The F-Word Is Going the Way of <em>Hell</em>
In today’s world, slurs are the real profanity, not the use of an “F-bomb” to describe a mass shooting.
The truth is that in 2019, using the F-word is quite commensurate with being clean of scrub. We may be taught to include it in lists of “profanity” in a formulaic sense, but in terms of how most of us actually use it today, it is less obscene than salty. We’ve long moved on to other words to move the shock needle—the words that truly make us cringe, that we perhaps wish would go away completely.
The Anglosphere is always out of step in terms of what we call profanity versus how we actually speak. Today, many of us and to some extent in front of children. Not too long ago, they were more like the F-word: formally treated as hot peppers, informally understood as no big deal.
