Bad Language and the US of A

Airsoftslayer93

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Mar 17, 2010
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So I was watching 'Breaking Bad' (a US tv show about meth dealing).
I will admit that it was a recorded version from america, I really don't want to wait months until it's shown in the UK.
Possible exceedingly minor spoilers from now on

In one scene, a character called Mike leaves a piece of paper under a bin to be found by the police, On it are written the words 'F**k You'
The U and the C were both blurred on the screen.

This got me wondering as to why they were blurred, this episode dealt with the themes of Adultery, the murder of a child, and of course the dealing and cooking of drugs.

Can the american audiance really stomach such strong themes, but struggle with a tiny bit of non verbal swearing? it just doesn't make sense to me.

So for conversation, What it your countries attitude towards swearing? Is it worse than violence?
How about your personal attitude towards it?

Please don;t make this descend into a cursing free for all, keep your language in check

TLDR: Should swearing be covered up in a show about murder and drugs?
 

Shadowstar38

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Jul 20, 2011
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America! We invented double standards.

For some reason, people get really offended by strong language over here. I never quite understood it myself.
 

twistedmic

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Airsoftslayer93 said:
TLDR: Should swearing be covered up in a show about murder and drugs?
Just remember what Shelia Broflovski said in 'South Park Bigger, Longer and Uncut'. 'Horrific, deplorable violence is okay as long as nobody says any dirty words.
 

Cabisco

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That blurring thing just seems to weird, unless the airing was a pre watershed version I can't see why they would do that, the term is not lost on anyone but it detracts from the scene. I'm sticking to it was a prewatershed version.

I do always cringe when I hear the term "F-bomb", it sounds overally aggressive and stupid at the same time, akin to what a small child with too much red bull would say.

Swearing in general is great when it's used in the correct way but sometimes people do seem to get giddy off the fact they can swear, some games have every second word as fuck and it just starts to sound moronic.

Anyway, a swearing based thread is always a brilliant oppotunity to post a video of the king of swearing Mr Malcolm Tucker:

 

RipRoaringWaterfowl

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Well, that's, you know, culture, man. It seems that in general, the USA deplores sex, and the UK deplores violence. Both can sometimes also be a little heavy handed with cuss words, but the USA far more so.

Don't ask me why, I just report the facts, then exit stage wherever.

 

Tuesday Night Fever

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I'm from the United States. It's the country where people seem to go into a moral panic when there's a swear or a nipple on screen, but then they're totally cool watching people get brutally murdered on CSI or whatever. Nothing but a bunch of overly-sensitive hypocrites.

My take on profanity? What does it matter? A word is just a word. It's only offensive to you if you let it be offensive. I'd be happy to see the day when our media is no longer censored, if nothing else just to force my fellow Americans to grow a thicker skin.
 

Wayneguard

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Airsoftslayer93 said:
So I was watching 'Breaking Bad' (a US tv show about meth dealing).
I will admit that it was a recorded version from america, I really don't want to wait months until it's shown in the UK.
Possible exceedingly minor spoilers from now on

In one scene, a character called Mike leaves a piece of paper under a bin to be found by the police, On it are written the words 'F**k You'
The U and the K were both blurred on the screen.

This got me wondering as to why they were blurred, this episode dealt with the themes of Adultery, the murder of a child, and of course the dealing and cooking of drugs.

Can the american audiance really stomach such strong themes, but struggle with a tiny bit of non verbal swearing? it just doesn't make sense to me.

So for conversation, What it your countries attitude towards swearing? Is it worse than violence?
How about your personal attitude towards it?

Please don;t make this descend into a cursing free for all, keep your language in check

TLDR: Should swearing be covered up in a show about murder and drugs?
I don't know what the legal rules are for television broadcasts but for radio, we have laws prohibiting obscenities. I'd bet that there is a similar legal regime in place for TV. Your gut reaction is correct though; it makes no sense that we can commercialize sex and violence but profanity is just off the table.
 

The Rogue Wolf

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It's been that way for a while, and not just in the media. As said by Francis Ford Coppola:

"We teach our boys to firebomb villages, but we won't let them write 'fuck' on the side of their planes because it's obscene."
 

FalloutJack

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Nov 20, 2008
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Airsoftslayer93 said:
-Sailor talk-
Nah, not when it's clearly an adult-level program. Incidentally, where did the recording come from? I smell a FOX...
 

Cakes

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Airsoftslayer93 said:
TLDR: Should swearing be covered up in a show about murder and drugs?
Of course not. If you're mature enough to handle the show where we see a child shot in the chest and corpses being melted in a barrel, you should probably be able to stomach the f-word.

This is just how AMC is though, they have particularly stringent rules about profanity. I think Breaking Bad gets one censored f-bomb per season (the last one was "I ****ed Ted"), and that's it. They also censor Scarface so heavily that it's unwatchable, butchering every line of dialogue while inexplicably leaving the gruesome violence intact.

Though personally I kind of like how Breaking Bad manages to seem realistic while avoiding profanity, aside from Jesse's "*****!" habit.
 

Total LOLige

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I noticed that too and it struck me as weird. Also Walt has gone full Heisenberg now exciting stuff.
 

Ryotknife

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It always puts a smile on my face when someone outside of the US tries to understand some wacky part of our country, not realizing that many americans gave that up years ago.

As for the FCC stuff, yea it really did start with the Janet Jackson boob.

violence = okay
sex = not okay
swears = not okay
violence against an animal, especially a cute animal = dear lord you have unleashed a flood of biblical porportions.