http://www.newsobserver.com/2011/01/08/906506/cursing-ban-struck-down.html

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"Cursing ban struck down BY ANNE BLYTHE - Staff writer Published Sat, Jan 08, 2011 05:00 AM You might have a foul mouth if you let a bit of profanity rip in public. But you no longer will be running afoul of state law - at least in Orange County. An Orange County Superior Court judge ruled this week that a state ban on public cursing - a 98-year-old law that never applied to Pitt and Swain counties - is overly broad and unconstitutional. With that, representatives of the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina offered a few choice words of their own - jubilant ones, celebrating a basic right. "This 98-year-old law is a blatant violation of the First Amendment," said Jennifer Rudinger, executive director of the ACLU of North Carolina. "We applaud the judge's ruling as an important victory for free speech." The case stems from an incident that took place in Chapel Hill last February on Franklin Street, the college town's main drag. Samantha Elabanjo, a 44-year-old woman familiar to police officers, was having a conversation near a bus stop and stepped into the street as a squad car approached. The officers in the car told her to move along, according to lawyers involved with the case, and she used a bit of profanity while calling their car "dirty." Then, Elabanjo stepped back onto the sidewalk, waved her arms wildly and uttered another curse word to describe the officers. Officers initially charged Elabanjo with disorderly conduct and using "indecent or profane language" in a "loud and boisterous manner" within earshot of two or more people on any public road or highway - a misdemeanor in North Carolina. At Elabanjo's trial in July, an Orange District Court judge dismissed the disorderly conduct charge, but found her guilty of using profanity in the street, not the sidewalk. Elabanjo appealed the conviction to Superior Court, and Judge Allen Baddour heard the case Monday. He dismissed the charge and on Wednesday issued a three-page ruling, a document that arrived in the mail at the ACLU late Friday. Elabanjo, according to her attorney Matthew Quinn, was thrilled with the resolution of her case, but guarded with her speech afterward. "She had a right to do what she did," Quinn said Friday. "But you don't want to stir a hornet's nest." Pitt and Swain The law, according to ACLU representatives, was adopted in 1913 after a very public kerfuffle in North Carolina. But several legislators didn't like the curb on speech and persuaded their colleagues to designate Pitt County, on the eastern side of the state, and Swain County, to the west, as places where Tar Heels could let words roar - as long as they complied with other behavior codes on the books. The public cursing statute is rarely used these days, court officials say. Still, free speech advocates would like to see it taken off the books. In his ruling, Baddour, son of UNC-Chapel Hill athletic director Dick Baddour, described the law as so broad that it "prohibits and criminalizes constitutionally protected speech, whether well-intentioned, but perhaps in poor taste (e.g., a protest or rally using profane language), high-spirited (e.g. profane but happy exaltation directed at no one in particular on Franklin Street by a zealous Tar Heel after a national championship), or otherwise." The statute is unconstitutionally vague, Baddour further stated, because it leaves the public "uncertain as to the conduct it prohibits." ACLU leaders laud the ruling as having statewide sweep. "The judge's decision constitutes a legal precedent that the law is unconstitutional," Rudinger said. "Anyone who proceeds with a prosecution after this is pretty much wasting their time and public dollars." ... What the law says General Statute 14-197: If any person shall, on any public road or highway and in the hearing of two or more persons, in a loud and boisterous manner, use indecent or profane language, he shall be guilty of a Class 3 misdemeanor. The following counties shall be exempt from the provisions of this section: Pitt and Swain."

God damn!
It's about time....


The thing that really gets me, is that "cuss" words are completely arbitrary. There is no logical, or even practical reason to ban certain words. If you think about it, the very act of singling out certain words as "bad", is what makes them "bad"! (stupid) The people that so strongly oppose these words seem to be too dumb to realize that their opposition is the only thing that makes them "bad" in the first place. We as a society need to move past the concept of "cussing". When we scold children for saying "shit" instead of "poop", or "fuck" instead of "intercourse", etc., we are only perpetuating a completely useless concept. It's as though people somehow need to have "dirty" words.... but why?

