I’m a f***ing hypocrite
: Michael Powell wants to ban the f word from the airwaves. Now you probably thought it was already banned, but the FCC staff ruled that when Bono uttered it at last year’s Golden Globes, it wasn’t indecent, so Powell wants to make sure that doesn’t happen again. Mind you, if Howard Stern ever said it, they’d slap him with gazillions in fines without a moment’s deliberation. Hypocrites? Yes.
But so am I. I use the f word often. But I hit the tape-delay button on myself when I’m around my kids, of course — because if I didn’t, you’d call DYFS on me. And because kids can come here, that’s why I don’t use the f word here and kill comments that use it and other allied bad words.
But I wish it weren’t a bad word. I wish there weren’t any bad words.
It’s offensive that we get offended by a mere word. What we should be offended by are offensive ideas or insults or attacks. But a mere word? We can’t handle a simple word?
This lexicographic puritanism is the predecessor of political correctness: Somebody holds the list of the things you can’t say — and you can’t say anything about it. This empowers the holder of the list. It subjugates those who would use the word but now can’t. And it insults everybody else who would hear the word, for the holder of the list thinks that he’s protecting them and that that they can’t protect themselves.
See also the CBS post below.
I don’t need Michael Powell or Les Moonves to be my protector. F’ em.
