
of curse a lot, and I was like, Okay, alright, sorry,
a little sensitive guy. Don't mean to insult your ears.
(40:40):
See you later, Yeah, I mean, and we're not trying to,
you know, blast men for wanting ladylike language. I don't
think that this is, you know, something that applies to
all guys, but it is something that still crops up
in at least heterosexual dating dynamic. Yeah. I mean, it's
(41:01):
the conversation about gender and and cursing. I mean, it's
framed in so many conversations, whether it's about dating or
like about work, which we've we've touched on. I mean,
like the question is still being asked over and over
again about like is it okay for women to curse ladies?
We shouldn't curse. We don't want to put man off.
We don't want to anger our bosses and the men
(41:21):
in our labs. Yeah, I mean, and and say over
and over again that this is we're talking about, like
straight dating dynamics, because I have a feeling that, as
with other issues like this where it's a lot of
gender norms and scripts that are coming into play, that
it might not be as pertinent of an issue refreshingly
for LGBT dating. And I would love to know if
(41:44):
it is, And in that case it probably is simply
a matter of oh, I don't curse a lot, you
don't curse a lot, cool, you know, like, rather than
being a thing. Well, but in a more formal setting
of a workplace, this is where cursing behavior gets a
little dicier. Yeah. I mean a lot of people, as
(42:05):
you would expect, argue that cursing in the workplace is bad.
It's wrong. It makes you appear immature and hot headed.
Um that it can damage morale, damp and respect um
even coaches. There was a study looking at coaches talking
to their teams, and they were rated less effective by
their players if they cursed, particularly if those players were girls.
(42:29):
There's just all of this talk about how cursing is
the worst thing you could possibly do, especially if you're
a lady. Yeah, because the workplace too. If you want
to put gender and power dynamics under the microscope, just
walk into the office. Because you know, while there are
those assumptions that maybe cursing might be bad, they're also
conflicting studies that have found that cursing makes bosses in
(42:53):
particular more relatable, it builds employee solidarity. Hey, we can
all blow off steam together by talking about how this
meeting is blanking terrible. You know, it probably was a
terrible meeting. It probably was, and even some speeches were
were rated to be more effective when the speaker delivered
(43:13):
a well placed or well timed curse word. But again,
especially if you are in a leadership position at work,
your amount of cursing and or the acceptability of your
cursing is gonna be seen probably through a gendered lens,
where in, if you're a woman, the penalty for cursing,
(43:33):
the negative penalty is probably gonna be stronger than if
you are a male boss. Right, or in the case
of former Yahoo CEO Carol Bart's, the use your use
of a curse word could shape how the entire world
sees you, and in an instant, Yeah, when she was
fired from her position as CEO, she essentially made an
(43:55):
F bomb laced exit speech, which I remember hearing about
this on the news and I thought it was kind
of amazing. I totally think it's amazing. When I was
revisiting all of that too for this episode, I was like, God,
I just want to give her such a big high five,
because yeah, because she was now great, I can understand why.
Some people say, well, if you're overseeing a company, you
(44:16):
don't need to publicly be saying all of these horrible words.
But yeah, I don't know. I mean, I think this
is a terrible comparison. But if it had been like
Donald Trump or somebody, everybody would have just rolled their
eyes and been like, there's that old man ranting again.
But instead it was like, she's a woman and she's
at the head of a company and she's saying all
this stuff. Obviously she's a B word. Well, and she's angry. Yeah, scary, Yeah,
(44:41):
it's that danger element that who was it? The loft
Key brought up um in terms of how swearing for
women has always been perceived as dangerous because we're being angry, right,
women are not allowed to express that. Men can yell
and they can throw their fists, but women just have to,
you know, you cut their eyes over to you and
(45:02):
roll their eyes. We're not allowed to say anything. You
can throw shade, we just can't say it out loud.
But I mean, obviously, for any cursing, no matter where
you are, there's a time and a place, um, And
I think that should be it. I don't think that
it should be determined by virtue of you being a
man or a woman. Yeah, I mean it's it's it's
(45:26):
unfair if women are put at a disadvantage for cursing
over men, But it is what it is, And so
I guess it's helpful to be aware. Well, it's always
helpful to be aware of how people perceive you. Yeah.
So with all of this research on gender and power
and swearing in history and our brains in your brain, Caroline,
(45:47):
that has this given you any pause at all about
your own cursing behavior? Um it? Well, I want to
say that I'm going to try to clean up my
act a little, but it's not going to be for
fear of like scaring someone. I mean, I think it's
(46:10):
worth it to pull back at work a little, you know,
when we're at work, Um but because I mean, you know,
you don't really know who's around. You don't know every
single coworker, and I mean the general you you don't
know every single coworker exceptionally well to know whether or
not you're offending that person. But I mean, I just
still it's like God, when I'm in my car in
(46:31):
Atlanta traffic and I'm just screaming something, it just feels right. Yeah. Yeah.
I think the one area where I consistently want to
do better in terms of not cursing is talking to
my parents, because by this point I have I really
enjoy the fact that we have an open, you know,
(46:51):
honest relationship. But when I go over there, maybe I've
had a rough day. We're having dinner, and I go
off on a rant, and it feels really good to
say exactly what I'm thinking. But then later I'm thinking, oh,
they must be horrified by their dear daughter dropping those
heinous phrases. And I will all get into a stretch
(47:13):
of like getting really stressed out and calling my mother
and she's like, oh, honey, what's going on? And I
will just unleash like verbal, angry, curse word laden vomit
all over her and be like, Okay, well I gotta go.
I love you back. It's like we just leave them
with the mess, like, okay, you clean it up. I
feel so much better, thanks, Oh Heaven, love you well.
(47:35):
Now I want to hear though from listeners about this.
What is your stance on cursing? Do you are you
a woman who curses and and doesn't see any problem
with it? Guys, you find it a turn off for
other women to curse. What are your thoughts? Let us
know them. Mom Stuff discovery dot com is where you
(47:56):
can send your letters. And by the way, if you
do use profanity in the subject line, it will get
spam filtered out, and just keep that in mind you
might want to keep your letters clean. So mom stuff
at discovery dot com is where you can email us.
