Voices Carry. Watch the F-bomb!
27 September 2007 – 2:30 pm
If you know me well, you know I talk like a truck driver. I do only talk like that among my close friends whom I’m totally comfortable with, or a bunch of other guys tailgating. Lucky you if you’re one of them.
A few weeks ago I was at a good friend’s wedding. The morning of the wedding we played golf, about eight of us. I’m sure there was plenty of foul language on the golf course.
After golf, we grabbed lunch in the clubhouse.
One guy there didn’t seem to realize or care that there were others well within earshot of us or otherwise forgot to turn on the filters.
And since we were at a wedding event, he felt compelled to tell his nasty bachelor party stories. That’s all well and good, very funny and all, but he was really loud, fucking fuck fuck. You know how we do it, adding ‘fucking’ as a new syllable into words.
The rest of us got really uncomfortable and told him to cool it more than once.
What’s this have to do with anything, Scott?
Lots of bloggers I read tend to use this language in their blog posts as well. That’s cool. That’s who they are. Doesn’t bother me at all to read that. It’s actually nice to see that they have no inhibitions in their writing. I can sling that shit with the best of ‘em.
But, a few times recently, a few of the blogs I read had up with “Fuck” right there in the title (like here and here).
They made me think, “cool it man, you’re in crowded room.”
Here’s the thing. In this web 2.0 world of mashups and widgets, your blog headlines end up all over the place. Sure, if people are grabbing your feeds, fuck ‘em, they get what they get.
But if you submit your blog to places like BlogCatalog, BUMPzee, Blogrush, etc. they dutifully pick up your blog posts and publish your headlines on other people’s blogs who are in those networks.
It’s all fine to put this stuff on your own blog, but when you put it in the title, you’re putting it in other people’s blogs and sites as well.
And their grandmothers may be reading. Or it may be your mother’s blog. Consider that.
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23 Responses to “Voices Carry. Watch the F-bomb!”
I hear what you’re saying about swearing in a headline, and it’s not my every day practice, but hey, sometimes a headline just has to scream and obscenity for dramatic effect.
It’s just a word. But I will clean it up in the future
Grandmas and Mom’s don’t swear?
By Jim Kukral on Sep 27, 2007
Maybe Grandmas and Moms in Cleveland do, Jim.
By Scott on Sep 27, 2007
Ouch! My mom swore once, I remember the moment clearly.
By Jim Kukral on Sep 27, 2007
I am personally against swearing, so I never use swear words. I agree with you, though. Even if one is not against swearing, there are times when it’s best to shut up and talk nice.
By Adam on Sep 27, 2007
Good reminder to people - bloggers in particular. You’re absolutely right - those headlines are pushed via feeds, etc. It’s one thing to go to a blog - get what you want - if you don’t like the language - don’t go. However, I’ve had some problems with this same issue setting up blog search and feeds on my Squidoo pages. For example, I might be doing a Squidoo on a kids TV show (kids are going to be reading it) - place a “blog posts news feed” on the Squidoo and what do I see? ___ this and ___ that, etc. You never know where those headlines be seen and who might be reading them (8 year old kids in some cases).
By E Lawrence Welch on Sep 27, 2007
I think it’s a fair point and I’m with Jangro on the ‘appropriate’ theme. I still read Jim’s post ’cause I have a cowboy mouth myself so I’m not easily offended and I enjoy his writing anyway.
But, mama raised me not to curse, so, although it didn’t work, it did make me mindful of where I do it.
By Maurice (TheCaymanHost) on Sep 27, 2007
Scott, I totally agree. Its the same with voicing political or religious views (unless that’s the point of your blog I guess). You never know who’s going to read your stuff. Kind of goes in line with things you don’t talk about in mixed company; money, religion, and politics.
By Bill on Sep 28, 2007
Hi Scott,
Since my personal blog was provided as second example (next to Jim’s). I was thinking quite a bit before I used the F-word in the post and even in the title. I don’t know if I ever spelled it out even in a post before. I am sure that I used “WTF” or F*ck or “F**k etc. a few times, but I am almost certain that I never spelled it out in any of my 300 blog posts.
A 5 1/2 years ordeal came to a very sudden and surprising end (good end) that cost me a lot of money, time, energy, got a congress man involved, forced my to leave house and home unvoluntarily without knowing if I can come back, forced me to let opportunities go by and a bunch of other things.
Everybody has a handful moments in life where “clean” language can simply not express the feelings.
Anybody who read the F-word and at least checked the post did probably understand and forgive me.
