CURSE OF THE FOUL MOUTH:

CURSE OF THE FOUL MOUTH: The Wall Street Journal says “Bad language used to be associated with the lower classes–hence the term ‘vulgarity.’:

But it is now an affectation of celebrities and macho corporate go-getters. Even sailors and peasants watched their language around ladies and children, but now family gatherings at the ballpark must endure obscenities from neighboring fans. Women are swearing the same blue streak as men, and young children don’t seem to have their mouths washed out with soap. A recent Washington Post op-ed lamented the common experience of finding oneself in a subway car “filled with cursing students.”

It would be easy to say that in this time of impending war, that vulgarity is even silly to worry about. And yet, somehow, our fathers and grandfathers got through two world wars and the Depression without (at least publically) sounding like they were “sailors and peasants”.

James Lileks an excellent Bleat on this very subject a few months ago.