Small Piece with F Word.

O

Omits

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Done a short flash fiction and wanted to post it here for feedback but should I include the F word?
 
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3. Please moderate your language and avoid swearing and expletives. The only exception to this is written fiction posted for critique.
Even then, if you wish to post writing of a strong nature, please consider whether a general forum is going to be a suitable place for useful feedback.
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If you want to be sure, send it to a Mod in a private Conversation (envelope symbol by your avatar at the top of your page), and they will run it past the other mods for discussion.
 
Omits said:
Done a short flash fiction and wanted to post it here for feedback but should I include the F word?
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Just to confirm that Critiques is fine for the occasional swear word, though we'd ask that thought be given and the word is used for a purpose, not just from lazy writing. The same is true for the Challenges, where it's even more important to consider whether it's necessary, but I'm not the only one to have used them there to get the necessary effect.

However, the software will automatically **** out any swear words, so I'd always suggest you change the word yourself, using an asterisk in place of a vowel.
 
Omits said:
Done a short flash fiction and wanted to post it here for feedback but should I include the F word?
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Why am I getting the urge to write a piece that consists of nothing but words other people might concider cencorable?. Just for good measure I would include one anodyne noun; something like 'Turbot' which would, in context, probably look like the most riot-inducingly offensive word in the English language.
 
I think if "F" has a meaning other than offensive words, it is allowed. However, it should not remind readers of the slang word*

If I see a writer use "F" as the same swearing word, I will change my opinion about him. It will make me think that he is just pretending to be a writer.
 
Mans said:
I think if "F" has a meaning other than offensive words, it is allowed. However, it should not remind readers of the slang word*

If I see a writer use "F" as the same swearing word, I will change my opinion about him. It will make me think that he is just pretending to be a writer.
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Oops. Lol.

Try writing Northern Irish without it. And then tell me I’m being just pretending and not authentic

Also her, cheers. Not all writers are blokes.
 
"I want more life, felbercarb," said Roy to Mr. Tyrell.
 
Mans said:
I think if "F" has a meaning other than offensive words, it is allowed. However, it should not remind readers of the slang word*

If I see a writer use "F" as the same swearing word, I will change my opinion about him. It will make me think that he is just pretending to be a writer.
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Reading a book by Naomi Alderman, THE FUTURE. Plenty of F words. Books is OK though. Have I changed my opinion in any way? Slightly. But then, I'm an old guy and it's in my firmware. Won't use it in my writings.
 
Cussing is a universal part of human language--pick a language, literally any language, and you'll find cuss words.

Chaucer and Shakespeare cussed--in writing, so I'll assume in person, too! Kerouac swore in On the Road. Capote dropped copious swears In Cold Blood. Pynchon dropped bombs in Gravity's Rainbow. Gabriel García Márquez swore in Spanish and English. Salinger wasn't a phony in Catcher in the Rye and Heeeeere's Stephen King in The Shining. Ulysses, Catch-22 and Slaughterhouse Five are all masterpieces of English Literature -- capital E, capital L, English Literature. They all contain the F word.

Can I poke the other side of this conversation: Characters who don't drop f-bombs for "publishing" reasons. Nothing sucks the life from a story faster than a supposedly gritty, raw character who doesn't cuss because it might offend a reader. The, Aw shucks, gunman/assassin/leatherneck/soldier in a war zone/bully/etc. is a laugh.

In high school we read a series of war novels (IIRC, Red Badge of Courage, The Thin Red Line and The Things They Carried) and the teacher was friends with/knew Tim O'Brien (author of, The Things They Carried, which is based on his experience in Vietnam). O'Brien came in and we got to talk about the book and ask questions and, being an all-male Catholic high school, someone asked about the swearing and O'Brien turned cold. Apparently an editor had suggested he remove some of the cuss words from the book and he asked why? Well, it might offend some readers and turn them off from reading. And O'Brien countered, And what would not including them do? Would it make the work feel authentic? Would it make it more real? Or would it cheapen and sanitize it? Would it create or strip the work of meaning?

I have no idea if O'Brien coined it or repeated it, but I remember him saying, Language is the currency of writers: you've got a budget, so spend wisely. Someone dropping cuss words every 2 sentences? Yawn. Someone using it to showcase a scene, emotion, feeling or character? Gimme.
 
ColGray said:
Can I poke the other side of this conversation: Characters who don't drop f-bombs for "publishing" reasons. Nothing sucks the life from a story faster than a supposedly gritty, raw character who doesn't cuss because it might offend a reader. The, Aw shucks, gunman/assassin/leatherneck/soldier in a war zone/bully/etc. is a laugh.
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Funny you mention this: I'm reading Larry Niven's Gil "The ARM" books. I'm reading it on my Kindle and was reading a passage and came across something like "And what the censored was that about." I read bits like this several times, and I was "WTF? Who jiggered with the words in my book?" Then later on a person is talking and says "What the bleep?" I was reaching for my pen to write the publisher when, fortunately, the old sage character in the story says "You know, in the olden days people didn't say 'censor' or 'bleep'. They said actual words that had bad meanings."

After I stopped laughing, I found it decently insightful, because I think the narrator MC at that point says (or means) that 'censor' is a bad enough word.

Words are just sounds. We give meaning to them. Same as the word "special needs" can be used with the same negative connotation as "retard" did a generation ago. "retarded" of course replaced "idiot" both being formal medical terms at some point, before the bullies won.
 
msstice said:
Words are just sounds. We give meaning to them.
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HA! Larry Niven with a solid flip. I <censored> like that.

They're just sounds but they have immense power and influence-- to stir emotion, to make people think and to injure them. Cussing is a release or amplification of emotion. Slurs and epithets carry an intention of injury that cuss words lack.

No one says, I f****ing like that, with the intent to injure the listener; the cuss is used to amplify and show how much the speaker likes that thing.

Conversely, no one says, You lost <slur>? without the intent to injure. The slur is used as a means to remind the listener that they're an outsider/other/less than a normal person. The intention is injury.
 
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