You can also tweet us your thoughts at mom stuff
podcast or send us a Facebook message, and we have
a couple of messages to share with you right now. Well,
(48:20):
I've gotta let her here. From Jessica about our gender
reveal party episode, She writes, Hey, ladies, I really liked
your podcasts on gender revealed parties. We had a reveal
party in July for our baby. We saw it as
a fun way to announce what we were having, but
we also had other motives. Throughout my pregnancy, my mom
and my mother in law have been strangely competitive and
(48:40):
jealous of one another. The party was a way to
ensure that everyone found out the sex together in an
attempt to be fair. The things you hit on were
definite concerns when planning our party. The invitation said no gifts,
so no one felt they had to bring us a present.
I know the difference between sex and gender being a
graduate of a liberal women's college. Sex or old party
(49:00):
just doesn't have the same ring to it. We didn't
have a cake, but instead we picked out two outfits
and had the store rapid correct one. I'm glad we
had everyone together because it was a special moment, this
baby being highly anticipated as the first grandchild. That being said,
it did stress me out and make me wonder if
it was really worth all the trouble. I think it was,
but probably wouldn't have another party with future pregnancies. Oh
(49:21):
another interesting fact, my nine pound one ounce baby girls
movements could never be described as a delicate ballet, so
that study completely cracked me up. He's Jessica, I know,
I love that nine pounds and I had a friend
who just gave birth to a ten pound baby. He
looks I mean, he looks like a toddler who just
walked out of her But anyway, um, okay, I have
(49:44):
a hilarious email from Jennifer Um. Her seject line is
very straightforward. It is gender revealed parties equal sign stupid.
So here we go. Jennifer. She says, I'm a mom.
Most of my friends are ms. I love babies, my own,
my friends, nieces and nephews. I love the baby who
(50:05):
was gurgling at me in the grocery store yesterday. He
was really cute. I have traveled long distances to attend
baby showers or visit new babies. I bring food to
new parents and lend my support in any way I can.
I use social media. Gender reveal parties are stupid. George
Packer was right. They reflected creeping narcissism in our society.
(50:26):
At the end of the day, no one outside of
the immediate family cares boy, girl, whatever. It's just another
excuse to be the center of attention. Come to my
house and cheer for me. I procreated calm down people.
And then Jennifer has a smiley face. So thank you
for writing in and telling us just what you think, Jennifer.
We appreciate it, and thanks to everybody who's written into us.
(50:46):
Mom Stuff at Discovery dot com is where you can
send all of your emails and if you want to
find out all of our other social media properties and
check out all of our podcast, blogs and videos, there's
one place to go. It's stuff Mom never told you
dot com For more on this and thousands of other topics.
Isn't how stuff works dot com
Welcome to Stuff Mob Never Told You from how Stop
works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Caroline and I'm Kristin and Kristin. To start off today's podcast,
I have a joke. It's not really a joke, but
I'm going to set it up like a joke. Okay, ready, um, So,
a blonde and a brunette walk into an Indian restaurant
(00:26):
for lunch, and the blonde says to the brunette, you know,
I'm really teaching my daughter that it's bad to curse.
And the brunette says, why that's I mean, that's good,
but why And she's like, The blonde says to the brunette, Well,
you know, it's just not lady like. You know, she's
(00:47):
not a true lady if she curses, it's not a
ladylike thing to do. The brunette tells the blonde, Oh,
I totally agree. I have two boys, and I think
it's way more acceptable for them to curse, especially like
on the football field. I mean, that's totally fine. Okay.
So what I've just told you is an actual true
(01:07):
story that I overheard at an Indian restaurant at lunch
one day where two women were discussing the upside and
downside of children cursing according to their gender. Yeah, my
next question was going to be, and so what did
the redhead you say to the blonde and brunette? Because
I've heard similar things like that in terms of talking
(01:30):
about little girls and being lady like and the lady
like behavior. And I'm pretty sure that I was also
told as a girl to watch my language because ladies
don't talk in X y Z kinds of ways. So
how did you react? I shoved some non into my
(01:51):
face and I just kept eating my curry. I was
not going to intervene in this situation, like tap tap tap,
excuse me, what do you mean by a true lady?
And so instead you decided, hey, this is a great
podcast topic, which it is because swearing, cursing, profanity, whatever
you want to call it, has so many gendered elements
(02:14):
to it. It's so fascinating once you start to unravel
that ball of yarn it is. And the more that
Kristen and I read about this topic, the more I
found myself kind of looking inwardly because I tend to
have a sailor's mouth. I curse all the time, I
think the F word is like one of the most
(02:35):
satisfying words to say. The m F word is my
my go to curse word at work because I managed
to stop myself after the first two syllables, therefore not
actually cursing. UM, so that that's a good route to take.
But um, Yeah, it was kind of interesting. I felt
like there was a little bit of a mirror being
held up at me when I was reading this stuff,
(02:55):
because everything we read is like, you know, cursing say
masculine linguistic attribute, and women who do it are viewed
kind of negatively. Yeah, and not only that there's the
masculine element, but there's also this power element of cursing
that we'll get into as well. And that's what really
(03:16):
struck a chord with me in thinking about my own
cursing behavior because Caroline, like you, I don't have to
tell you that I have a salty mouth as well
and have a penchant for the F word because there
is something particularly satisfying about saying it and sometimes no substitute,
no euphemism, will do. For reasons that we'll get into.
(03:41):
Um and don't worry, this is gonna be a clean podcast,
so for listeners out there. I think this will be
for men and women alike something to think about while
about your own cursing behavior too as you're listening to this.
But first, a little bit of history in terms of
how long we have been swearing. Answer basically forever. Yeah,
(04:04):
I mean, I'm sure there were cavemen who grunted, you know,
when they stubbed their toes things like that. But if
you look at the etymology of the word curse, like
to say a bad word, to swear profanely, that comes
from the early thirteenth century. And something that I didn't
realize about the origin of even talking about saying bad words, uh,
(04:25):
is that to curse or to swear to you swear words.
