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The Curse of Swearing Women

The Curse of Swearing Women

Released Wednesday, 5th February 2014
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The Curse of Swearing Women

The Curse of Swearing Women

The Curse of Swearing Women

The Curse of Swearing Women

Wednesday, 5th February 2014
Good episode? Give it some love!
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Episode Transcript

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0:03

Welcome to Stuff Mob Never Told

0:05

You from how Stop works dot com.

0:12

Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Caroline

0:14

and I'm Kristin and Kristin. To start

0:17

off today's podcast, I have a joke. It's not really

0:19

a joke, but I'm going to set it up like a joke. Okay, ready,

0:22

um, So, a blonde and a brunette

0:24

walk into an Indian restaurant for lunch,

0:27

and the blonde says to the brunette,

0:31

you know, I'm really teaching

0:33

my daughter that it's bad to curse.

0:37

And the brunette says, why

0:39

that's I mean, that's good, but why And she's like,

0:41

The blonde says to the brunette, Well, you

0:44

know, it's just not lady

0:46

like. You know, she's not a true lady

0:48

if she curses, it's not a ladylike thing

0:50

to do. The brunette tells the blonde,

0:53

Oh, I totally agree. I

0:55

have two boys, and

0:57

I think it's way more acceptable for them

0:59

to curse, especially like on the football

1:02

field. I mean, that's totally fine.

1:04

Okay. So what I've just told you is an actual

1:07

true story that I overheard at an Indian restaurant

1:09

at lunch one day where two women were

1:11

discussing the upside and downside

1:14

of children cursing

1:16

according to their gender. Yeah,

1:18

my next question was going to be, and

1:20

so what did the redhead you say

1:23

to the blonde and brunette? Because I've

1:26

heard similar things like

1:28

that in terms of talking

1:30

about little girls and

1:32

being lady like and the lady like behavior.

1:34

And I'm pretty sure that I

1:37

was also told as

1:39

a girl to watch my

1:41

language because ladies

1:43

don't talk in X y

1:46

Z kinds of ways. So how

1:48

did you react? I shoved

1:50

some non into my face and I just

1:52

kept eating my curry. I

1:54

was not going to intervene in this situation,

1:57

like tap tap tap, excuse me, what do you

1:59

mean by a true lady? And so instead

2:02

you decided, hey, this is a great podcast

2:04

topic, which it is because

2:08

swearing, cursing, profanity,

2:10

whatever you want to call it, has so

2:12

many gendered elements to it.

2:15

It's so fascinating

2:17

once you start to unravel that ball of yarn

2:20

it is. And the more that Kristen and I read

2:22

about this topic, the more I found myself

2:24

kind of looking inwardly

2:27

because I tend to have a

2:29

sailor's mouth. I curse all the

2:31

time, I think the F word is

2:34

like one of the most satisfying words

2:36

to say. The m F word

2:39

is my my go to curse word at

2:41

work because I managed to stop myself

2:43

after the first two syllables, therefore

2:45

not actually cursing. UM,

2:48

so that that's a good route to take. But um,

2:51

Yeah, it was kind of interesting. I felt like there was a little

2:53

bit of a mirror being held up at me when I was reading

2:55

this stuff, because everything

2:57

we read is like, you know, cursing

3:00

say masculine linguistic

3:02

attribute, and women who do

3:04

it are viewed kind of

3:07

negatively. Yeah, and not only

3:09

that there's the masculine element, but there's

3:11

also this power element of

3:13

cursing that we'll get into as well.

3:15

And that's what really struck a chord with

3:18

me in thinking about my own cursing

3:20

behavior because Caroline,

3:22

like you, I don't have to tell you that I have

3:24

a salty mouth as well

3:26

and have a penchant for the F

3:29

word because there is something particularly

3:31

satisfying about saying it

3:34

and sometimes no substitute,

3:36

no euphemism, will do.

3:39

For reasons that we'll get into. Um

3:42

and don't worry, this is gonna be a clean podcast,

3:44

so for listeners out there. I

3:47

think this will be for men

3:49

and women alike something to think

3:51

about while about your own cursing behavior

3:54

too as you're listening to

3:56

this. But first, a little bit of history

3:59

in terms of how long we have

4:01

been swearing. Answer basically forever.

