Rated R for Language Issues

I know most of the words. The F word. The S word. The C word. Multiple terms for multiple body parts, elimination functions, sexual connections, and, in the words of J.P. Donleavy, "vilenesses various." I quoted, in an earlier blog, George Carlin's take on one of the stronger rude terms. I drop more than my share of F-bombs in conversation. And I enjoy a rude jest, if it involves clever wordplay or exceptional meanness of spirit, whether or not it uses "bad language."

None of these words or phrases are necessary to basic communication. I can go all day, as indeed I must in the workplace, without using them. Of the twenty-odd preceding blogs in this collection (Holy Crap! Thirty-couple!), less than half use such terms at all, and only a few feature them in any way.

But there is a subtle difference between basic communication and effective communication. I remember a rubber stamp that Gordy Baird, a dorm-mate my freshman year, carried and used to great effect, and many are the times I have longed to have that stamp. It said only one word: "Bullshit ." Come on, now, you want it, too. And you wouldn't overuse such a precious tool, you'd be judicious. Only one memo...well maybe two. And a copy of an ordinance, or a so-called news story that is nothing but a press release in the paper's stock type. Or most anything put out by the Bush Administration, those poor lost bastards.

Oops! That's one of those terms that may or may not be offensive. Did you know that one type of file used in metal shops is called a mill bastard? Learned that in junior high. In class. It wasn't explained: what did the poor file do to earn such a term of disrespect? The word used to refer simply to someone whose parents weren't married to each other, and was often used to explain why some young British fellow wasn't coming into the family money. Now it's in wide use, generally to express disapproval or to explain that someone has done someone else, who is probably closer to you, dirt.

It's also one of the words that is part of the creeping decline of TV standards. You'll hear it, along with "ass," "penis," and others like you never heard them even ten years ago. So maybe what's filthy now isn't the same as what was filthy back then. But the standard is so loose, and individuals' standards are spread over such a spectrum, that it's impossible to know exactly where the bounds of good taste lie. Bodily functions, sexual connections, and "vilenesses various" appear nightly in ways I don't recall from years past.

Even at work, the standard moves all over the place. I work with a range of people from 17 to 60, from cussing dockworked to professing Christian. We generally use the terms "HR-friendly" and "HR-free;" you might guess that I try to maintain a ten-foot perimeter of HR-free. This refers to language, joke and other issues that may or may not offend someone to the point that they bring action under the arcane and remarkably biased rules of harassment and discrimination; HR-free means that I hope I can speak freely and not get myself hauled in for some ill-chosen word or joke. "HR-friendly" means that everyone treads awfully lightly, and fun suffers as well as effective transmission of ideas or training. You can say otherwise, but it's like saying that tortilla chips taste just as good without salt.

Mostly I have no desire to offend or hurt anyone. Except, of course, when they have it coming. There's a lovely, if HR-free, description of stress that defines it as "the mind's struggle to overcome the body's natural desire to choke the living shit out of some asshole who richly deserves it." While that's a little over the top for most situations, once in awhile you'll resonate with the sentiment and appreciate the directness of the expression. And what, pray tell, do you say when you catch your thigh on the corner of a table, or stub your toe, or nail your thumb with a hammer, or spill the red wine on the white carpet, or step in the middle of the night on the cold pile of dog barf? "Oh, golly gee?"

I think not. I bet that a good old Anglo-Saxon plosive of one form or other slips past your lips before you can gather yourself, or you consign the event or its perpetrator to Hades, or suggest that one parent may be canine.

I make a reasonable effort to describe events, tell stories, give opinions, or generally blog away without slipping into language that may put readers off. But sometimes I can make a point, or more effectively emphasize it, or tell a story with more truth, if I throw in a word or a phrase that may run a little rough. Effective communication is more important than "appropriate" language.