Swearing was a huge deal back in the day. Yeah.
We're looking at a Brief History of swearing, which is
a book by Melissa More and she divides swearing into
what she calls two spheres of the unstayable. And the
(04:46):
first one that really came around were religious swears, and
this is especially taking God's name in vain. Uh. And
then you have the sexual or excremental types of swearing,
such as the S word. Right, And she says that
these two types are kind of at the root of
all of the bad words that we say today. Okay,
(05:08):
but going back to the religious, the holy, the swearing
that actually goes way back in text records to ancient Latin,
and blasphemy against deities predates cursing in reference to sexual
or scatological behaviors, because religion was the central part of
our lives, right, So saying something like sounds, which would
(05:29):
be short for God's wounds or by God's bones, would
have been horrendously profane. Yeah, sounds sounds like something that
Scooby Doo would say, right. Yeah, today we wouldn't think
of it because think of how common it is to
just say, oh my God. Right, that even would have
been bad to say, right. And I mean, I was
(05:49):
telling Kristen that I did get a bit of an
education reading about this, because you know, I was raised
that saying oh my God was so bad that you
did not say that in the house and you didn't
say in front of my dad. Um, But I didn't
understand that. You know, things like when you talk about
the Covenant, you know, when you talk about God's promises
or swearing to God or making an oath, that that
(06:12):
is so serious, and that when you take God's name
in vain, you are essentially promising something false. You're kind
of bringing God or whatever deity into your lie essentially. Yeah,
and more describes why the whole emergence of it being
bad to take God's name in vain, to make those
blasphemous slurs, was important, especially for building the foundations of Christianity.
(06:38):
She writes, in the Old Testament, God is fighting a
war for supremacy with other near Eastern gods, and he
wields oath swearing as one of his most powerful weapons.
And right there from the get go, we have that
we're powerful coming up. Because in a way, this is
one way in which you could say that, you know,
religion is setting out a rule, a social rule, saying hey,
(07:00):
don't don't do this people kind of you need to
abide by these religious rules, respect your God, and he
won't smite you. I know I've I can't believe I've
avoided being smoked, being smoked the whole time. Well, So
as we move forward though, into the eighteenth century, and
we move away from maybe taking God's name in vain
or or religious swearing being the worst possible thing you
(07:23):
can do we get the rise of kind of body
consciousness and hating our bodies and hating our bodily functions,
and being scared of everything that comes out of our bodies.
And so we get this rise in kind of body shyness,
but also the use of euphemisms. Yeah, and so by
the end of the nineteenth century, More says that swearing
began to indicate not only those religious oaths but also
(07:46):
those obscenities. Um. But also by this time too, well,
by this time we have a lot of gender specificity
with swearing behavior because earlier injuries before in fact, it
was had been established that women, especially who were considered
(08:07):
the more who were considered the purer sex, the morally upright, uh,
you know, kind of counterparts to men. We're certainly not
supposed to use these words, right. In fifteen twenty three,
a piece titled on the Instruction of a Christian Woman
(08:28):
includes observations about what is appropriate language for women to use.
So already, I mean, that's coming from somewheres that didn't
originate eighty three, So obviously it's already being laid out
formally that women are supposed to talk a certain way
and not tread into bad, scary territory and from fifteen
(08:48):
twenty three all the way up to an Indian restaurant
in two thousand and fourteen, right, And I mean, you
know that conversation that I overheard you out, It was
like girls shouldn't curse, and you certainly should not curse
in front of girls, but boys or should be allowed
(09:09):
to do whatever they want. It's way more acceptable to
curse in front of them. And and I heard, you know,
in that conversation the brunette telling the blonde basically that
you know, well, it's just a fact of life. You know,
a boy will curse on the football field or curse
in the halls of school. Um, but if a girl doesn't,
she will be looked down upon, people will think she's trashy. Well,
and unfortunately, there might be some validity to that point,
(09:33):
although that's not to say that that's necessarily a good
thing or a thing that we should simply condone and say, Okay, well, yeah,
the girls just just don't do that, But guys, go
ahead and do what you want to do. But first
we we got to figure out why we do this
in the first place. Because there's a linguistic theory that
humans very first words were swear words because of their
(09:58):
emotional nature. It's interesting that there is such a gender
divide in cursing behavior because it's such an inherently human
thing to do. It's like in our DNA almost Yeah
and More talks about She gives some examples of of individuals,
well known individuals who you know have experienced whether you know,
(10:20):
dementia or or you know, general speech loss for whatever reason,
who still are cursing because it's it seems to be
kind of deeply ingrained in some part of our brain
that maybe when the rest of our brain has been
affected by some disease or some injury, we can reach
down into those pits of the brain and still managed
to throw out a well placed for a letter word.
(10:42):
And that's because swear words are actually produced in different
parts of the brain compared to regular speech. Because what
you and I are saying right now on the podcast
Caroline is being processed through the left hemispheres of our brain,
and it's known as a higher brain function, this language processing.
(11:02):
But if you and I were to start cursing up
a storm on this podcast, we would probably be activating
the limbic system, which is known as a more ancient
part of the human brain. And this is where expletives
are stored, right, And it's basically brain circuitry that is
(11:25):
linked to emotion and is just as Chris and said,
evolutionarily ancient. And it's buried deep inside the right half
of our brain. And it makes neurological sense that that's
where swear words originate from, because that's also the part
of the brain that regulates things like fear response, fight
or flight are autonomous nervous system and for that reason.
(11:47):
Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker was talking about this to Scientific
American and he essentially compared human swearing behavior to that
of cats, saying, quote, I suspect that swear ring taps
into a defensive reflex in which an animal that is
suddenly injured or confined erupts in a furious struggle accompanied
(12:07):
by an angry vocalization to startle and intimidate an attacker. Right, So,
if you sit on a cat accidentally and the cat
gets really angry and reaches up and swats it you
and runs away, like cat just cursed you, Kristen, Yeah,
just Mr Whiskers, It's set a four letter word at you.
