How should Atheists swear?
One cannot understand English without having a basic knowledge of Christianity; so pervasive is that religion on our culture. Christianity's hold on European civilization has been totalitarian.
I am in favour of a secularization of North America that is so profound that when people swear they do not use religious references.
How many Atheists, when they have an orgasm exclaim "god!" What spoils the mood more: when you say it or when your partner says it?
And why do we use "fuck" as a swear-word. The Atheist comic George Carlin often wondered, why does a word describing the act of procreation merit being turned into a pejorative?
Towards an Atheist Newspeak.
A reason why Christianity dominates the English language and culture is because the theists imposed habits of thinking, altered the meanings of words to suit their world-view and made it as difficult as possible for anyone to think outside the box they built for us. The successful struggle against these efforts is called "The Enlightenment."
Secularists have ended the domination of Christianity - people now enjoy freedom of thought, at least in most countries. The time is overdue for us Atheists to take English over - to make it more likely that people will think secular thoughts and less likely to entertain obscurantist ideas.
Here are two ways we can do this :
1) stop using words that have religious or mystical meanings. The objective is that the words will die out from lack of use;
2) Co-opt the words. change their meaning permanently so that whenever someone uses a given word it can only have a secular interpretation.
In his novel 1984, George Orwell described how a totalitarian government used language to condition people's thinking.
That language can be shaped, controlled and purposively modified is not only an idea that totalitarians can implement- it is a fact that should be appreciated by anyone desiring liberty. We Atheists are partisans in a culture war and the English language is a battlefield we must control.
I therefore submit the following list as an example of words and expressions we should use in place of the current obscurantist terms:
This seems like such a good idea someone must have already proposed it. If you can find out who please let me know. As you can tell by these first four examples, I could use some assistance.
My god - my word
bless you - you are so good looking (Seinfeld)
Jesus! - Darwin!
holy shit - blue screen!
Dave Mann
Tags: 1984, Orwell, Swear, english, language, orgasm, swearing
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by T A A on -
Indeed, we live in a culture where swearing has evolved into a major linguistic pattern, I think many of us are accustomed to the 'facile' nature of using swear words left right and centre instead of a more interesting vocabulary. I swear A LOT, whenever I'm visiting my agnostic/atheist mother, she finds my obsession with swearing annoying. And often requests that I cut it out. I don't think she is 'right' or 'wrong' about her request. But my mother has always lived outside pop culture, whereas I've been a partaker of pop-culture and many of the hedonistic pleasures it involves.
I've often discussed the linguistic patterns of swearing before in a strictly cultural sense, but this discussion of swearing's linguistic value to atheists is an interesting and novel topic, on which I'll do some additional pondering... :)
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Permalink Reply by Donald S. Chase on -
You are in their same trap by allowing yourself to be catagorized by something you are NOT. A-theist. I am an evolutionist, a pragmatist, a free-thinker, but refuse to describe myself in the negative.
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Permalink Reply by Henry Ruddle on -
I've always found that food products make good swear words, and they get noticed more. One of my favorites is "cheese nibbles."
My favorite swear phrase also involves food and was coined by Kurt Vonnegut. "Take a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut."
If I want to cuss something scandalous around religious people, I usually say, "bloody Jesus on a stick!"
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Permalink Reply by Gregor Basić on -
You reminded me of a swear that works better in croatin, but here it goes:
F*ck soup made from nails Jesus Christ was crucified with
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Permalink Reply by Laura Foster on -
I never knew "flying fuck through a rolling donut" was Vonnegut's! I'll be damned!
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Permalink Reply by Kirk Holden on -
Jesus H. Christ --> Jesus Fucking Christ
Jesus --> Fuck that Jesus dude.
BTW - this is a losing battle. The speech center that provides the wellspring of spontaneous epithets is not the same as the cognitive speech center. Read Steven Pinker instead of wishing in one hand and shitting in the other.
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Permalink Reply by Laura Foster on
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Just in respondse to the title:
Often. :P
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Permalink Reply by Lisa on -
I don't know. Since I'm atheist, I get a charge out of saying god dammit and holy shit without a smidge of guilt. I think I'll just keep doing it.
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Permalink Reply by Walden Bowen on -
I think that blaspheming against a religion is hardly advancing its cause. Almost any Christian would object to using "Jesus Christ" and "shit" in the same contexts. Blasphemy is, after all, expressly forbidden to its constituents. It seems almost like a kind of protest against religion, showing that we don't fear its power.
I've found its also fun to change it up and swear with different religions. It's easy to get around taboos that way.
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Permalink Reply by Arcus on -
Thor knows how you always seem to hammer in the good statements all the time. :)
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Permalink Reply by Peter on -
I don't remember if it was from Dennet or Dawkins but an alternative for :
"Thank God!"
can become:
"Thank goodness!"
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Permalink Reply by Akshay Bist on -
me & a friend used to say that when we were 10. But it was quiet a handful to say
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