 This month some musings on the subject to foul language:
To answer the question of profanity is the images they portray. Every word we speak is chosen from within. Words have power and can produce changes in others. When I say "red juicy strawberry" your mind starts to see a "red juicy strawberry". I produce an image in your mind with those words. Vulgarity/profanity does the same. Words like "sunshine" for example, give us images of what ? Well... sunshine!
(you may need a dictionary for the rest of this...)
The word a person chooses tells the world where their mind and heart have been lately. Using a curse word bespeaks an appalling poverty of vocabulary indicating an abysmal education resulting in common ignorance. In short, a person choosing to insult with four letter words has simply run out of adjectives. One can truly insult, to the best effect, with a command of the language. Such a person can cut so deeply that the victim of the assault does not even know they were insulted quite possibly at the genetic level. Be that as it may, harassment, regardless of eloquent content, is a violation of the AW guidelines. The only good thing about ignorant harassment is it is easy to see.
As common as it is becoming, children who speak in vulgarities always surprise the "older" generation. Yet children are just as much a part of society as the rest of us. When children grow up to be those who have been surrounded with profanity all their life, what do you get? You see it all the time at the Gate when chaos is the object of a poorly behaved tourist or, less often, a citizen.
Those who come in contact with such users do well to ignore, mute and forget rather than justify the behavior with any reaction. It is often the case that if there is no profit in insult the offenders lose interest and simply go away. Of course they do get help with that from the Peacekeepers.
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