(12:27):
Because it was like, dude, don't sit on me, I'm here,
and so yeah, I mean, if you think about it,
like that makes a lot of sense. When when when
certain things drive you to curse without thinking about it,
it's usually because you're scared, you're anxious. All of a
sudden something startled you or hurt you, and so you
react by, you know, screaming a bad word. Well, and
it's also fascinating to look at the physiological effects of
(12:52):
swearing because our it's a total brain body connection going
on when we swear as opposed to just casual, clean conversation.
Because when we swear, for instance, it induces greater skin
conductance than other words, which indicates emotional arousal, and so
(13:12):
our heart rate also goes up and it might have
a pain mitigating effect. Yeah, I love this study. This
was published a Nerror report back in two thousand nine.
People who held their hands in icy water, the people
who swore held their hands in the water for an
average of forty seconds longer. So there you go. If
(13:32):
you unleash a string of course words versus just chanting
something random and neutral, you can withstand pain better. But
there was one caveat to that study finding, which was
that with repeated use, that pain threshold actually diminishes, which
is why you might want to put a limit on
your swearing, because if you're dropping F bombs all the
(13:55):
time in a way, it do you sensitie as you
and probably your audience to the power of that word. Now,
I yeah, this is exactly right. Uh. You know, researcher
Caroline did a little bit of studying on this topic,
and I did. I had a day where, um, not
what you can to details, but something was really taking
(14:18):
me off, and I unleashed like a string. I think
I said more F bombs than I said actual subjects
and verbs, uh in in my sentence. And uh, you know,
the other person in the conversation was stunned, rightly so,
But I don't know, maybe in my string of expletive use,
maybe I was trying to exercise a degree of power
(14:39):
over the person across the table from me. More does
call curse words quote the most powerful words we have
with which to express extreme emotion, whether negative or positive. Sure,
that's kind of a no brainer to read, But there's
also linked to that this old theory that women swear
(15:01):
as kind of a linguistic power grab. That the only
reason we would really want to violate those longstanding gender
norms that we are supposed to speak like good ladies
and and be clean and euphemistic and no no f bombs.
The only reason we would do that is to try
(15:23):
to kind of exert some power flex our muscles. Right,
And but why is that equated with power? Because I
mean it's also equated with masculinity, and so women, being
the repressed, oppressed group of people that we are, maybe
we're all just cursing up a storm according to this theory,
to uh to boost our power seat. Yeah, I think
some of that is being said with sarcasm. I don't know,
(15:46):
what do you think about that? I don't because I
remember the first time I really started cursing was in
high school. There was one girl in my class who
knew all of the words, and yeah, I know this
is high school. Hello. I was a little bit of
a late bloomer. But I started kind of practicing cursing
under my breath and then I started staying out loud
(16:07):
and there was that power element to it. But like
I like, it felt like I felt like I was
rebelling in a way. Yeah, I think, yes, I would
agree with you. Personally, I feel like it's less to
do with I'm a woman and so I need to
somehow elevate myself up to being equal to men through
the use of the F bomb, but more so than like,
(16:30):
I'm just angry and I'm conversationally rebelling and I'm going
to let you know exactly how angry I am. Yeah,
I mean, and I don't think that you can discount
the power element. It just might not be as gendered
as saying the only recent women are cursing is to
try to emulate male behavior, because there's also one thing
(16:51):
that more another linguists point out is the socioeconomic power
element of it too, where cursing has generally been associated
with either lower class people more of a blue collar
type of thing to do, or at the very upper
echelons of society where they're standing is so secure that
(17:14):
they can swear and not be looked down upon, whereas
for good middle class folk, you keep it clean. Yeah,
I mean talking about women being the ones who supposedly
use euphemism over like an out and out curse word.
Linguists have found like they looked at one study looked
at um courtroom transcripts and found that social class, not gender,
(17:36):
was actually a greater predictor of the use of quote
unquote woman's language, which sounds horrifically offensive to me, but
it just means that this is the language that people
typically associate with women, being like lower on the power scale,
maybe using euphemism instead of the stronger language, etcetera, etcetera.
So why don't we dig even deeper into this gender issue?
(17:58):
Because one thing I was surprised to find in the
research on cursing, like the more scholarly research on cursing,
is how you cannot get very far away from gender
when you start looking for academic research on this um.
And one paper that we found was by Christie Bears Fagerston,
and it's called Who's Swearing Now? The Social Aspects of
(18:21):
Conversational Swearing? And this quote immediately jumped out, which is
that quote? By far the most thoroughly investigated aspect of
the socio linguistics of swearing is the correlation between swearing
and the gender of the interlocutors of social interaction. So,
in other words, it's swearing behavior and gender are almost
(18:44):
always inextricably linked. It seems like right. And one researcher,
one linguistics professor who is constantly cited and all of
these studies is Robin lake Off, who is a professor
at the University of California, Berkeley, and she said that
women cursing had long been considered dangerous because these words
quote express anger and act as a substitute for physical
(19:06):
expression of anger. So basically, whereas men have the power
to hit each other in the face at the bar,
women are just gonna throw some nasty words at you instead. Yeah,
this also does remind me of some of the research
that we found in our episode a while back on
women and anger, where it's not that we are less
(19:26):
angry than men, but we don't express it as outwardly
sometimes as men do. And then this also reminded me
too of growing up. My dad is a big guy,
and he's he has a loud and booming voice, and
he didn't curse all that much, but it was like,
if he was angry, you could hear it, whereas my
(19:48):
mom verbally expressive, though she is um, you knew things
were bad if you heard her curse. Even today, I mean,
we have like a very like close adult relationship, and
I can say whatever I want for the most part
around her, but even still, I mean, she'll like drop
her voice and say a curse word, and then it's
(20:10):
like that's when, you know, just immediately everyone starts crying. Yeah,
because that's like I mean, if if she is pushed
to the point of cursing, then she is angry. Yeah,
it's kind of My mom doesn't curse much. She Actually
I think my mom is kind of entertained when I curse,
and so she kind of curses along with me, and
it's like a girlfriend activity. But yeah, my dad is
kind of the same way, Like he never gets loud,
(20:32):
he never yells, but he will lower his voice to
a growl. And if he says just like a soft
so quote unquote soft for letter word, you're like, it's
all over. It's all over, the apocalypse, everything's crumbling. Oh
my god, run for the hills. And it's because though
of that longstanding notion of women having women and your
(20:55):
dad cleaner speech, that they're often described as the guardians
of language and propriety, the experts of euphemism. But there's
this interesting shift that happens starting in the nineteen seventies
and eighties where you see this correlation between the women's
(21:15):
lib movement and second wave feminism picking up steam and
women cursing more so, I mean, I can obviously see
where stemming from those studies that you would link power
grabs by women and cursing and cursing being a masculine
thing and women trying to ever take men blah blah
blah blah blah, all that whole narratives, right, I mean,
(21:36):
and again, like it studies like that, there's always the
thing of hey, correlation versus causation, Keep that in mind,
but it was nevertheless interesting to see these studies coming
out in the mid seventies looking specifically at that um
But one thing, though, when we're talking about men and
women in mixed company and cursing behavior, men will curse
(21:59):
less around women, right, because there's that natural assumption that
like almost ingrained assumption that women don't curse. Women have
a lower what's it called, like offensiveness threshold or obscenity threshold,
and so they they're they're fragile brains just can't handle it. Well,
that's the outside assumption. Whereas women really in self reports
(22:21):
aren't necessarily as definitives. We tend to think they would be,
and when women are around men, we tend to curse more.
