Gendered Pejoratives [NSFW]

This question is about the language of words that aren't exactly used in polite company so if you're offended by a clinical discussion of such nature or are not mature enough to participate in this, please just skip this thread

First... great show.

Second... same reason why slut or whore is an insult with no "real" male counterpart. If a man sleeps with a lot of women it is taken as a positive. In general there are way too many words used to insult women almost referencing ONLY their gender or gender + references to sexual activity. Men haven't had that simply because its been a male dominated patriarchal society where women were basically owned until not too long ago. So while they joke about these things they often make the point lest we forget.

Think about it. Guys will even call other guys "B****" to indicate negative and highly subjective and stereotypical views about women; insulting him by casting aspersions on femininity. It's not cool for a guy to girly as if there is something inherently wrong with that. But if a girl is a "tomboy" that's cool.

Most of us accept all these words as common but I think that's part of the problem and why they really don't change and the end result is that women are still shamed for things that men are praised for such that is easier to be a man in society than to be a woman. Children learn these words and treat each other based on what they understand their meaning to be regardless of right and wrong and so the cycle of hurt continues. They just get used to it.

ZealotX wrote: Think about it. Guys will even call other guys "B****" to indicate negative and highly subjective and stereotypical views about women; insulting him by casting aspersions on femininity. It's not cool for a guy to girly as if there is something inherently wrong with that. But if a girl is a "tomboy" that's cool.

So I did acknowledge the basis behind this, but still found it a bit lacking in explaining how the words have/are evolving descriptively. I would say almost to the opposite that femininity is imposed on women and tomboys are against the norm.

Most of us accept all these words as common but I think that's part of the problem and why they really don't change and the end result is that women are still shamed for things that men are praised for such that is easier to be a man in society than to be a woman. Children learn these words and treat each other based on what they understand their meaning to be regardless of right and wrong and so the cycle of hurt continues. They just get used to it.

Agree in your analysis here, handles the normative side pretty well.

I'd say the difference lay in the historical context of power as it related to gender..... being (only) a 'c' would have been equvilant perhaps to calling someone a prostitute, which a lot of women were forced to do to survive throughout history... while calling someone a 'd' might be fairly said a punter of said establishments, a bachelor or player, and more of a reckless attribute then the female version which is a deeper level and more about lack of choice or worth etc. To me this reality nicely explains it. Why some societies are more accepting of it might come down to its use in different languages and cultures, but I don't think that is a valid reason to assert a blanket usage as globally correct. So in international forums it serves communication clarity and efficiency to work in a clearer space of less ambiguity. Even worse of course when people know its going to be taken as an insult, use it anyway, and then claim niavity or that their own interpretation is the correct one

I would say almost to the opposite that femininity is imposed on women and tomboys are against the norm.

Well that's true, but I think masculinity is also imposed on men. I think the difference is that masculinity is imposed by men on men and femininity is imposed on women much by men. I don't think women wore corsets because they wanted to. And then you have those tiny feet made by foot binding for Japanese women. It's like torture but women (I don't know how much of this is nurture) see high heels and things as beautiful (much more than I do) and that fetish like torture is accepted, normalized, and standardized, such that women are pressured to wear those things to fit in; especially at formal events.

Honestly, I think we need to take a lot of these norms and reset based on what people used to look at in Africa and call "uncivilized". Because if civilization amounts to torture and women being uncomfortable then the "uncivilized" were the ones who got it right. I personally like seeing women's natural beauty. The more we keep dressing women up to match some sort of Barbie doll exterior the deeper the damage to the natural psyche.

Two people stand in a field one slays the other - is one of a “ Humanistic” statements I think I’ve heard- I think that’s what ya call it - it erases a lot of labels we often add ... that we don’t often realize or know. For a person to demoralize another person / a lot of thought and effort has ta go into it. It may seem ... like a fly at the moment type of thing but in truth - it’s needs a lot of things to happen to become reality. So when one heart tears down another - it’s never a laughing matter to me. Hurt is hurt. I swear - I have days when songs I no longer listen to ... get played as I continue on with my daily activities - I turn it all the way up .. to 11 Lol
To diss some one is just that. Can the human race tack on hurt from gender side area ... dude - we used to sit outside during reseda and “ play battle” yo mama jokes- my dad used to tell me some for school as well as my uncles and aunts who all .... did graduate from the high school I did graduate from too ... hmmm any how - there is always a way to diss some one - in any area way - thing - I watched ladies in a restaurant-snub - some one while they ordered the wrong wine with a meal ... just a sound and a face ... same thing. Strait diss. Words and intentions can be just as sharp as a steel sword or a light saber itself. People will find ways to diss ... if they really want to ...
I make an effort - not - to swear any time. This doesn’t mean I don’t or I even think about the right colorful word that can .... get em ... but I choose not to. This helps me personally on my path. I’ve heard it does and it’s didn’t for most its one of those 50/50 things.