(Rest in peace, George Carlin. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_Nrp7cj_tM)

1/8/2011 3:07:50 PM

I remember when I encountered the word fuck for the first time. I was probably 4-5 years old, and one of my classmates was like, "Hey, I got a secret....fuck. It's a word you can't say." My reaction, of course, was to say fuck over and over again. Then the same classmate tattled on me. The teacher came up to me and told me not to ever say that word, and that it was a bad word. No reasons why, no explanation as to what made it bad, just a request for simple and blind obedience.

Intuitively, I knew it was stupid. I had barely embarked on my 17 year journey to become "educated," yet I could understand that a word is not bad unless you use it for degradation or insult.

1/8/2011 3:26:45 PM

^You at least ratted that kid out for saying the word first, right?

1/8/2011 6:03:13 PM

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"The following counties shall be exempt from the provisions of this section: Pitt and Swain."

I wonder why these counties were excluded? That's pretty funny.

1/8/2011 6:06:04 PM

If I had to live in either of those counties, I'd want to have the right to curse.

1/8/2011 6:25:07 PM

http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/record-meeting/1270072/

1/27/2011 3:28:25 PM

Forget you.

2/28/2011 11:19:31 AM

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"Intuitively, I knew it was stupid. I had barely embarked on my 17 year journey to become "educated," yet I could understand that a word is not bad unless you use it for degradation or insult."

Ahahahaha personal mythology, how cute

2/28/2011 11:39:21 AM

^
What's wrong with what he said?

2/28/2011 11:46:02 AM

If the sentence doesn't strike you as humorous then me explaining it isn't going to help much

2/28/2011 12:13:57 PM

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"The teacher came up to me and told me not to ever say that word, and that it was a bad word. No reasons why, no explanation as to what made it bad, just a request for simple and blind obedience."

It's not that there was no reason for it being bad, you were just too young to understand that reason... jeez...

It's awesome though that you have finally unraveled 10,000+ years of human language development with your epiphany that bad words don't actually exist.

[Edited on February 28, 2011 at 12:19 PM. Reason : ]

2/28/2011 12:16:08 PM

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"If the sentence doesn't strike you as humorous then me explaining it isn't going to help much"

Please. If you're going to ridicule someone's statement, be able to back it up. Or troll on, whatever.

2/28/2011 1:10:02 PM

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"What's wrong with what he said?"

Five year olds don't have thoughts like that. They're five. They're stupid. They don't have deep etymological theories about what makes a word bad.

Throw in the fact that a person's ability to accurately recall memories from when they were five is pretty bad, and you've got a pretty good case for thinking that what he said was bullshit, or, to put it in fancy McDanger speech, a "personal mythology." d357r0y3r wants to believe that he's truly been on a lifelong journey to reach his uniquely genius brand of anarcho-liberalism or whatever the fuck. He's probably actually convinced himself of it.

Here's what I'll bet really happened: Kid A said fuck. Our friend here said fuck and got in trouble and thought, "This isn't fair, he said it first!" And over time, that sense of injustice -- well within the realm of five year old logic -- got adapted to fit into his anti-authority worldview. There you have it, the birth of a personal mythology.

I'm guessing that's a fairly close approximation of what McDanger was saying, at any rate. Or not. It's what I'm running with.

[Edited on February 28, 2011 at 3:23 PM. Reason : ]

2/28/2011 3:22:52 PM

well, shit, that's a fucking good explanation

2/28/2011 3:29:13 PM

His teacher told him a word was bad, and he thought "That's dumb". Therefore, he intuitively knew that a word in and of itself can't be bad. I doubt he meant that his five-year-old self made a more complex rationalization. I could be wrong, though, and if I am, I agree that it's ridiculous.

Either way thanks for actually explaining.