It's like we're trying to meet in the middle in
terms of our gendered swearing behavior. But when you think
too about swear words, swear words to me is such
a hokey phrase. But what do you think about the
(22:43):
list of swear words that we have and the ones
that you hear so often? Uh. Faggerson writes that the
implication of swearing as a male domain can also be
found in the language of swearing itself, which includes an
abundance of terms for females and their body parts. Right. Yeah,
(23:03):
I thought this was interesting to an interesting link between
cursing and gender, that there's so many naughty quote unquote
things that you can call women in their body parts,
but maybe not as many about men and theirs. Yeah,
because even the swear words that might be more commonly
directed to men are typically just insulting them in female terms,
(23:28):
calling them things related to women. Right makes sense since
we can't curse on this podcast, right, and we do
as men and women tend to insult each other and
react to insults differently. Um. This was coming from Timothy
Jay's Cursing in America, a psycholinguistic study of dirty language
(23:49):
in the courts. He talks about sexual looseness or not
being loose enough, being the crux of the strongest female insults.
Are concerns, he writes, tend to surround intimacy, social desirability,
and security, whereas men's men's concerns tend to surround sex,
power and physical attractiveness. And so Jay theorizes that the
(24:12):
curse words that men and women tend to rely on
more often are filtered through those concerns, as he calls them.
But the whole sexual looseness or not being loose enough
thing in terms of like the types of swear words
or insults that are lobbed more often at women, is
so frustrating because it's either you are horribly frigid or
(24:36):
way to promise us, you can never really win in
terms of that, Yeah, I mean yeah and everything. As
far as men insulting each other, it seems to be, yeah,
like you said, you call them something feminine to insult
them the worst, or you insinuate that they're gay or
whatever to be to be the most the most insulting.
And I think that this is interesting because it ties
(24:59):
back to one of the sources we read talking about.
I think it was more talking about curse words in
ancient Rome. And one of the most vulgar swear words
or curse words in ancient Rome was the word for
performing oral sex on a woman. That was like the
most vulgar you could not get any more vulgar. Performing
(25:21):
oral sex on a man was not even on the
charts compared to this. It was just because the mouth
is viewed as this clean and sacred place, and then
when you talk about performing oral sex on a woman,
that's like the worst thing. Vagina's vagina's messing at all,
watch out. And this researcher Karen Stapleton also found that
men found it more acceptable for men than women to
(25:43):
use terms referring to female anatomy. So women aren't even
allowed to refer to our own female anatomy in any
sort of vulgar terms if we wish. But when you
go back to looking at how we curse as kids,
you know, talk about learning how to curse, like, I
don't even remember really when I learned curse words at all.
Just sort of appeared in my brain one day, Yeah,
I I they I just remember kind of absorbing them,
(26:06):
and then a couple of them being there and like
testing the grounds and using them, but having no idea
what I was actually saying. But one thing that my
surprise parents listening is that at least according to research
that Timothy J. Has done, mean, he studied cursing for
like thirty five years. He found that we start we
(26:27):
as boys and girls start picking up our first swear
words by the age of two. There's a good chance
that we know a swear word before we know the
alphabet right, and we're saying the same amount, whether we're
little boys or we're little girls. We were familiar with
the same amount. But by three and four, girls are
producing more swear words. But after three or four boys
(26:48):
began to clearly pull ahead. And this is a trend
that starts as early as five and continues into adulthood.
But this is a good point to keep in mind
that this isn't offering evidence that well, men are one way,
they're just cursing like sailors and ladies are, you know,
at home knitting lace doilies and whispering euphemisms under their breath,
(27:11):
But simply that this is a reflection of gender norms
and expectations, because think about it, at age five, you
have your kid already talking, you have your gender schema
already well underway of formation, and you're probably already teaching
girls to be like little girls and boys to be
like rough and tumble boys. And you probably have people
like the ladies you overheard at the Indian restaurant saying, Oh,
(27:35):
don't say little ladies don't talk like that, right, I mean,
I mean, how many times have we already, Brenda, how
many times have we talked in the podcast about having
your gender identity basically defined for you already at such
a young age. And so it's not that cursing is
outside of that. I mean, I think the way you
speak is very much tied into how you're instructed to
(27:57):
behave to act, to own that gender. Yeah, I clearly
remember being talked to. I don't know, I wouldn't call
it punished necessarily, but my mom caught me or I
was tattled on. I'm not sure for saying a curse
word that I had no idea what it really meant,
and I just thought it was funny. And but I
(28:19):
don't think she ever told me to not say because
I was a girl. But at the same time, though
I had no clue what was going on, she was like,
I knew I had done something wrong, and she clearly
was uncomfortable that I had said this F word. But
I mean, I guess, you know, she didn't really want
to explain to me poll helve you you know, the
Human Anatomy book and go into an in depth lesson.