ZealotX wrote: Honestly, I think we need to take a lot of these norms and reset based on what people used to look at in Africa and call "uncivilized". Because if civilization amounts to torture and women being uncomfortable then the "uncivilized" were the ones who got it right. I personally like seeing women's natural beauty. The more we keep dressing women up to match some sort of Barbie doll exterior the deeper the damage to the natural psyche.

There are counter arguments to that though... that things like heels served to minimize the statistical norm that women were generally shorter then men, and thus allowed them to be 'at level'. As physical stature does unfortunately serve some advantages in exerting power, just ask Napoleon B. For it was men who started wearing them first to ride horses better, and it just happened to be accepted and normalized on women because women felt taller and men noticed it made their butts more prominent... a win win for both sides I guess. I doubt its not really about any plastic doll for most women so much, and instead representative of some deeper nature of psyche. Things like lipstick feminism and stilletto feminism serve to embrace those sexualized concepts as forms of deeper personal power, and in doing so shift the burden of responsibility on conduct right back where it belongs in the eye of the holder, ie fashion is not always for other people or their effect on other people, things can be worn because it empowers the wearer into some coherence of inner and outer energy. The 'natural psyche' should not be confused with the superficial skin deep appearance alone, as for many a person is better defined less about how they look naked and more about their beliefs, actions and motivations. Having said that, many cultures have monetized and defined femininity in such a way as to be less about the women and more about the effect it has on men.... but I guess ultimately its up to the women to decide that and not us, and instead we all just have to ensure they have that right and power to make their own decisions!?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napoleon_complex
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lipstick_feminism

Open a dictionary, look up what 'vulgar' actually means, realize that there is no difference between cunts and vulva, except someone's opinion of which word sounds better to describe the exact same thing. The someone in question of course being the upper class, who merely invented vulgarity for ego feeding purposes... And the commoners fell right for it.

Fun fact: you owe your life to a plethora of cunts and dicks.

There are exceptions, and there's a theme to those that represent those exceptions, but I won't go down that path just now -

(as another aside, we can spend days ponderously going through historical references and meanings, and I can try to persuade everyone I like to used myriad the way I want them to, but the unfortunate reality is that language only means what it means at the time, and speculation on historical or future usage is academic)

Broadly, in my circles, Cunt is not a particularly vulgar word. It's up there with "Cad" or "Mischief Maker"

Someone flicks a rubber band at you you respond - "You cunt!" (you could just as easily proclaim "you perfidious swine!" but it doesn't seem to roll off the tongue.

Car doesn't start 'cause of the cold "bloody cunt of a thing"

It's rarely actually used as a specific gendered insult, and whatever the oxford dictionary offers us, I doubt anyone using the word actually spares half a tenth of a hundredth of a second visualising any genitalia, or even musing on the relevance to females.

And, my general response to anyone who pipes up and says "Don't use that word, I'm offended (or more likely, I think I should be offended, so I'm making some kind of stand" - well dickcheese, I'm offended by how you use the word myriad, so I guess we can all agree language is fairly flexible and it's damn near impossible to make everyone else use it the way you want them to.

As for any other general vulgarity you want to choose.

I don't know what the word is, I'll just call it "meaning enhancer" - they're there to let everyone know your level of intensity with whatever else you are trying to communicate, and oft-times, far more efficiently than "Well now old chum, I am quite put out but this unfortunate, unforseeable, and otherwise unavoidable turn of events, Oh bother indeed!"



rambling onwards - as far as insulting people's personal habits and natures, If I was to say "She just loves love" I am saying that "she, with little incentive other than the temporary pleasures of the flesh, will happily copulate with just about anyone, on any day of the week, with little regard to future consequences, or interest in additional interaction in the times to come"

It's not really a moral position, just a way of passing on information about someone's habits.

If I call someone a slut (or any other word you like), I'm probably not saying anything at all other that they've done something in recent memory that was inconvenient to my personal goals.


rambling ever onwards again (and possibly getting wildly off topic) - I never have had to say "he just loves love" because the default assumption, regardless of a man's celibacy, monogamy, or otherwise, is that a Male is always virile and potent and without preference or the ability to plan into the future, and thus, is always of the intent to copulate freely.

I wonder if that's sexist?