4:04

Yeah, I mean, I'm sure there were cavemen who grunted,

4:07

you know, when they stubbed their toes things like

4:09

that. But if you look at the etymology

4:12

of the word curse, like to say

4:15

a bad word, to swear profanely, that

4:17

comes from the early thirteenth century. And

4:20

something that I didn't realize about the origin of

4:22

even talking about saying bad words,

4:25

uh, is that to curse

4:28

or to swear to you swear words.

4:30

Swearing was a huge deal

4:33

back in the day. Yeah. We're

4:35

looking at a Brief History of swearing, which

4:37

is a book by Melissa More and

4:40

she divides swearing into what she

4:43

calls two spheres of the unstayable.

4:46

And the first one that really came around were

4:48

religious swears, and this is especially

4:51

taking God's name in vain. Uh.

4:53

And then you have the sexual

4:56

or excremental types of swearing,

4:59

such as the S word. Right, And she says

5:01

that these two types are kind

5:03

of at the root of all of the bad words

5:06

that we say today. Okay,

5:08

but going back to the

5:10

religious, the holy, the swearing

5:13

that actually goes way back in

5:15

text records to ancient Latin,

5:17

and blasphemy against deities predates

5:20

cursing in reference to sexual or scatological

5:22

behaviors, because religion was

5:24

the central part of our lives, right, So

5:27

saying something like sounds, which

5:29

would be short for God's wounds or

5:31

by God's bones, would

5:33

have been horrendously profane.

5:37

Yeah, sounds sounds like something that Scooby

5:39

Doo would say, right. Yeah, today

5:41

we wouldn't think of it because think of how common it

5:43

is to just say, oh my God. Right,

5:46

that even would have been bad to say,

5:49

right. And I mean, I was telling Kristen that I did get

5:51

a bit of an education reading about this, because

5:53

you know, I was raised that saying oh

5:55

my God was so bad that you did

5:57

not say that in the house and you didn't say in front

5:59

of my dad. Um, But I didn't

6:01

understand that. You

6:04

know, things like when you talk about the Covenant,

6:06

you know, when you talk about God's

6:08

promises or swearing to God

6:11

or making an oath, that that is so serious,

6:13

and that when you take God's name in vain,

6:15

you are essentially promising something false. You're

6:18

kind of bringing God or whatever

6:20

deity into your

6:22

lie essentially. Yeah, and more

6:24

describes why the

6:26

whole emergence of

6:29

it being bad to take God's name in vain,

6:31

to make those blasphemous

6:33

slurs, was important, especially for building

6:35

the foundations of Christianity.

6:38

She writes, in the Old Testament, God is

6:40

fighting a war for supremacy with other

6:42

near Eastern gods, and he wields oath

6:44

swearing as one of his most powerful

6:47

weapons. And right there from the get go, we have

6:49

that we're powerful coming up.

6:51

Because in a way, this is one

6:54

way in which you could say

6:56

that, you know, religion is setting out a rule,

6:58

a social rule, saying hey, don't don't

7:00

do this people kind of you need to

7:02

abide by these religious rules, respect

7:05

your God, and he won't smite you. I

7:07

know I've I can't believe I've avoided being

7:09

smoked, being smoked the whole

7:11

time. Well, So as we move forward

7:14

though, into the eighteenth century, and we move

7:16

away from maybe taking

7:18

God's name in vain or or religious

7:20

swearing being the worst possible thing

7:23

you can do we get the rise of kind of body

7:25

consciousness and hating our bodies

7:27

and hating our bodily functions, and being scared of

7:29

everything that comes out of our bodies. And

7:32

so we get this rise in kind

7:34

of body shyness, but also the use of euphemisms.

7:37

Yeah, and so by the end of the

7:40

nineteenth century, More says that swearing

7:42

began to indicate not only those

7:45

religious oaths but also those

7:47

obscenities. Um. But also

7:50

by this time too, well,

7:52

by this time we have a lot of

7:55

gender specificity with swearing

7:57

behavior because earlier

8:00

injuries before in fact, it was had

8:02

been established that women,

8:04

especially who were considered

8:07

the more who

8:10

were considered the purer sex, the morally

8:12

upright, uh, you know, kind

8:14

of counterparts to men.