(28:42):
But I do think that we need to be I
don't know, more accepting of the fact that kids pick
up curse words and not be so terrified of it. Yeah.
I mean, I have friends with kids who basically tell
their kids, these are grown up words. And when you're
around your your dad and me, you can say them
at home because you've heard us say them, but you
can't say them outside of home. So yeah, I mean,
(29:06):
because there's really, at some point there's going to be
no controlling that language. Um. But let's next look at
whether or not this swearing gender gap is closing today,
because Caroline, you and I have admitted now that we
off Mike on the podcast, we curse a lot quite
(29:26):
a bit, and my girlfriend's curse a lot as well,
and when we are around each other we are certainly
cursing not all the time, but you know it happens
a lot. So let's let's figure out whether or not
this whole antiquated idea of women being the experts of
euphemism has really gone by the wayside. And we're going
to do that when we come right back from a
(29:47):
quick break and now back to the podcast. So we've
looked at gender and swearing behavior in the past, but
what about the present. Are we cursing more as women
in our data day conversation? And also are we cursing
more in the workplace? I try not to, Hi, I
(30:10):
try not to as I don't try that hard actually
either actually to be honest. But anyway, we found this
study that when I when I first looked at it,
I thought there's no way this could be relevant or interesting.
It's called f K. Yeah, I swear cursing in gender
in my space my space, my space, and I just
had a little moment of like remembering college the sound
(30:33):
of a dial tone, a dial up modem, right it was.
It was very very warm and fuzzy feelings about my space,
except for when it won't load at all. Um. But anyway,
researcher Mike Fellwall found no significant gender differences in the
swearing on my Space for male and female users in
the UK between the ages of sixteen and nineteen. Yeah.
(30:54):
And while you might be thinking to yourself, why are
they quoting a study about my base, Well, this is why,
because fell Wall concluded that quote this is perhaps the
first significant evidence of gender equality in strong swearing frequency
in any informal English language context, because social media has
(31:15):
presented a new and unique database, essentially for academics looking
into swearing behavior, because otherwise they had to rely on
people's self reported swearing behavior or had to essentially creep
up on conversation like I did, yeah, and and overhear
people and keep tallies of how much they curse. So
(31:37):
this is pretty relevant data. But the thing is I
specified that this was u K teens. This is not
US teens. They're still was a cursing gender gap on
my Space for teens in the US. I wonder too, though,
and I want to hear from listeners in the UK
about this whether this is any reflection of differences in
(31:58):
culture in terms of censorship broadcast censorship, because the rules
in the UK are way less strict about the kinds
of things that you will see in here on TV
versus the FCC in the U S which is, you know,
you still can't say the F word the S word
UM on broadcast networks. So I wonder if it is
(32:21):
maybe part of that could be UM. But yeah, I guess.
And also just maybe it's a reflection of American prudery.
I that's what I would link. But I mean, but
it's one and the same. I mean, the FCC being
is reactionary and you know, heavy handed as they are.
It's kind of one and the same. UM. But as
of two thousand thirteen, moving away from the MySpace era
(32:42):
now into the age of Facebook, American men still do
it more Overall, there was a study conducted on Facebook
linguistics out of the University of Pennsylvania and Cambridge, and
it found that women use more of what they call
emotion words like it cited, love you, et cetera, whereas
(33:03):
men use more swear words and object references, so things
like I blank love my or not love my Nintendo
is blanking awesome. And similarly, a study from thirteen by
to Lunar Quick Surveys found that millennials are the likeliest
to swear repeatedly throughout the day. I fall squarely into
(33:27):
that category. But of all age groups, it's still men
at least, we were into this survey who are cursing
more in the US. But I think that millennial um
finding is significant because I do think there is a
distinct generational difference with our swearing behavior. Yeah, I mean,
(33:47):
this is common sense to say, but I mean, you know,
with every successive generation, things get more permissive. Things that
you know, our grandparents found to be completely obscene, uh,
you know, aren't so bad anymore, and we hear them
on television shows. So yeah, I mean the fact that
there was a New York Times article from a few
(34:07):
years back, but nevertheless, it was talking about the rise
of hearing the word douche on TV because it's just
another like funny but slightly taboo word that you can say.
And also the B word it's said all the time.
And that's on broadcast networks as well. Well. It's almost
like shows like that on those networks find the safe
(34:28):
curse words that they can say and then just say
them to death, and so that almost has an effect itself.
I would think that like, okay, well, you know, this
four letter word isn't nearly as offensive. It's more much more,
you know, soft and everything. So we can say this
a hundred times per episode. Well, and one thing that
might be becoming more publicized through TV shows and what
(34:48):
we're seeing reflected on screen is the fact that a
lot of studies have found that when women are talking
to each other casually, we curse more and we're filthy. Yeah,
we're totally healthy. And we found a study called get
this Taboo, Language and Sex in the City. Yes, there
have been a number of studies actually conducted on sex
(35:10):
in the City, but it found the most swearing when
the main characters Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte, and Miranda, we're talking
to each other. But it was interesting that when they
were talking to male characters on the show, the amount
of swearing went down and the euphemism use went up.
But male characters when they were talking still to the
to the gal pals, we're cursing more directly. Aren't imitating life?
(35:38):
Sort of Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, I'm I know
that I'm like completely disgusting and open with my girlfriends
when we're having a conversation about whatever, you know, I mean,
but I not wouldn't necessarily say the same things to
guy friends exactly. Well, and I think that we're seeing
too that girlfriend type of language being reflected in publications
(36:02):
specifically targeting us as millennial women. I mean, there was
an entire New York Times trend piece that came out
in January about the rise of profanity in women's media.