2/28/2011 3:35:04 PM

Haha, haters coming out of the woodwork. I love it.

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"It's not that there was no reason for it being bad, you were just too young to understand that reason... jeez..."

It's only bad if you say it in a context that makes it bad. Fuck, by itself, can mean a few different things, but it's not necessarily "bad" or even offensive. There's nothing bad about a kid repeating a word he doesn't know the meaning of.

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"It's awesome though that you have finally unraveled 10,000+ years of human language development with your epiphany that bad words don't actually exist."

Swing and a miss.

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"Five year olds don't have thoughts like that. They're five. They're stupid. They don't have deep etymological theories about what makes a word bad."

Five year olds aren't stupid, they're naive. Five year olds have the ability to see the consequences of their actions, at least as they manifest in human reactions. A five year old understands pain and sadness. Thus, he may be able to feel remorse if he's mean to someone else, or he may feel anguish if someone is mean to him, but he will not be able to recognize that a word is inherently "bad" without some amount of conditioning.

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"Throw in the fact that a person's ability to accurately recall memories from when they were five is pretty bad, and you've got a pretty good case for thinking that what he said was bullshit, or, to put it in fancy McDanger speech, a "personal mythology." d357r0y3r wants to believe that he's truly been on a lifelong journey to reach his uniquely genius brand of anarcho-liberalism or whatever the fuck. He's probably actually convinced himself of it. Here's what I'll bet really happened: Kid A said fuck. Our friend here said fuck and got in trouble and thought, "This isn't fair, he said it first!" And over time, that sense of injustice -- well within the realm of five year old logic -- got adapted to fit into his anti-authority worldview. There you have it, the birth of a personal mythology."

Yeah, and here you call me a liar. This memory has been with me since...well, since I can remember.

Fuck off, asshole. I mean that in the most offensive way possible.

2/28/2011 5:15:42 PM

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"Thus, he may be able to feel remorse if he's mean to someone else"

Actually, IIRC, modern psychology begs to differ.

2/28/2011 5:26:05 PM

"Modern psychology" says that 5 year old kids are remorseless? Why don't you elaborate on that?

2/28/2011 5:27:59 PM

because remorse requires a concern for others, which 5-year-olds don't have.
http://www.character-education.info/Articles/stages_of_moral_development.htm

2/28/2011 5:38:36 PM

I'm skeptical of that whole charting system, but it doesn't take away from the central point: "...but he will not be able to recognize that a word is inherently 'bad' without some amount of conditioning."

2/28/2011 5:43:33 PM

yes, the ages are approximate, but at least note that the concept of remorse for harming someone else is still occurring, minimum, around age 9 or 10. and such complex thought as you are ascribing to your 5-year-old self, really isn't possible at that age. Like someone else said, it's more likely you were struck by the concept of unfairness, and that has fostered an antagonism

2/28/2011 5:47:29 PM

First off, you need to stop acting like you're a qualified psychoanalyst. You're not, you're just a dumbass on TWW trying to win an argument, without ever bothering to understand my original point.

The thought was not complex. I did not break it down, when I was 5, like I can today. Nowhere do I suggest that I could. I just didn't understand how a word could be "bad." If you want to hop on the douchebag wagon with the other two and accuse me of making it all up, I don't care. I can remember the event taking place in after school care in the Farmington Woods cafeteria. I could have made it up, though, because the fact of the matter is that children have to be taught that words are bad. Adults teach them that words are bad, because that's how it's always been.

2/28/2011 5:55:35 PM

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"Five year olds have the ability to see the consequences of their actions, at least as they manifest in human reactions. A five year old understands pain and sadness."

Both of these are probably true of my uncharacteristically stupid golden retriever.

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"Yeah, and here you call me a liar. This memory has been with me since...well, since I can remember. "

Well, to be fair, I was mostly just explaining McDanger's comment, which seemed to cause some confusion. I also didn't call you a liar. Self-deluded, possibly. But I'm sure by now you actually believe that you were the smartest five year old to walk the face of the Earth.

