It is so extremely variable. I have met old ladies that would die instantly and dissolve into dust if they heard someone "use the lords name in vain" ("God damn"), but until they speak I can't tell them apart from the old ladies that habitually curse with every breath they take.
I used to work at a nursing home where two old bitties were friends and would call each other removed all the time. They would just sit together and cackle while they talked.
If I encounter an American who uses words like “darn” or “gosh” I strongly suspect that I’m speaking with a person from a Protestant background, and I do the best I can to minimize our interactions.
Jusko, does that not apply to Catholics as well?
I’ve encountered churchgoing Catholics who swore just as much as anyone. If I had to generalize, I would say that avoiding swears is more of a Protestant/Mormon thing.
wait. so "gosh" is just a way of saying "god" without swearing? i (non native english speaker) always used it because it sounded cute but i never did the connection with that
Someone I know who would 'ironically' drop the F-slur, in a bid to be hyper-dirtbag Left, now unironically says "gosh" in an attempt to seem mature or professional or whatever.
Can't stand this shit.
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I'm not American but I love the self-censoring on television before the 2010s. So many funny ways to avoid saying "fuck"
The sci-fi TV show Farscape did a masterful job of this. They made up alien swear words that the viewers had never heard before, but it was crystal clear what real english words they were replacing.
I never really liked frell as a replacement for fuck honestly, the sound is a little too round to put energy behind it. Was best when it was used in a sort of defeated, resigned reaction to things getting worse. Because of course it's getting worse.
The swears from Expanse's lang belta are my favourite, ya lik pashang! Easily the most creative of sci-fi swear replacements, the intent still carries through clearly to the viewer and they have good range. Though it wasn't used to escape censors.
Frak from BSG gets points for still being able to convey the same range as fuck, but loses them all for being the least creative.
The answer is yes - if you're in a place in the US where people might believe that the devil is real or that hell actually exists or that the Rapture will happen or that the hand of god is connected to the forearm of god.
It varies greatly from family to family. On one end of the spectrum you have intense Christian households where damn and hell are taking the lord’s name in vain and therefore a 10/10 swear word. They will not watch shows which uses these words. Etc. On the other end, you have kids who swear around their parents and their parents don’t bat an eye. There are enough of the first kind of family that you can’t say damn or hell or in schools, although a lot of teachers will let it slide as long as you’re not being unkind or disruptive.
My kid came home and said they had to play the clean version of Welcome to the Black Parade in music class because it had the D word in it. And they said, “but I listened to the lyrics and I don’t know where they’re singing about dicks.” They just forgot damn was a swear word.
Personally, we call them “at home words” and tell our kids that if they say them in public people might think they’re being mean when they’re not. So our kids swear a little at home but not much. Because they’re not bad words so they don’t have as much appeal to them.
Holy shit this is the first time I've ever heard anyone do the same thing as me. My kids have "home words." We've tried to explain that some people think those words are bad, but we think the idea of bad words is silly and really it's all about what you're saying. Similarly to you, my kids will curse every once in a while (and sometimes I have to try really hard not to laugh) but not nearly as much as I did when I was a kid (though never around in my parents, in my case).
Good to hear we’re not alone! It seems like a decent compromise of a rule. It’s really funny how it works out. My oldest asked me why her classmates were obsessed with saying jokes about dicks and balls and my first response I was, “it’s just that age” but they pointed out that they didn’t find them funny and they didn’t understand why the other kids seemed to. My best guess was that we’ve encouraged our kids to use the proper names of body parts and discuss them openly when it’s necessary and relevant. So they’re just not as taboo.
I also agree that not laughing is really hard, especially when they’re young and don’t use the words appropriately. When one of mine was 4, they said, “I love my crayons, you bitch” in the most pleasant tone I’ve ever heard and I was just at a loss.
If I count as an American for the purposes of this question despite not growing up in the USA, I'd say yes. I was raised to say "darn" or "dang" or "heck" instead of "damn" and "hell", and I'm still caught a bit off guard when I see these words used in things like anime subtitles because I'm still used to thinking of these as naughty no-no words that you're not supposed to say on television — at one point as a kid I didn't even like talking about dams, but the grown-ups around me assured me that it was OK to say "dam" in that situation. I think that might be part of why I generally prefer to say "damned" instead of just "damn". I also generally capitalize "Hell" even though others don't, just because Hell is supposed to be a specific location.
Though curse words do come in tiers or gradations, and "damn" and "hell" to me have always been in a lower tier of vulgarity than "fuck" and "shit" and "oge 'e boo".
The whole concept of cursing is outdated in the US I think, it's not even unusual to hear these things in the workplace. There's a handful of words we don't use out of respect for others, racial and gendered slurs mainly, but nobody under 50 cares about the rest.