I mean, if you go, if you look on any
lady blog like Jezebel or The Gloss or the Hairpin,
you're gonna see cursing even in headlines. Yeah, and you
(36:25):
have my attitude, but as someone who curses all the time,
my attitude about that is kind of like, that's a
little forced. Yeah, I feel like it can be forced.
I think that you have to keep in mind, especially
and this is just getting nerdy about writing in literary preference,
I do think you have to keep in mind the
power element of cursing and the desensitizing effect that it
(36:47):
can have, to where it's like, don't you want to
save powerful words for making powerful statements? Yeah? And then
it kind of makes me look at what at the
point they're making overall and being like, what is that?
Why is that even needed? Right? You're not enhancing it?
And I mean I'm I am the last person to
make the claim about well, people who use vulgar terms
(37:10):
just obviously have a poor vocabulary, because hello, let me
just read you my resume real quick. I have a
fine vocabulary, but I understand the power of a well
placed curse word, even when I do fly off the
handle and use them too much. That being said, I
think in in the written word, in the world of
the written word, I think it's okay to pull back
a little. I don't think we need to unleash the hounds,
(37:32):
like every time we write a blog about you know, cellulite, right,
I mean? And I can see how with blogging in particular,
there is a particularly conversational voice that you're often going for,
where it's it's almost as though the writer is speaking
directly to you. And I think there is some shock
value that some people try to employ. By what I
(37:53):
what we might think of is overusing curse words. But
even in more mainstream publications like Cosmopolitan Maggazine Marie Claire,
you are way likelier to see curse words, not only
within the pages, but even on the cover. Yeah, they
might have a well placed asterisk or something, but it's
still I think they're pursuing. They want to talk to
(38:15):
their audience the same way that their audience talks to
one another. Yeah, it was funny though. That New York
Times piece was called fifty Shades of Vulgarity, to which
some women our age wrote response pieces being like New
York Times, of course we're cursing. But when you as
two people who went to journalism school as we did,
and also reading the responses of editors at these magazines,
(38:40):
yet it's kind of a big deal that they are
employing more profanity because you wouldn't do that. They're letting
their hair down in the New York Times is just
clutching its pearls. It's right, I haven't New York Times
reaching for a scrunchee to put that hair back up
really quickly. Um. But in our day to day conversation too,
there is still, anecdotally at least this debate over whether,
(39:08):
if you are at least a straight woman, okay, whether
or not cursing all the time. It's gonna be a
turn off for guys. Yeah, there was a lot of debate.
One of the first UH websites I stumbled across when
I was searching for just you know, gender women cursing
all that stuff was like this whole message board. I
don't even know what it was on, but this whole
(39:28):
message board where men were like, yeah, bro, you know,
like I'm a like a woman and she's hot and
then she's like curses all the time, and I'm just like, oh,
I don't have any respect for you to which, yeah,
I mean, I think I think that was an AskMen
dot com message board, which there you go. Um, But
I was thinking about this, and in my previous dating life,
(39:56):
I did pay attention to how much the guy curse
on dates and how comfortable he was if I curse.
And I think honestly that if you are a woman
concerned about your cursing behavior, kind of like take the power.
Because for me, if a guy flinched when I dropped
an F bomb, listen, I'm not no, it wasn't a
(40:18):
deal breaker, but it usually was indicative of maybe the
fact that we were in a match because I'm not
gonna have to do I don't want to have to
watch my language right around you. Now. I I dated
a guy years ago who was like, wow, you kind
of curse a lot, and I was like, Okay, alright, sorry,
a little sensitive guy. Don't mean to insult your ears.
(40:40):
See you later, Yeah, I mean, and we're not trying to,
you know, blast men for wanting ladylike language. I don't
think that this is, you know, something that applies to
all guys, but it is something that still crops up
in at least heterosexual dating dynamic. Yeah. I mean, it's
(41:01):
the conversation about gender and and cursing. I mean, it's
framed in so many conversations, whether it's about dating or
like about work, which we've we've touched on. I mean,
like the question is still being asked over and over
again about like is it okay for women to curse ladies?
We shouldn't curse. We don't want to put man off.
We don't want to anger our bosses and the men
(41:21):
in our labs. Yeah, I mean, and and say over
and over again that this is we're talking about, like
straight dating dynamics, because I have a feeling that, as
with other issues like this where it's a lot of
gender norms and scripts that are coming into play, that
it might not be as pertinent of an issue refreshingly
for LGBT dating. And I would love to know if
(41:44):
it is, And in that case it probably is simply
a matter of oh, I don't curse a lot, you
don't curse a lot, cool, you know, like, rather than
being a thing. Well, but in a more formal setting
of a workplace, this is where cursing behavior gets a
little dicier. Yeah. I mean a lot of people, as
(42:05):
you would expect, argue that cursing in the workplace is bad.
It's wrong. It makes you appear immature and hot headed.
Um that it can damage morale, damp and respect um
even coaches. There was a study looking at coaches talking
to their teams, and they were rated less effective by
their players if they cursed, particularly if those players were girls.
(42:29):
There's just all of this talk about how cursing is
the worst thing you could possibly do, especially if you're
a lady. Yeah, because the workplace too. If you want
to put gender and power dynamics under the microscope, just
walk into the office. Because you know, while there are
those assumptions that maybe cursing might be bad, they're also
conflicting studies that have found that cursing makes bosses in
(42:53):
particular more relatable, it builds employee solidarity. Hey, we can
all blow off steam together by talking about how this
meeting is blanking terrible. You know, it probably was a
terrible meeting. It probably was, and even some speeches were
were rated to be more effective when the speaker delivered
(43:13):
a well placed or well timed curse word. But again,
especially if you are in a leadership position at work,
your amount of cursing and or the acceptability of your
cursing is gonna be seen probably through a gendered lens,
where in, if you're a woman, the penalty for cursing,
(43:33):
the negative penalty is probably gonna be stronger than if
you are a male boss. Right, or in the case
of former Yahoo CEO Carol Bart's, the use your use
of a curse word could shape how the entire world
sees you, and in an instant, Yeah, when she was
fired from her position as CEO, she essentially made an
(43:55):
F bomb laced exit speech, which I remember hearing about
this on the news and I thought it was kind
of amazing. I totally think it's amazing. When I was
revisiting all of that too for this episode, I was like, God,
I just want to give her such a big high five,
because yeah, because she was now great, I can understand why.
