Thursday, August 18, 2011

It's Just A (expletive deleted) Blog, People

Today I read an interesting article, about OSU (Oklahoma State, people... OSU doesn't always mean Ohio) coach Mike Gundy. It seems that he hired Brent Loveland, a contractor, to do some work on his house. Unfortunately the poor man showed up in an OU (again, think Oklahoma University, not Ohio) shirt to work. This... made Mr Gundy mad. Believe it or not, this is not the real point of this blog. I'm not starting a debate here about whether Mr Gundy is too uptight and needs to get a sense of humor about his rival (altho I totally think he should) or how completely stupid it is for a paid employee to wear something he knows will hack off his boss (said the girl who's worn Michigan flip-flops into the Buckeye Hall of Fame restaurant.) No, this blog is about cussing.


I'm not going to sit here and pretend I don't cuss. One, you wouldn't believe me. Two, it's not true. Three, oh, #$%^ what was I going to say for three? ; ) Sorry, I couldn't resist that one. As it turns out, tho, that's kind of my point. Why do they refrain from printing the swear words in articles? I mean, I *know* why they do - they're offensive. They're "not allowed" to write those words in the printed media. Fine. Don't print them. I tell you what tho, just because they haven't been printed doesn't mean reading the article won't make us *think* them. Watch:


The article quoted Mike Gundy as he voiced his disapproval regarding his contractor's wardrobe choice. He started out with a tame "How dare you come into my house and offend my wife?" When Mr Loveland didn't know what he was talking about, Mr Gundy said "That (expletive) shirt you have on." Mr Loveland, according to himself, didn't even think about his shirt as he had apparently gotten dressed in the dark. (REALLLLLY? We're supposed to believe that? Ooops, wait... that's not the point here. I digress.) Mr Gundy then proceeded to say “what a lowlife he was, telling him to ‘pack his (expletive) stuff and get off his (expletive) property.” Hmmm. Those direct quotes get a girl to thinking.


I don't think I'm that unusual of a person, I kind of see myself as Missy the Everyperson. Not everyone is going to agree with me, but there are some things I think I see the same way as alot of people. Things like stubbing your toe. Stubbing your toe hurts, and I'm against it. Feel free to disagree if you'd like, but I bet I'll get a solid majority voting my way on that one. Or air. I totally think everyone is entitled to have as much air as they need every day, regardless of how much air they may have used the day previous. I'm kinda generous when it comes to air. Pro air, definitely in favor of air. See? I'm Everyperson, just like you. That being said, when I read Mr Gundy's quote, I was compelled to fill in the blanks and I bet you were too. My internal dialog went something like this:


" 'That (expletive) shirt you have on.' Hmmmm, well, the placement of the (expletive) lends itself towards an adjective. I bet the bleeped word is... tangerine. Wait, no - it can't be that. OSU's colors are black and orange, so why would they delete the word tangerine. That BIG shirt you have on. Maybe it was so big you could see right into the sleeves and all his man hair was offensive to Gundy's wife. No, that's silly. You can write 'big' however or wherever you want, even in all caps. It must have been a... dirty word. That's it! They deleted a dirty word. What could it be? 'That damn shirt you have on.' That makes sense! I bet it's damn. But... people say damn on TV all the time. They write it alot. Dammit. It can't be damn. Hmmmm.... shitty? Maybe he said 'That shitty shirt you have on.' Well, that sounds just stupid. I mean really. If Mike Gundy can't swear better than that what is he worth. What would sound really, really powerful coming out of his mouth that would REALLY make it clear just how upset he was with this guy's wardrobe. O.M.G. He said fucking. He said fucking!!! 'That fucking shirt you have on'! THAT'S IT!!!" I won't bore you with the rest of the internal dialog, but suffice it to say me and my dirty word brain decided that Mr Gundy needs to bone up on some more creative cusswords. I'm like *pretty* sure he totally overused the same words.


Anyway, the point of this blog: Let's think about it for a second. The writer of the article (or writers of the articles, since this was covered pretty well in the press) fulfilled his journalistic duty by not printing the offending words. It seems to me, he's following the letter of the law... but not the spirit of the law. If the idea is to protect my fragile eyes (ears) from such foul language, he failed miserably. Honestly, it would have been better to just see the one swear word, rather than have me think the many, many swear words I tried to make fit. I was Goldilocks, tripping through the Swear Word Lexicon, searching for the just right cuss word to make sense of Mike Gundy's rant. Truth be told, I even said some swear words multiple times while testing it out to see if it really did fit. The whole experience was not unlike trying on a new pair of shoes. Do you slip on the shoe and take one step to see if it feels good? No! You march up and down the aisle and stop at the mirror turning this way and that to make sure you have the right shoe. Just like I did with the Mike Gundy Cuss Words.


So, I guess that's it. I just find it funny that in an effort to keep me from reading profanity, the writers end up making me think way more swear words than I would have if they had just kept it simple. Something easy like "That (insert f-bomb here) shirt you have on," or "That (rhymes with shucking) shirt you have on," or my favorite "That uckingfa shirt you have on." Come on, writers is it really so forking tough to find other ways to get the story out? I thought not. Commence to getting creative, and for the love of Pete, get a (bleeping) thesaurus, wouldja?