When I was choosing my MySpace profile song back in 2006, as an innocent Christian, I was hanging out with a crush. They asked what song I wanted, and I said "Make Darn Sure" because to my ears at the time, "damn" would damn you to hell.
Luckily, a few years later I left the small town and made damn sure I wouldn't let a religion determine what could or couldn't be enjoyed.
basically depends on how Christian the offended person is
"God damn" or "goddamn" or "goddamnit" are all considered not just curse words but depending on the person and how religious they are or how religious they were raised they're top tier "no no" words. Taking the Lord's name in vain is in the Ten Commandments and all that. You can include exclamation of "Jesus Christ!" or obviously variations of "Jesus Fucking Christ!" just "Jesus!" "God!" in that list too. Adding fucking is particularly bad. Just exclaiming the names in frustration or anger or whatever is enough for a face slap in a lot of religious families when I was growing up. I was never slapped, but my grandparents used to pretty openly tell my parents that my brother and I were definitely going to Hell because we said "God, Mom! Leave me alone!" too much or whatever.
"Hell" and "damn" are both curse words but on the very low end. A lot of the Christians who would cover their mouths if someone said "goddamnit!" around them would be ok with a "damnit!" or just a "get the hell out of here!" although it should still be reserved for only situations of anger, surprise, etc. and you should still feel bad. Also still generally forbidden for children to say them outside of the context of speaking about Hell the place or God damning someone (Biblical loopholes. Jesus understands the space and how important it is!)
Taking the Lord's name in vain is in the Ten Commandments and all that.
Which is funny because Lord and God are basically titles used because of the name taboo around the actual name of the God, Yahweh/Jehovah
Yes and no. It depends on how conservative the people you’re around are. I’ve found heavily religious people get the most upset when you use those words but outside of that they’re used so often that they’re almost the same as saying, “stupid”.
I remember it being a big deal when the Ninja turtles said “Damn” repeatedly in the first movie. Nowadays most kids wouldn’t be phased because their favorite YouTubers say way worse all the time.
I don't know about US, but the equivalent for "god damn" (jumalauta) and "hell" (helvetti) are considered strong cursewords in Finnish.
Also "Satan" (Saatana) and "Perkele" which likely comes from an old pagan god Perkwunos, are very strong curse words
Most curse words related to anatomy are less severe, with exception of maybe vittu (cunt, used similarly to fuck), and kyrpä (dick).
In the 90's through the early 2000's they were. It feels like today they've become common parlance. I know tv shows today can say shit, bastard, stuff like that without censorship I think?
Yeah Christians in the 1990s--and a bit after-- got pretty upset about "damn" and "hell". Kids used to say "H E double hockey sticks".
Southpark broke things open here, on my recollection.
My brown parents didn't want me saying it in school since you would get in trouble for it as a kid (elementary school). But really that goes away once you reach high school and university since correcting the now [young] adult students in person as if they were a child is weird so people who get offended by those phrases will just avoid you/dislike you privately.
Mostly just for squares. Hell is fair game, damn is something you want to refrain from when kids are nearby, and the god in goddamn is censored on radio music.
Also on television. As a child hearing (bleep) damn made me think they were saying "Fuck damn"
Oh, absolutely. You just need to distinguish cursing from swearing. Cursing is directly tied to blasphemy, such as "God damn you". Swearing is all coarse, crude, impolite language that typically includes cursing. So yeah, it's more about how down you are with blasphemous language -- how religious you are, the people around you, etc. In America, that's usually pretty high, and it's more about accommodating the sensitivity of the people around you than anything else
Cursing culture changes state to state and even county to county. Larger cities are cursing constantly, so much so that they basically lose their meaning, smaller towns are cursing a lot too but they tend to hold it back for more emphasis.
The exception to this is Appalachia where every other word is crude but you're doing a bit the whole time
Yup.
Yes in pearl-clutching circles, and being religiously brainwormed as the US is that's quite a few. Even ass is going too far.
Do British people really foam at the mouth when you call them bastard?
Is that real? It’s an insult with no teeth (ironic) given that “legitimacy” isn’t a thing anymore.
Hell is real, in America
Some people think it's offense just to say, "God" in exasperation
Yes
God Damn is there with the c-word and fuck in my family, work, and when I was in school. I got detention for for saying "bloody" back in HS and it was eplained to me it was because that term is derived from God's (Bloody) Wounds. I went to the government provided free schools here, we call it public school but I've heard that "public school" means what we call private schools in some countries.
I say it anyway but yes, God Damn is rude as hell. Damn and hell are likewise unacceptable in most scenarios one is expected to be polite.
'Sblood, that's quite outrageous!
