What’s in a word?

Kill, murder, maim, torture, decapitate, garrotte, execute, hang, eviscerate, strangle… What do these words have in common?

No, it’s not what you’re thinking!

They are all perfectly acceptable in any country in the world, in any media, even allowed on BBC before their self-imposed watershed. Yet they all conjure up unpleasant images of ways to kill and inflict pain on another human being. Our children grow up thinking that these words – and thus implicitly the actions – are normal and therefore acceptable as long as they hear them being used in the news or read them in newspapers on a daily basis.

Now consider ‘fuck’. A harmless enough word, isn’t it? Think it, say it in your language of preference, taste it. Does it make you feel bad? Of course it doesn’t – it simply describes a passionate act, quite often loving and occasionally resulting in the continuation of our species. A word that represents a natural activity, one that is perceived as pleasurable and appreciated by the involved parties, in stark contrast with the words above. And yet it is shunned and banned from public media, possibly written as f**k but never, ever allowed to be spoken.

Is this what we want to teach our children? That taking someone’s life and causing pain is more acceptable than giving and receiving sexual satisfaction?

Well fuck it, I say it’s time for a change. Wouldn’t you agree?