Some people say, well, if you're overseeing a company, you
(44:16):
don't need to publicly be saying all of these horrible words.
But yeah, I don't know. I mean, I think this
is a terrible comparison. But if it had been like
Donald Trump or somebody, everybody would have just rolled their
eyes and been like, there's that old man ranting again.
But instead it was like, she's a woman and she's
at the head of a company and she's saying all
this stuff. Obviously she's a B word. Well, and she's angry. Yeah, scary, Yeah,
(44:41):
it's that danger element that who was it? The loft
Key brought up um in terms of how swearing for
women has always been perceived as dangerous because we're being angry, right,
women are not allowed to express that. Men can yell
and they can throw their fists, but women just have to,
you know, you cut their eyes over to you and
(45:02):
roll their eyes. We're not allowed to say anything. You
can throw shade, we just can't say it out loud.
But I mean, obviously, for any cursing, no matter where
you are, there's a time and a place, um, And
I think that should be it. I don't think that
it should be determined by virtue of you being a
man or a woman. Yeah, I mean it's it's it's
(45:26):
unfair if women are put at a disadvantage for cursing
over men, But it is what it is, And so
I guess it's helpful to be aware. Well, it's always
helpful to be aware of how people perceive you. Yeah.
So with all of this research on gender and power
and swearing in history and our brains in your brain, Caroline,
(45:47):
that has this given you any pause at all about
your own cursing behavior? Um it? Well, I want to
say that I'm going to try to clean up my
act a little, but it's not going to be for
fear of like scaring someone. I mean, I think it's
(46:10):
worth it to pull back at work a little, you know,
when we're at work, Um but because I mean, you know,
you don't really know who's around. You don't know every
single coworker, and I mean the general you you don't
know every single coworker exceptionally well to know whether or
not you're offending that person. But I mean, I just
still it's like God, when I'm in my car in
(46:31):
Atlanta traffic and I'm just screaming something, it just feels right. Yeah. Yeah.
I think the one area where I consistently want to
do better in terms of not cursing is talking to
my parents, because by this point I have I really
enjoy the fact that we have an open, you know,
(46:51):
honest relationship. But when I go over there, maybe I've
had a rough day. We're having dinner, and I go
off on a rant, and it feels really good to
say exactly what I'm thinking. But then later I'm thinking, oh,
they must be horrified by their dear daughter dropping those
heinous phrases. And I will all get into a stretch
(47:13):
of like getting really stressed out and calling my mother
and she's like, oh, honey, what's going on? And I
will just unleash like verbal, angry, curse word laden vomit
all over her and be like, Okay, well I gotta go.
I love you back. It's like we just leave them
with the mess, like, okay, you clean it up. I
feel so much better, thanks, Oh Heaven, love you well.
(47:35):
Now I want to hear though from listeners about this.
What is your stance on cursing? Do you are you
a woman who curses and and doesn't see any problem
with it? Guys, you find it a turn off for
other women to curse. What are your thoughts? Let us
know them. Mom Stuff discovery dot com is where you
(47:56):
can send your letters. And by the way, if you
do use profanity in the subject line, it will get
spam filtered out, and just keep that in mind you
might want to keep your letters clean. So mom stuff
at discovery dot com is where you can email us.
You can also tweet us your thoughts at mom stuff
podcast or send us a Facebook message, and we have
a couple of messages to share with you right now. Well,
(48:20):
I've gotta let her here. From Jessica about our gender
reveal party episode, She writes, Hey, ladies, I really liked
your podcasts on gender revealed parties. We had a reveal
party in July for our baby. We saw it as
a fun way to announce what we were having, but
we also had other motives. Throughout my pregnancy, my mom
and my mother in law have been strangely competitive and
(48:40):
jealous of one another. The party was a way to
ensure that everyone found out the sex together in an
attempt to be fair. The things you hit on were
definite concerns when planning our party. The invitation said no gifts,
so no one felt they had to bring us a present.
I know the difference between sex and gender being a
graduate of a liberal women's college. Sex or old party
(49:00):
just doesn't have the same ring to it. We didn't
have a cake, but instead we picked out two outfits
and had the store rapid correct one. I'm glad we
had everyone together because it was a special moment, this
baby being highly anticipated as the first grandchild. That being said,
it did stress me out and make me wonder if
it was really worth all the trouble. I think it was,
but probably wouldn't have another party with future pregnancies. Oh
(49:21):
another interesting fact, my nine pound one ounce baby girls
movements could never be described as a delicate ballet, so
that study completely cracked me up. He's Jessica, I know,
I love that nine pounds and I had a friend
who just gave birth to a ten pound baby. He
looks I mean, he looks like a toddler who just
walked out of her But anyway, um, okay, I have
(49:44):
a hilarious email from Jennifer Um. Her seject line is
very straightforward. It is gender revealed parties equal sign stupid.
So here we go. Jennifer. She says, I'm a mom.
Most of my friends are ms. I love babies, my own,
my friends, nieces and nephews. I love the baby who
(50:05):
was gurgling at me in the grocery store yesterday. He
was really cute. I have traveled long distances to attend
baby showers or visit new babies. I bring food to
new parents and lend my support in any way I can.
I use social media. Gender reveal parties are stupid. George
Packer was right. They reflected creeping narcissism in our society.
(50:26):
At the end of the day, no one outside of
the immediate family cares boy, girl, whatever. It's just another
excuse to be the center of attention. Come to my
house and cheer for me. I procreated calm down people.
And then Jennifer has a smiley face. So thank you
for writing in and telling us just what you think, Jennifer.
We appreciate it, and thanks to everybody who's written into us.
(50:46):
Mom Stuff at Discovery dot com is where you can
send all of your emails and if you want to
find out all of our other social media properties and
check out all of our podcast, blogs and videos, there's
one place to go. It's stuff Mom never told you
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