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"the fact of the matter is that children have to be taught that words are bad. Adults teach them that words are bad, because that's how it's always been."

Children have to be taught that words mean anything at all. I have no idea how this is supposed to support anything you've claimed.

2/28/2011 6:30:27 PM

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"Well, to be fair, I was mostly just explaining McDanger's comment, which seemed to cause some confusion. I also didn't call you a liar. Self-deluded, possibly. But I'm sure by now you actually believe that you were the smartest five year old to walk the face of the Earth."

I don't appreciate the conclusion that my current political philosophy is just a consequence of a fabricated event that allegedly took place in my childhood (but didn't), but whatever. I don't go around calling into question people's anecdotes, but my anecdote came to mind and was used to explain a pretty simple concept.

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"Children have to be taught that words mean anything at all. I have no idea how this is supposed to support anything you've claimed."

I haven't made too many outstanding claims. I just said that words have no inherent meaning, basically, which is true and easily observable. Like the OP says, it's arbitrary. "Poop" is not better or worse than "shit." It all means the same thing. It really is as if some people want to maintain the sanctity of shit/damn/fuck/etc. Bad words are just a dumb cultural phenomenon. That really is the whole point, and given that everyone here seems to use "bad words" pretty commonly, I didn't expect there to be much disagreement. Like usual, McDanger would rather be a dick than contribute anything.

2/28/2011 6:44:25 PM

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"Bad words are just a dumb cultural phenomenon."

They exist in every culture, in all known languages, for as far back as recorded history goes.

Obviously the meaning of words is derived from society, and language by necessity needs “bad words.” It’s not really arbitrary in that context… it’s like saying a computer doesn’t need a hard drive because it can store stuff in RAM. While technically true, it limits what that computer can do if it didn’t have the HD.

Language, likewise, could exist without “arbitrary” bad words, but it would mean language overall would have to be very different than it is now.

And especially considering how languages develop and evolve over time, rather than being dictated by a governing body, it would literally be impossible for bad words not to coalesce (i would even imagine they are some of the first words to be developed…).

It’s laughably idiotic for anyone to march around screaming “but people are TAUGHT these words are bad!!!” That’s primarily because people have to learn the meaning of ALL words, as GrumpGOP pointed out.

2/28/2011 7:48:00 PM

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"I don't appreciate the conclusion that my current political philosophy is just a consequence of a fabricated event that allegedly took place in my childhood (but didn't), but whatever."

I said the exact opposite, that you (probably subconsciously) adjusted your memory of the event to fit a political philosophy that came into being much later. This is hardly uncommon.

I've also not accused you of fabricating the event itself, for the record.

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"Like the OP says, it's arbitrary. "Poop" is not better or worse than "shit." It all means the same thing."

Any meaning attributed to our mouth noises is essentially arbitrary. There's nothing about an egg to lend itself to the sound, "egg," which is probably why every language has a different sound for it.

But it does not all mean the same thing. It seems to be a common thread in language that we want some words to be more emphatic, provocative, or loaded with emotion (typically anger, with profanity) than others. That way, for example, we can express displeasure at somebody on multiple levels. "You're a jerk" is not likely to start a fight, and you're not likely to say it if a fight is your goal. "You're a fucking asshole" is a lot more likely to start something, and you shouldn't say it unless that's your goal.

These nuances have a purpose. Yes, "fuck" and "make love to" refer to essentially the same action, but rightfully evoke very different images.

And very broadly speaking, it doesn't make much sense that a single word can express displeasure if it's a normal, everyday word and not loaded with a little extra meaning. If I wreck my car, I'm not going to say, "Feces!" I'm going to say "shit!"

I'm not for legal bans on swearing, of course. I do think that social norms regarding their use are both necessary and unavoidable, lest they become stripped of any extra meaning (and I say "unavoidable" because as soon as "fuck" becomes stripped of its extra meaning, we're just going to come up with another word to replace it that will of necessity have to offend social norms).

