I have serious
concerns about people who can accept murder and other violence (even if it's
off screen) yet are offended by mere words in a story.
Let me preface this
by saying I'm not a proponent of profanity. I don't sprinkle my prose with
vulgarity in order to shock or thrill readers. On those rare occasions when I
do employ one of those words which offend some people, it's usually because
that particular one is the appropriate choice for that character or situation.
Like it or not,
people do swear. Some more often than others.
Many of the words
condemned as obscene or coarse come to us from Germanic, Latin or Greek roots
with rather benign, descriptive origins. For instance, that four-letter word
with sexual implications we hear so commonly today, even among children,
originally meant "to plow." The interesting thing is these taboo
words exist in all languages and cultures.
You don't have to
like those words. You don't even have to read them. If such a word offends your
sensibilities, skip over it. Just accept these words exist and people do voice
them, especially people who might be inclined to commit a crime.
Not that every
character in a book who uses vulgarity is a criminal. For some it's just their
nature. Lydia Brubaker, Chief Brubaker's daughter in my Sticks Hetrick mystery
series, swears frequently. Aside from that, Lydia's a nice, compassionate young
woman. Officer Flora Vastine, in the same series, is not given to profanity.
Other than a rare hell or damn, nasty words aren't part of Sticks's
vocabulary either. Incidentally, since the intent is the same, there isn't a
shade of difference between hell and heck or damn and darn. A euphemism can't
change the nature of the beast.
For the most part
I've refrained from using so-called offensive language in my 19th century
stories for the simple reason it wasn't common to the culture as it is today.
And it was largely as a result of that repression obscene words came into more
widespread use in modern society.
Some opponents suggest using profanity
indicates laziness on the part of the writer; i.e., he could have found a
better word. Or might have simply said, he/she
swore.
Really?
Either is a cop
out. The writer chose that particular word because it was the most descriptive.
Simply saying the character swore does not reveal the depth of the character's
feeling. That's tell, not show.
To deny a writer
the use of any word is, simply put, censorship.