I hear you regarding the general problem, especially with bloggers who use this type of language in every other post (diminishing its power IMO, but that is a different story). They should be at least considerate enough to avoid it in the title. So I agree with your message, but not with the examples used. I know that those happened to be the ones at hand and probably the triggers for this post, because they happened right one after another.
Cheers!
Carsten aka der boese Roy/SAC
By Carsten Cumbrowski on Sep 29, 2007
sorry if you feel that you were made an example of, but yeah, you happened to trigger the thought. I agree, and I think I even said it in a comment, that the emotion in your blog warranted the language.
No need for either of you to explain yourself. I tried to remove myself from any holier-than-thou position with how I wrote this post.
My ONLY point, is that when you write a blog title, you’re posting it not only on your own personal blog, but on others’ personal blogs as well. And if you have taken the specific action of submitting your blog to places that facilitate that, then you have some responsibility for what you write.
(Again, congrats on the green card, Carsten!)
By Scott on Sep 29, 2007
@Adam,
Mind me asking why are you using url to my website? You link to your comments on my website that are absolutely irrelevant to this post.
By Vlad on Sep 29, 2007
I saw that Vlad and was a little puzzled, though I knew it wasn’t you. but hey, if others are spreading your links, cool!
By Scott on Sep 29, 2007
Scott,
I am not worried about that. You have been more than generous with links in the past. This is not the first time I come across this. Is it a new “spamming” technique?
If he can’t leave his own url for example the next best thing to do is to point to a comment on another blog the allowed him to do so.
Yea, I know I sound paranoid a little. But if did not happen to me in the past I would have not bothered to raise the question.
By Vlad on Sep 29, 2007
Hey Scott - good point. For all you potty mouths out there… you’ve been put on notice
Quick suggestion:
Why not do a simple regex replace on those naughty words? Seems like it would be rather trivial to setup, no?
By Jeremy Palmer on Sep 30, 2007
Heheheh….my Grandma spoke a blue streak….
However, I sure see what you mean by posts being circulated and syndicated all over the place.
Interesting though….as long as they link back what’s the harm. Sort of like a bunch of half-assed technorati’s?
By Cathy on Oct 1, 2007
In your blog swearing using as heading, i think so its very effective on your blog posting. yep i am agreed as well as others that its just same political and religious views its very effective because there is nobody know that who is the reader on the other end.But i think so searing is a good thing in which you can agree to other persons.
By marshal on Oct 3, 2007
Well said, Scott. I actually found a Firefox plugin to block such profanity.
By Satellite TV Guru on Nov 5, 2007
Good post Scott, I find that I can talk like a sailor no problem, even when I shouldn’t sometimes. I almost never type cuss words, and never thought of it until now. It seems odd to me that you accidentally type cuss words, especially since you can take them back before you hit submit or send. I think that it has to be done on purpose knowing that it could be offensive to some people.
By Promotional Dude on Nov 9, 2007
It’s a good point and one I’m becoming more aware of as my daughter grows up and becomes more PC literate. At 6 years old, I don’t want her exposed to that kind of language.
It’s an eye opener actually as I’m now seeing more and more of the internet that I don’t want her to be exposed to. Something that you don’t think about till you become a father.
By Colin McNulty on Dec 14, 2007
This is especially good advice for the teens on the net trying to make a “name” for themselves. My daughter recently viewed a video that was posted on a friends MySpace page where the main word was ‘F’. This video was emailed to her and several other friends as well. Basically, this video went viral, locally through our church and within less than a week, everyone knew whose 14 year old son has language issues.
Nothing shames like the stupid things your children do. Having it seen by hundreds of people in the church doesn’t help any.
That young man no longer has Internet access according to my daughter.
By Local SEO Specialist - Terry Reeves on Dec 18, 2007
I think it is also important to think about the professionalism of your blog. How professional do you want it to come across as? If you are using your blog for business, I think that keeping swear words out is best. There are many people who feel it isn’t professional at all.
By Jason Pearson on Feb 12, 2008
I hear you…
Reminds me: there was this whole big hoopla on JohnCow.com when one of the lead bloggers used the word ‘C*nt’ in the post title. Because of the nature of that blog (informative and humorous), I didn’t think there was anything wrong with the language used; however, quite a few bloggers got really ‘hot under the collar’ and self-righteous about it.
Being a woman, I’ve learnt not to take offence to that word as I now know its original meaning (which is very positive).
My mum swears every now and then, but not in English, which makes it sound kinda cool!
By Tia on Feb 24, 2008