8:18

We're certainly not supposed to use

8:20

these words, right. In

8:23

fifteen twenty three, a piece titled

8:25

on the Instruction of a Christian Woman includes

8:28

observations about what is appropriate language

8:31

for women to use. So already,

8:33

I mean, that's coming from somewheres that didn't originate

8:35

eighty three, So obviously

8:38

it's already being laid out formally

8:41

that women are supposed to talk a certain way and

8:44

not tread into bad, scary

8:47

territory and from fifteen twenty three

8:49

all the way up to an

8:51

Indian restaurant in two

8:53

thousand and fourteen, right,

8:55

And I mean, you know that conversation

8:58

that I overheard you out,

9:01

It was like girls shouldn't curse,

9:03

and you certainly should not curse in front of girls,

9:06

but boys or

9:08

should be allowed to do whatever they want. It's way

9:10

more acceptable to curse in front of them. And

9:12

and I heard, you know, in that conversation the brunette

9:15

telling the blonde basically that

9:17

you know, well, it's just a fact of life. You know,

9:19

a boy will curse on the football field or curse

9:21

in the halls of school. Um, but if a girl

9:23

doesn't, she will be looked down upon, people will

9:25

think she's trashy. Well,

9:28

and unfortunately, there might

9:30

be some validity

9:33

to that point, although that's not to say

9:35

that that's necessarily a

9:38

good thing or a thing that we should simply

9:41

condone and say, Okay, well, yeah, the girls

9:43

just just don't do that, But guys, go ahead and do what you want

9:45

to do. But first we we got to figure

9:47

out why we do this in the first place.

9:49

Because there's a linguistic theory

9:52

that humans very first

9:55

words were swear words

9:57

because of their emotional

10:00

nature. It's interesting that there is such

10:02

a gender divide in cursing behavior

10:04

because it's such an inherently

10:07

human thing to do. It's

10:09

like in our DNA almost Yeah

10:12

and More talks about She gives some

10:14

examples of of individuals, well

10:16

known individuals who you know have experienced

10:19

whether you know, dementia or or

10:22

you know, general speech loss for whatever

10:24

reason, who still are cursing

10:26

because it's it seems to be kind of deeply

10:28

ingrained in some part of our brain that maybe

10:31

when the rest of our brain has been affected

10:33

by some disease or some injury, we

10:35

can reach down into those pits

10:37

of the brain and still managed to throw

10:40

out a well placed for a letter word. And

10:42

that's because swear words

10:44

are actually produced in different parts

10:46

of the brain compared to regular

10:49

speech. Because what you and I

10:51

are saying right now on the podcast Caroline

10:53

is being processed through the left hemispheres

10:56

of our brain, and it's known as a

10:59

higher brain function, this language

11:01

processing. But if

11:03

you and I were to start cursing

11:06

up a storm on this podcast,

11:09

we would probably be

11:11

activating the limbic system,

11:14

which is known as a

11:17

more ancient part of the human

11:19

brain. And this is where expletives

11:21

are stored, right, And it's basically

11:24

brain circuitry that is linked to

11:26

emotion and is just

11:29

as Chris and said, evolutionarily ancient.

11:31

And it's buried deep inside the right

11:33

half of our brain. And it makes

11:36

neurological sense that that's where swear words

11:38

originate from, because that's also the

11:40

part of the brain that regulates things like fear response,

11:42

fight or flight are autonomous nervous

11:45

system and for that reason. Harvard

11:47

psychologist Steven Pinker was

11:50

talking about this to Scientific American and

11:52

he essentially compared human

11:54

swearing behavior to that of

11:57

cats, saying, quote, I

11:59

suspect that swear ring taps into a defensive

12:01

reflex in which an animal that is suddenly injured

12:04

or confined erupts in a furious

12:06

struggle accompanied by an angry

12:08

vocalization to startle and intimidate

12:10

an attacker. Right, So, if you sit on a

12:12

cat accidentally and the cat gets really angry

12:15

and reaches up and swats it

12:17

you and runs away, like cat just

12:19

cursed you, Kristen, Yeah,

12:22

just Mr Whiskers, It's

12:25

set a four letter word at you. Because

12:27

it was like, dude, don't sit on me, I'm

12:30

here, and so yeah, I mean, if you think about

12:32

it, like that makes a lot of sense. When when when

12:35

certain things drive you to curse without

12:37

thinking about it, it's usually because you're

12:39

scared, you're anxious. All of a sudden

12:41

something startled you or hurt you, and so

12:43

you react by, you know, screaming a

12:45

bad word. Well, and it's also fascinating

12:48

to look at the physiological

12:51

effects of swearing because

12:53

our it's a total brain body connection

12:56

going on when we swear as opposed to

12:58

just casual, clean

13:00

conversation. Because when

13:03

we swear, for instance,

13:05

it induces greater skin conductance

13:07

than other words, which indicates

13:10

emotional arousal, and so our

13:12

heart rate also goes up and

13:15

it might have a pain mitigating

13:17

effect. Yeah, I love this study.