Ren, I did preface this discussion asking you to ignore this if you're not going to respond maturely. You should behave better than this

JamesSand, you're Australian right? I'm sure there's myriad minute differences between my usage of English and yours. I'm not particularly easy to offend, but I think there's a cultural difference at play (maybe people I know just need to toughed up a bit ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)
Calling someone a slut literally versus figuratively is the sort of conversation that was had about calling someone a fag.
Yeah, norms are a weird thing but they exist

Ren, I did preface this discussion asking you to ignore this if you're not going to respond maturely.

No, you did not.

If you didn't like my reply, you could have ignored it, instead of branding my reponse "not mature". Nothing I said is false or exaggerated. It appears you are not interested in learning the origins of vulgarity, and are interested in yet another women vs men thread. Give us a shout when you want to discuss ideas not personalities.

This thread breaches totjo's rules and your personal attack does not help. I eagerly await an explanation as to what was not mature enough for your taste.

I did. Look at the OP

I very purposely included that short disclaimer and set of instructions because I wanted to have mature discussion. I do talk about vulgarity but your flippant comments don't. If it was a guest or a novice, I would've ignored it, but I expect better of you. Your combative and needlessly coarse language in your post aren't conducive to mature discussion.

This is interesting

You've got two choices here, as I see it - Continue on with the initial purpose of the thread, regardless of interruption, or have this spiral into another of TotJOs famous battle of [strike]wits[/strike] semantics for a week until someone complains or a Mod gets twitchy enough to close it.

Neither is necessarily more correct, or "Jedi" or preferred in some barely defined and intangibly linked to the doctrine way - that's just more or less the way I see it can go.

And honestly, with you lot, the second one is like cancer - it's going to happen eventually, you just gotta hope the thread dies of something else before it gets too big....


Cancer is another funny one isn't it? Everybody has got dead people, but talk of cancer sometimes makes us feel uncomfortable. More so than talk of road accidents or pneumonia, but, we are quite happy to use it as an adjective (I think it might have been replaced by "toxic" for but a long while, people unhelpful to an organisation were "cancer".)

When someone is fastidious and irritating to our lives, we call them "as fun as cancer".

I don't really have a theory as to whether there is a link or relevance here, but it is in the ballpark of things that are taboo, potentially vulgar, as used arguably incorrectly in the literal sense to explain or enhance the meaning of something else.


Edit: Ros's bit - I (possibly incorrectly) assumed that everyone knew the etymology of the word Vulgar itself, but much like anything else - the history is merely interesting, the more "contemporary" meaning of "gross, unpleasant, and lacking sophistication" is arguably more useful for the purposes of communication.

From memory, the origin of Vagina is Scabbard, but saying "I'm going to put my meat sword in your scabbard" doesn't make me sound like an enlightened history buff.

I mean a lot of insults came from a descriptive term. Vulgar meant having to do with the hoi polloi and the progression to it meaning uncouth is pretty straightforward.
The divergence in the paths of dick and cunt (in American English) still bugs me. Is dick going to become a stronger term? Is cunt going to be reappropriated? Will there always be a pejorative set of words to describe genitalia (as opposed to a common and/or clinical one)?

I cut them altogether out of my own vocabulary but that’s me

I don't think many people are actually insulted by the term, but some indeed are so that is cause enough for some folk to show restraint, refinement or indeed professionalism depending on the circumstance. Perhaps so Jedi if considering the Doctrine.

I also imagine even less that the 'c' term is used in any anatomical reference.... and with 'd' it's common only informally AFAIK. I'd suggest the difference in that is because the d word has little to no negative connetations of any weight so found to be acceptable slang for the organ, and that the metaphorical usage of it is like the metaphorical usage of c totally loaded only by that which the culture brings with it. As such the c word is in many places burdened with suffering and so not generally commonly used in its non-metaphorical anatomical potential.

Metaphors be with you.

This question is about the language of words that aren't exactly used in polite company so if you're offended by a clinical discussion of such nature or are not mature enough to participate in this, please just skip this thread

I very purposely included that short disclaimer and set of instructions because I wanted to have mature discussion. I do talk about vulgarity but your flippant comments don't. If it was a guest or a novice, I would've ignored it, but I expect better of you. Your combative and needlessly coarse language in your post aren't conducive to mature discussion.

I am mature enough to discuss words I hear every day. As you must have figured out by now, those words do not upset me.

You appear upset. Why? Is it because the words upset you, or do you only want them discussed in a way you like? Did you read your own disclaimer?

I mean a lot of insults came from a descriptive term. Vulgar meant having to do with the hoi polloi and the progression to it meaning uncouth is pretty straightforward.
The divergence in the paths of dick and cunt (in American English) still bugs me. Is dick going to become a stronger term? Is cunt going to be reappropriated? Will there always be a pejorative set of words to describe genitalia (as opposed to a common and/or clinical one)?

I take it you made exactly 0 effort to read my post.