"Language." "Nng, sorry..."

[prog]

So babies & toddlers are starting to inevitably spread through my social group, and are being brought to gaming events, which serve as the mead-halls for my social life. This much is fine. I like kids OK, and I like smart kids a lot, so I honestly look forward to this crop getting old enough to think and talk, so I can start feeling jealous for their awesome childhoods within a whole crowd of delightfully immature "aunts" & "uncles". (Versus that of poor baby jmac, raised by friendless oldsters and sent to bed at 6pm every night. Alas!)

But there is one thing I don't like so much: it's accepted that, when the wee ones are around, all the grown-ups must refrain from using cuss-words. This actually makes me a little annoyed. Actually: rather annoyed, and a little angry, that I must constrain my own behavior for reasons which, when I think them through, seem more harmful than beneficial to the kids in question.

I mean: beyond being a futile exercise (you do plan on sending them to school one day, yes?), it smacks of teaching one's children a known falsehood, setting them up for later disillusionment and confusion. I guess I could see it if we as a group truly abused the words to a nautical degree, but I would argue that we use them as proper language flavoring: salt rather than syrup, if you will. So wouldn't one want to expose their kids to smart grown-ups speaking naturally, rather than teach them the fiction that the words simply don't exist, and are never said by anyone?

Naturally, I say all this as a non-parent, and further one who can't imagine changing this status, not without a rather severe personal mental rearrangement, so maybe there's something magical I'm not getting. Furthermore, were I ever put in charge of a child, I would (barring, again, a drastic change of personal philosophy) teach them during their first sentient Xmas the truth about both Santa Claus and Jesus Christ, and I don't know how different this strategy would be from even the new parents in my current crowd.

Comments

[ruthling.livejournal.com]

I don't have strong opinions on the language issue. I think I swear too much sometimes and it makes me look stupid, petty and inarticulate, so I sometimes appreciate that little nudge of maybe this isn't the place. Its good exercise in situational behavior, which *is* something people need to teach to kids. I don't think finding out that there are good and bad places to swear is any worse than finding out there are good and bad places to scream and run around, and if we can't get that, it's tough to teach by example.

As a data point, since I grew up Jewish in a very non-Jewish locale (at the time, what's happened since is a bit odd), my parents did sit me down my first "sentient" Christmas and explain the whole Santa Claus thing to me. They also warned me that my friends wouldn't maybe be so eager for me to spoil things for them, so I should keep it to myself. So far, I've grown up to be an intellectually snobby atheist who hates people. Your mileage may vary. :)

[avon.livejournal.com]

A thread along this line came across a list I am on. Like the social circle in question, kids are beginning to infuse some of the social situations making for some interesting tensions.

My general thought on the matter, as a parent of one of those kids, is that if language is appropriate for the venue in general, then don't edit yourself because a kid is there. If it becomes apparent to me that the venue is not appropriate for my daughter, (say the traditional valentine's event at the freaks), I will remove her from the situation.

Now, that said, don't you dare ruin Santa Clause! :)

[aspartaimee.livejournal.com]

i swear like a trucker. i find it perfectly reasonable, however, to watch my mouth in front of my friends' kids, especially the wee-er ones. while i know they will learn to swear eventually (as we all do), i prefer them not learning it from me.

[dougo.livejournal.com]

Taboos are weird. I think the whole reason to make certain words taboo is to preserve their power, so that saying "fuck" means "my feelings are intense enough that I'm breaking a taboo to express them". I.e. if cuss words are outlawed then only outlaws will cuss. Or something like that.

On the other hand, I don't really care about words having power, so the idea of not saying certain words "for the children's sake" seems archaic to me. So I think I agree with avon that it's up to the parent to just avoid "inappropriate" gatherings rather than imposing a G rating onto all gatherings.

as a parent

[jtroutman.livejournal.com]

well, it is more of a logistical problem. if you ever have the experience of a small child (say 2 years old) running around chanting "fucking asshole!" over and over again in a sing-song voice, you can't really understand. The child did not really know what it meant, but that had heard it, and they were repeating it. And that can lead to some interesting situations if you are taking said child out in public.

I don't swear much. I *can* and do swear, when needed. I believe that if you use swear words too often, they loose their impact and power. I know some folks that swear all of the time, and I don't really like it. It just makes them seem illiterate and dumb. If you can't find a way to express your anger to someone other than saying "fucking fuck fuck fuck" then maybe you have an issue. It doesn't offend me on moral grounds or anything like that.

Because I don't swear much, when I drop a careful placed F-bomb into a conversation (like if I am reprimanding someone), they really go 'wow, he is really upset about that", and it makes a bigger impact.

I have known guys coming from armed services backgrounds that literally had to make up new swear words and combinations all of the time, because the normal ones had lost their effectiveness.