2/28/2011 8:03:38 PM

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"First off, you need to stop acting like you're a qualified psychoanalyst."

I am doing no such thing. I am simply pointing out what your 5-year-old self was capable of comprehending, based upon accepted scientific research.

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"I just didn't understand how a word could be "bad.""

That is perfectly understandable, and probably true. But your transfigurative talk about how you knew there was no such thing as a bad word and it was only how we took them to be was what made them bad is a concept far beyond the grasp of a 5-year-old, which was the point.

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"Five year olds have the ability to see the consequences of their actions, at least as they manifest in human reactions."

But they really don't have the capacity to give a fuck about someone other than themselves.

[Edited on March 1, 2011 at 12:20 AM. Reason : ]

3/1/2011 12:19:42 AM

My ex-gf was (and still is I guess) a bitch and a cunt, which both mean the same thing. If I called her a bitch she would keep arguing but if I called her a cunt she would shut the fuck up. Thank God for curse words.

3/1/2011 12:20:24 AM

What's the deal with "courtesy" ? Why does it make a difference whether I tell someone "Please be quiet for a moment" or "Shut the fuck up" ?! Both phrases convey the same desire, why are people so hung up on these arbitrarily different phonetic combinations?!?!


[Edited on March 1, 2011 at 12:47 PM. Reason : .]

3/1/2011 12:47:17 PM

^Inorite

3/1/2011 1:03:12 PM

I agree with Grumpy that certain words convey stronger emotion. "Please be quiet" is less forceful than "Shut the fuck up". It doesn't mean that "Shut the fuck up" is a bad phrase, though. It should just be reserved for when it's necessary, or it loses its meaning.

3/1/2011 1:28:28 PM

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"bad words don't actually exist."

3/8/2011 6:08:14 PM

The fact that the word 'nigger' is so terribly offensive if I use it but not at all if a black person does should give you a clue at how much the actual word matters vs. context, speaker, and listener.

3/8/2011 9:27:33 PM

nigger

3/8/2011 9:44:12 PM

Language is funny.

Cause I can think of plenty of situations where "shut the fuck up" is less forceful than "please be quiet"^^^^ and some situations where the N-word is more offensive coming from a black person than it is from a white person^^.

3/8/2011 11:34:59 PM

I do so love it when people decide that society -- and, in this case, decades or centuries of linguistic evolution -- are wrong, without any support whatsoever.

3/9/2011 1:19:55 AM

In case you're responding to me, I just want to be clear that I'm not addressing your points or opinions at all. I dropped out halfway through the class that would have helped me get all uppity in an Internet argument about this topic. All I'm saying is that language is funny.

If you're joking on a friend, and they're like, "Aww, come on, shut the fuck up, dude," that's less forceful than a teacher glaring at you and saying, "Please be quiet." And if your black neighbor explains to you that your darker-skinned sibling will never be any good because he's got too much N-word in him, then that's definitely way more offensive than the white kid who says the N-word cause he thinks he's down.

Right?

3/9/2011 2:48:15 AM

Right. Tone and setting have a large influence, but generally speaking, different words have different connotations.

[Edited on March 9, 2011 at 8:02 AM. Reason : .]

3/9/2011 8:02:20 AM

Entirely dependent on context, listener, and speaker. One dude joking to his friend "shut the fuck up" means something entirely different if you only change the context between the two people. The words themselves are only vehicles for conveying a message, which is utterly dependent on context. No word or combination of words is objectively tied to a given message.

In 1000 years, 'dog' might not have the same meaning it has today. What does that tell you about objective connotation of words? Hell, even today, 'dog' by itself doesn't have a definitive connotation.

3/9/2011 8:47:14 AM

Ok, I guess you're right. Connotation is objective.

3/9/2011 9:13:30 AM