13:19

This was published a Nerror report back in

13:21

two thousand nine. People who held

13:24

their hands in icy water, the

13:26

people who swore held their hands

13:29

in the water for an average of forty seconds longer.

13:32

So there you go. If you unleash a string

13:34

of course words versus just chanting something

13:36

random and neutral, you can withstand

13:38

pain better. But there was one caveat

13:41

to that study finding, which was that

13:43

with repeated use, that

13:45

pain threshold actually diminishes,

13:48

which is why you might want to put

13:50

a limit on your swearing,

13:53

because if you're dropping F bombs

13:55

all the time in a

13:57

way, it do you sensitie

14:00

as you and probably your audience to

14:03

the power of that word. Now, I

14:06

yeah, this is exactly right. Uh.

14:08

You know, researcher Caroline did a little bit

14:10

of studying on this topic, and I

14:12

did. I had a day where, um,

14:15

not what you can to details, but something

14:17

was really taking me off, and

14:19

I unleashed like a string.

14:22

I think I said more F bombs than I said actual

14:24

subjects and verbs, uh in

14:26

in my sentence. And uh,

14:29

you know, the other person in the conversation was stunned,

14:32

rightly so, But I don't know, maybe

14:34

in my string of expletive use,

14:36

maybe I was trying to exercise a degree

14:39

of power over the person across the

14:41

table from me. More does call

14:43

curse words quote the most powerful

14:46

words we have with which to express extreme

14:49

emotion, whether negative or

14:51

positive. Sure, that's kind of

14:53

a no brainer to read, But

14:55

there's also linked to that this

14:57

old theory that women

15:00

swear as kind of a linguistic

15:03

power grab. That the only reason

15:06

we would really want to violate

15:08

those longstanding gender norms

15:10

that we are supposed to speak like good ladies

15:13

and and be clean and euphemistic

15:16

and no no f bombs.

15:19

The only reason we would do that is to try

15:23

to kind of exert some power flex our muscles.

15:26

Right, And but why is that equated with

15:28

power? Because I mean it's also equated with masculinity,

15:31

and so women, being the repressed,

15:34

oppressed group of people that

15:36

we are, maybe we're all just cursing up a

15:38

storm according to this theory, to uh to

15:40

boost our power seat. Yeah, I think

15:43

some of that is being said with sarcasm.

15:45

I don't know, what do you think about that? I don't

15:48

because I remember the first time I

15:50

really started cursing

15:53

was in high school. There

15:55

was one girl in my class who knew

15:57

all of the words, and yeah, I know this is high school. Hello.

15:59

I was a little bit of a late bloomer. But

16:02

I started kind of practicing cursing

16:05

under my breath and then I started staying out loud

16:07

and there was that power element to it.

16:10

But like I like, it felt

16:12

like I felt like I was rebelling in a way. Yeah,

16:14

I think, yes, I would

16:17

agree with you. Personally, I feel like it's

16:19

less to do with I'm a woman

16:22

and so I need to somehow elevate myself up

16:24

to being equal to men through the use

16:27

of the F bomb, but more

16:29

so than like, I'm just angry

16:32

and I'm conversationally

16:34

rebelling and I'm going to let

16:36

you know exactly how angry I am.

16:39

Yeah, I mean, and I don't think that you

16:41

can discount the power element. It

16:43

just might not be as gendered as

16:45

saying the only recent women are cursing

16:47

is to try to emulate male behavior,

16:50

because there's also one thing that more

16:52

another linguists point out is

16:54

the socioeconomic power element

16:56

of it too, where cursing

16:59

has generally been associated with

17:01

either lower

17:03

class people more of a blue collar

17:05

type of thing to do, or at

17:08

the very upper echelons of society

17:10

where they're standing is

17:13

so secure that they can swear

17:15

and not be looked down upon, whereas for

17:17

good middle class folk, you keep it

17:19

clean. Yeah, I mean talking about women

17:22

being the ones who supposedly use euphemism

17:25

over like an out and out curse word.

17:27

Linguists have found like they looked

17:30

at one study looked at um courtroom

17:32

transcripts and found that

17:35

social class, not gender, was actually a

17:37

greater predictor of the use of quote unquote

17:39

woman's language, which sounds horrifically

17:42

offensive to me, but it just

17:44

means that this is the language that people

17:46

typically associate with women, being

17:49

like lower on the power scale, maybe

17:51

using euphemism instead of the stronger language,

17:53

etcetera, etcetera. So why don't

17:56

we dig even deeper into this gender

17:58

issue? Because one thing I was surprised

18:00

to find in the research on cursing,

18:03

like the more scholarly research on

18:05

cursing, is how you cannot

18:08

get very far away from gender

18:10

when you start looking for academic research

18:13

on this um. And one paper that

18:15

we found was by Christie Bears

18:17

Fagerston, and it's called Who's Swearing

18:19

Now? The Social Aspects of Conversational

18:22

Swearing? And this quote immediately

18:25

jumped out, which is that quote? By

18:27

far the most thoroughly investigated aspect

18:29

of the socio linguistics of swearing is the correlation

18:32

between swearing and the gender

18:34

of the interlocutors of

18:36

social interaction. So,

18:39

in other words, it's

18:41

swearing behavior and gender are almost

18:44

always inextricably linked.

18:46

It seems like right. And one researcher,

18:49

one linguistics professor who is constantly

18:52

cited and all of these studies is Robin lake

18:54

Off, who is a professor at the University of California,

18:56

Berkeley, and she said that women

18:59

cursing had long been considered dangerous

19:02

because these words quote express anger

19:04

and act as a substitute for physical expression

19:06

of anger. So basically, whereas men

19:09

have the power to hit each other in the face

19:11

at the bar, women are just gonna

19:13

throw some nasty words at you instead.

19:16

Yeah, this also does remind me of some of

19:18

the research that we found in our episode

19:20

a while back on women and anger,

19:23

where it's not that we are

19:25

less angry than men, but we

19:29

don't express it as outwardly

19:32

sometimes as men do. And

19:34

then this also reminded me too of growing

19:37

up. My dad is a big guy,

19:39

and he's he has a loud and booming

19:41

voice, and he didn't curse all that much,

19:43

but it was like, if he was angry, you could hear it,

19:46

whereas my mom

19:49

verbally expressive, though she is

19:52

um, you knew things

19:54

were bad if you heard her curse. Even

19:57

today, I mean, we have like a very

19:59

like close adult relationship, and

20:01

I can say whatever I want for the most part

20:03

around her, but even still, I

20:06

mean, she'll like drop her voice and

20:08

say a curse word, and then it's like

20:10

that's when, you know, just immediately

20:13

everyone starts crying. Yeah, because that's

20:15

like I mean, if if she is pushed to the point of cursing,

20:18

then she is angry.

20:21

Yeah, it's kind of My mom doesn't curse much.

20:23

She Actually I think my mom is kind of entertained when I curse,

20:25

and so she kind of curses along with me, and it's like a girlfriend

20:28

activity. But yeah, my dad is

20:30

kind of the same way, Like he never gets loud,

20:32

he never yells, but he

20:35

will lower his voice to a growl. And

20:38

if he says just like

20:40

a soft so quote

20:42

unquote soft for letter word, you're

20:44

like, it's all over. It's all over, the apocalypse,

20:47

everything's crumbling. Oh my god, run for the hills.

20:49

And it's because though of that longstanding

20:52

notion of women having women

20:54

and your dad cleaner

20:57

speech, that they're often described

21:00

as the guardians of language

21:02

and propriety, the experts of

21:04

euphemism. But there's this interesting shift

21:06

that happens starting in

21:08

the nineteen seventies and eighties

21:11

where you see this correlation between

21:15

the women's lib movement and second

21:17

wave feminism picking up steam

21:20

and women cursing more

21:23

so, I mean, I can obviously see where stemming

21:25

from those studies that you would link power

21:28

grabs by women and cursing

21:31

and cursing being a masculine thing and women

21:33

trying to ever take men blah blah blah blah blah, all

21:35

that whole narratives, right, I mean, and again, like it

21:37

studies like that, there's always the

21:39

thing of hey, correlation versus

21:41

causation, Keep that in mind,

21:43

but it was nevertheless interesting to see these

21:47

studies coming out in the mid seventies

21:49

looking specifically at

21:51

that um But one thing, though, when we're

21:53

talking about men and women

21:55

in mixed company and cursing behavior, men

21:58

will curse less around women,

22:01

right, because there's that natural assumption

22:04

that like almost ingrained assumption that women

22:06

don't curse. Women have a lower what's

22:08

it called, like offensiveness threshold or

22:10

obscenity threshold, and so they

22:12

they're they're fragile brains just can't

22:14

handle it. Well, that's the outside

22:17

assumption. Whereas women really

22:20

in self reports aren't necessarily as

22:22

definitives. We tend to think they

22:24

would be, and when women are around

22:27

men, we tend to curse more.

22:29

It's like we're trying to meet in the

22:31

middle in terms of our gendered swearing

22:34

behavior. But when you think too

22:36

about swear words, swear

22:39

words to me is such a hokey phrase.

22:41

But what do you think about the list of swear

22:43

words that we have and the ones that you hear so often?

22:46

Uh. Faggerson writes that the

22:48

implication of swearing as a male domain

22:51

can also be found in the language

22:54

of swearing itself, which includes an

22:56

abundance of terms for

22:58

females and their body parts.

23:01

Right. Yeah, I thought this was interesting

23:04

to an interesting link between cursing

23:06

and gender, that there's so many

23:09

naughty quote unquote things that you can

23:11

call women in their body parts,

23:13

but maybe not as many about men

23:16

and theirs. Yeah, because even the

23:19

swear words that might be more commonly

23:22

directed to men are typically

23:24

just insulting them in

23:26

female terms, calling them

23:29

things related to women. Right

23:32

makes sense since we can't curse

23:34

on this podcast, right,

23:36

and we do as men and women tend to

23:39

insult each other and react to insults

23:41

differently. Um.

23:43

This was coming from Timothy Jay's Cursing

23:46

in America, a psycholinguistic study of

23:48

dirty language in the courts. He

23:50

talks about sexual looseness

23:53

or not being loose enough, being the crux

23:55

of the strongest female insults.

23:57

Are concerns, he writes, tend to

24:00

surround intimacy, social

24:02

desirability, and security, whereas men's

24:05

men's concerns tend to surround sex,

24:07

power and physical attractiveness. And

24:09

so Jay theorizes that the

24:12

curse words that men and women tend to rely

24:14

on more often are filtered through

24:17

those concerns, as

24:19

he calls them. But the whole sexual looseness

24:22

or not being loose enough thing in

24:25

terms of like the types of swear words or

24:27

insults that are lobbed

24:29

more often at women, is so frustrating

24:31

because it's either you are

24:34

horribly frigid or way

24:37

to promise us, you can

24:39

never really win in terms of that,

24:41

Yeah, I mean yeah and everything.

24:44

As far as men insulting each other, it seems

24:46

to be, yeah, like you said, you call them

24:48

something feminine to insult them the worst, or you

24:50

insinuate that they're gay or whatever to

24:52

be to be the most the most

24:55

insulting. And I think

24:57

that this is interesting because it ties

24:59

back to one of the sources we read talking about.

25:02

I think it was more talking about curse

25:04

words in ancient Rome. And one

25:06

of the most vulgar swear

25:09

words or curse words in ancient

25:12

Rome was the word for

25:14

performing oral sex on a woman. That

25:16

was like the most vulgar you could

25:18

not get any more vulgar. Performing

25:21

oral sex on a man was not even on the charts

25:23

compared to this. It was just because the mouth is

25:25

viewed as this clean and sacred place, and

25:28

then when you talk about performing oral sex on a woman,

25:30

that's like the worst thing. Vagina's

25:32

vagina's messing at all, watch

25:35

out. And this researcher

25:37

Karen Stapleton also found

25:39

that men found it more acceptable for

25:41

men than women to use

25:44

terms referring to female anatomy. So women

25:46

aren't even allowed to refer to our own female

25:48

anatomy in any

25:50

sort of vulgar terms if we wish. But

25:53

when you go back to looking at how we

25:55

curse as kids, you know, talk about learning how

25:57

to curse, like, I don't even remember really when I learned

26:00

curse words at all. Just sort of appeared in

26:02

my brain one day, Yeah, I I they

26:04

I just remember kind of absorbing them, and then a

26:07

couple of them being there and

26:09

like testing the grounds and using them, but

26:11

having no idea what I was actually

26:14

saying. But one thing that my surprise

26:17

parents listening is that at least

26:19

according to research that Timothy J. Has

26:21

done, mean, he studied cursing for like thirty five years.

26:24

He found that we

26:27

start we as boys and girls start

26:29

picking up our first swear words by the age of

26:31

two. There's a good chance that we know

26:34

a swear word before we know the alphabet right,

26:36

and we're saying the same amount, whether we're little

26:38

boys or we're little girls. We were familiar

26:40

with the same amount. But by three

26:43

and four, girls are producing more

26:45

swear words. But after three or

26:47

four boys began to clearly

26:50

pull ahead. And this is a trend that starts

26:52

as early as five and continues

26:54

into adulthood. But this

26:57

is a good point to keep in mind that

26:59

this isn't offering

27:01

evidence that well, men are one way, they're

27:03

just cursing like sailors and ladies are,

27:06

you know, at home knitting lace doilies

27:08

and whispering euphemisms under their breath, But

27:11

simply that this is a reflection of

27:14

gender norms and expectations, because think about

27:16

it, at age five, you have your kid already

27:18

talking, you have your gender schema

27:20

already well underway of formation, and

27:23

you're probably already teaching

27:25

girls to be like little girls and boys

27:27

to be like rough and tumble boys. And you probably

27:29

have people like the ladies

27:32

you overheard at the Indian restaurant saying,

27:35

Oh, don't say little ladies don't talk like

27:37

that, right, I mean, I

27:39

mean, how many times have we already, Brenda,

27:42

how many times have we talked in the podcast

27:44

about having your gender identity

27:46

basically defined for you already

27:48

at such a young age. And so it's not that

27:50

cursing is outside of that. I mean, I think

27:52

the way you speak is very much tied into

27:55

how you're instructed to behave

27:57

to act, to own that gender. Yeah,

28:00

I clearly remember being

28:04

talked to. I don't know, I wouldn't call it punished

28:06

necessarily, but my

28:08

mom caught me or I was tattled

28:10

on. I'm not sure for saying

28:12

a curse word that I had no idea what it really

28:14

meant, and I just thought it was funny.

28:17

And but I don't

28:19

think she ever told me to not say because

28:21

I was a girl. But at the same time,

28:23

though I had no clue what was going on, she was like,

28:26

I knew I had done something wrong, and

28:28

she clearly was uncomfortable that I had said

28:31

this F word. But

28:34

I mean, I guess, you know, she didn't really want to

28:36

explain to me poll helve you

28:38

you know, the Human Anatomy book and

28:40

go into an in depth lesson.

28:42

But I do think that we need to be

28:45

I don't know, more accepting of the fact that kids

28:48

pick up curse words and not be so terrified

28:50

of it. Yeah. I mean, I have friends

28:53

with kids who basically tell their kids,

28:55

these are grown up words. And when you're

28:57

around your your dad and me, you can

28:59

say them at home because you've heard us

29:01

say them, but you can't say them outside of home.

29:04

So yeah, I mean, because

29:06

there's really, at some point there's

29:09

going to be no controlling that

29:11

language. Um. But let's

29:13

next look at whether or

29:15

not this swearing gender gap is closing today,

29:17

because Caroline, you and I have admitted

29:20

now that we off

29:23

Mike on the podcast, we

29:25

curse a lot quite a bit, and my girlfriend's

29:28

curse a lot as well, and when we are around each

29:30

other we are certainly

29:32

cursing not all the time, but you know it happens a

29:34

lot. So let's

29:36

let's figure out whether or not this

29:39

whole antiquated idea of women

29:41

being the experts of euphemism has

29:43

really gone by the wayside. And we're

29:45

going to do that when we come right back from

29:47

a quick break and now back to the

29:49

podcast. So we've looked at

29:52

gender and swearing behavior

29:54

in the past, but what about the

29:57

present. Are we cursing more as women

29:59

in our data day conversation? And also

30:02

are we cursing more in the

30:04

workplace? I

30:07

try not to, Hi, I

30:10

try not to as I don't try that hard

30:12

actually either actually to be honest.

30:15

But anyway, we found this study that

30:17

when I when I first looked at it, I thought there's

30:19

no way this could be relevant or

30:21

interesting. It's called f K. Yeah,

30:24

I swear cursing in gender

30:26

in my space my space,

30:29

my space, and I just had a little moment of like

30:31

remembering college the sound

30:33

of a dial tone, a dial up modem, right

30:36

it was. It was very very warm and fuzzy

30:38

feelings about my space, except for when it won't

30:40

load at all. Um. But anyway, researcher

30:43

Mike Fellwall found no significant

30:46

gender differences in the swearing on my

30:48

Space for male and female users

30:50

in the UK between the ages of sixteen

30:53

and nineteen. Yeah. And while

30:55

you might be thinking to yourself, why are they

30:57

quoting a study about my

31:00

base, Well, this is why, because fell

31:02

Wall concluded that quote this is perhaps

31:04

the first significant evidence of

31:06

gender equality in strong swearing

31:08

frequency in any informal

31:11

English language context,

31:13

because social media has presented

31:16

a new and unique database,

31:19

essentially for academics looking

31:21

into swearing behavior, because otherwise they

31:24

had to rely on people's self reported

31:26

swearing behavior or had to

31:28

essentially creep up on conversation like

31:31

I did, yeah, and and overhear people

31:34

and keep tallies of how much they

31:36

curse. So this is pretty relevant

31:38

data. But the thing is

31:41

I specified that this was u K teens.

31:44

This is not US teens.

31:46

They're still was a cursing

31:48

gender gap on my Space for teens in the US.

31:51

I wonder too, though, and I want to hear from listeners

31:53

in the UK about this whether

31:55

this is any reflection of differences

31:58

in culture in terms of censorship

32:00

broadcast censorship, because

32:03

the rules in the UK are way

32:06

less strict about the kinds of things that you will see

32:08

in here on TV versus the

32:11

FCC in the U S which is, you

32:13

know, you still can't say the F word

32:15

the S word UM on broadcast

32:19

networks. So I wonder if it

32:21

is maybe part of that could

32:23

be UM. But yeah, I guess.

32:25

And also just maybe it's a reflection of American

32:27

prudery. I that's what I would

32:30

link. But I mean, but it's one and the same. I

32:32

mean, the FCC being is reactionary

32:34

and you know, heavy handed as they are. It's

32:36

kind of one and the same. UM.

32:38

But as of two thousand thirteen,

32:40

moving away from the MySpace era now

32:43

into the age of Facebook,

32:45

American men still do

32:47

it more Overall, there was

32:50

a study conducted on Facebook linguistics

32:53

out of the University of Pennsylvania and Cambridge,

32:55

and it found that women use more of what

32:57

they call emotion words like

32:59

it cited, love you, et

33:02

cetera, whereas men use more

33:04

swear words and object references,

33:07

so things like I blank love

33:09

my or not love my

33:11

Nintendo is blanking awesome. And

33:14

similarly, a study from thirteen

33:17

by to Lunar Quick Surveys found

33:20

that millennials are the

33:22

likeliest to swear repeatedly throughout the

33:24

day. I fall squarely

33:27

into that category. But of all

33:29

age groups, it's still men at

33:31

least, we were into this survey who are

33:34

cursing more in the US. But I think that

33:36

millennial um finding

33:38

is significant because I do think there

33:40

is a distinct generational

33:43

difference with our swearing

33:45

behavior. Yeah, I mean, this

33:47

is common sense to say, but I mean, you know,

33:50

with every successive generation, things

33:53

get more permissive. Things that you

33:55

know, our grandparents found to be completely

33:58

obscene, uh, you know, aren't

34:00

so bad anymore, and we hear them on television shows.

34:02

So yeah, I mean the fact that there

34:05

was a New York Times article from a

34:07

few years back, but nevertheless, it was talking about

34:10

the rise of hearing the word douche on

34:12

TV because it's

34:14

just another like funny but slightly

34:17

taboo word that you can

34:19

say. And also the B word it's said all

34:22

the time. And that's on broadcast networks as

34:24

well. Well. It's almost like shows like that on those

34:26

networks find the safe curse words

34:28

that they can say and then just say them to death, and

34:30

so that almost has an effect itself.

34:33

I would think that like, okay, well,

34:35

you know, this four letter word isn't

34:37

nearly as offensive. It's more much more, you

34:39

know, soft and everything. So we can say this a hundred

34:41

times per episode. Well, and one thing

34:43

that might be becoming more publicized

34:46

through TV shows and what we're seeing reflected

34:50

on screen is the fact that a

34:52

lot of studies have found that

34:54

when women are talking to each other casually,

34:58

we curse more and we're filthy.

35:00

Yeah, we're totally healthy. And

35:02

we found a study called get this

35:05

Taboo, Language and Sex in the City.

35:07

Yes, there have been a number of studies

35:09

actually conducted on sex in the City, but

35:11

it found the most swearing when the

35:14

main characters Carrie, