Achtung! I think we need a refresher on the forum rules....

breasts and tits have exactly the same meaning, but breasts are OK and tits are forbidden. Silliness. I am OK with abiding by silly rules though and will in the future. This is America after all. Fuck is in all British dictionaries by the way. And recent studies in semantics have determined that when fuck is used in the phrase "fuck off" it is actually meaningless. My current research paper is precisely on people's attitudes about the word fuck, which I'm looking at by certain demographics like education level, age, and sex. My literature review is of course based on several of studies on the subject from . . . England of course. Land of 'lexical' grown ups.

Cursing, by the way, are hostile statements towards other people. Profanity is usually something offensive or disgusting, which I hope tits are not.
 
rickenvox said:
breasts and tits have exactly the same meaning, but breasts are OK and tits are forbidden. Silliness. I am OK with abiding by silly rules though and will in the future. This is America after all. Fuck is in all British dictionaries by the way. And recent studies in semantics have determined that when fuck is used in the phrase "fuck off" it is actually meaningless. My current research paper is precisely on people's attitudes about the word fuck, which I'm looking at by certain demographics like education level, age, and sex. My literature review is of course based on several of studies on the subject from . . . England of course. Land of 'lexical' grown ups.

Cursing, by the way, are hostile statements towards other people. Profanity is usually something offensive or disgusting, which I hope tits are not.
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correct me if I'm wrong but aren't boobies a type of bird ?
 
rickenvox said:
breasts and tits have exactly the same meaning, but breasts are OK and tits are forbidden. Silliness. I am OK with abiding by silly rules though and will in the future. This is America after all. Fuck is in all British dictionaries by the way. And recent studies in semantics have determined that when fuck is used in the phrase "fuck off" it is actually meaningless. My current research paper is precisely on people's attitudes about the word fuck, which I'm looking at by certain demographics like education level, age, and sex. My literature review is of course based on several of studies on the subject from . . . England of course. Land of 'lexical' grown ups.

Cursing, by the way, are hostile statements towards other people. Profanity is usually something offensive or disgusting, which I hope tits are not.
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Personally, I don't give a shit. They are all just words. But out of consideration for people who might like to keep a browser window open at work or have a coworker glancing at their monitor, it would just be nice to not have language that could cause them problems.
 
rickenvox said:
breasts and tits have exactly the same meaning, but breasts are OK and tits are forbidden. Silliness. I am OK with abiding by silly rules though and will in the future. This is America after all. Fuck is in all British dictionaries by the way. And recent studies in semantics have determined that when fuck is used in the phrase "fuck off" it is actually meaningless. My current research paper is precisely on people's attitudes about the word fuck, which I'm looking at by certain demographics like education level, age, and sex. My literature review is of course based on several of studies on the subject from . . . England of course. Land of 'lexical' grown ups.

Cursing, by the way, are hostile statements towards other people. Profanity is usually something offensive or disgusting, which I hope tits are not.
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This is an easy mystery to solve. You are forgetting connotations which are mapped by different cultures. That's the actual basis for language not denotations.

Hope this helps your research.
 
Bones McHorror said:
This is an easy mystery to solve. You are forgetting connotations which are mapped by different cultures. That's the actual basis for language not denotations.

Hope this helps your research.
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what mystery are you referring to? one thing is the actual basis for language? thanks for the update. maybe you can write my thesis.
 
rickenvox said:
what mystery are you referring to? one thing is the actual basis for language? thanks for the update. maybe you can write my thesis.
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No, why tits and breasts aren't used interchangeably and have different meanings in different countries. It's a pretty trivial reason and not 'silliness'.

It's the same reason racial slurs aren't used interchangeably with neutral terms for ethnic groups like Latino, African American, Irish, etc. And why "fuck off" has meaning even regardless of what either individual word means in isolation.

I can't write it for you because that is plagiarism and against school rules. I'm just here to help.
 
Help!I'maRock! said:
I love the number of people who posted in this thread 6 years ago and have left because they turned out to be closet bigots.
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I am a classroom teacher and use the forum from work.

I'm afraid the forum is vastly more acceptable than my occasional remarks regarding adolescent cultural norms.
 
Bones McHorror said:
No, why tits and breasts aren't used interchangeably and have different meanings in different countries. It's a pretty trivial reason and not 'silliness'.

It's the same reason racial slurs aren't used interchangeably with neutral terms for ethnic groups like Latino, African American, Irish, etc. And why "fuck off" has meaning even regardless of what either individual word means in isolation.

I can't write it for you because that is plagiarism and against school rules. I'm just here to help.
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let's take your assertion and apply it to the word fuck. Fuck denotes sex, but only in the most limited context. Like:

"hey it's Friday, that means me and the wife get to fuck tonight."

In almost every other usage of the word, sex is not denoted or in the connotation.

"Fuck off"

"Fuck" here clearly has no connection to sex in any way. The phrase means something like "Get out of here", "Shut up", or "I detest you so I'm going to refer to you after this culturally taboo word which has no meaning in this context other than it's supposed to be offensive." The word in this context has no connotation or meaning, just functions to sound profane by association and without any lexical reference.

Also as used as an inflex:

"fan-fucking-tastic"

"in-fucking-credible"

No connotation of sex or anything profane at all - in any English speaking country. Except where people with puritanical tendencies call any use of "fuck" profane. The words above simply mean what they did without the inflex, but now have emphasis with "fucking".

Your comparison of tits/breasts to ethnic labels neutral/insulting is fallacious. People don't use the word "tits" to insult breasts. Neither does "tits" mean breasts in some special context like porn or strip clubs, there is no connotation apart from the literal meaning. My girlfriend always refers to her own as tits. And she's not trying to be edgy or provocative. Bad comparison.
 
rickenvox said:
let's take your assertion and apply it to the word fuck. Fuck denotes sex, but only in the most limited context. Like:

"hey it's Friday, that means me and the wife get to fuck tonight."

In almost every other usage of the word sex is not denoted or in the connotation.

"Fuck off"

"Fuck" here clearly has no connection to sex in any way. The phrase means something like "Get out of here", "Shut up", or "I detest you so I'm going to refer to you after this culturally taboo word which has no meaning in this context other than it's supposed to be offensive." The word in this context has no connotation or meaning, just functions to sound profane by association and without any lexical reference.

Also as used as an inflex:

"fan-fucking-tastic"

"in-fucking-credible"

No connotation of sex or anything profane at all - in any English speaking country. Except where people with puritanical tendencies call any use of "fuck" profane. They words above simply mean what did without the inflex, but now have emphasis with "fucking".

Your comparison of tits/breasts to ethnic labels neutral/insulting is fallacious. People don't use the word "tits" to insult breasts. Neither does "tits" mean breasts in some special context like porn of strip clubs, there is no connotation apart from the literal meaning. My girlfriend always refers to her own as tits. And she's not trying to be edgy or provocative. Bad comparison.
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the 'bad' connotation of fuck off comes from it being an overly forceful way of telling someone to go away. the connotation is about the entire phrase. it's never about a confusion or revulsion about the sexual word. studying what 'fuck' or 'off' means (or doesn't mean) in the word tells you nothing about it whatsoever. other than the trivial point that definitions are inadequate to describe or catalogue how actual people talk.

I compared 'tits' to racial slurs only in the sense they are similar. In that they are both words with connotations which differentiate them from words with the same reference. A word does not need to be derogatory to carry a connotation either. Tits just happens to carry a lot of negative baggage from sex work: strip clubs, prostitution, porn. And those things in turn carry shitty connotations for most women. It's used in strip clubs not because it changes meaning there, but women don't want to hear it without consent. And men assume consent is given at a strip club or in a porn video. (and also among their group of buddies).

That doesn't really apply to just saying breasts. Therefore they are not used interchangeably. It seems to be okay at Mark Wein forum, only because it is 99.99% male and therefore isn't going to be a discussion about consent or something. And most here are merely kind of nerdy guys who use that language ironically. Or with so many layers of irony they are not sure. In the same way they like 80s metal lyrics or something.

Racial slurs don't have connotations of insult by themselves. It's not just an arbitrary word that then refers to some group. Or an arbitrary word that means 'this is an insult'. It is basically connotation that comes from history. And that history then gives it the force it has. And that history is what was shitty not the arbitrary letters or sounds it uses.
 
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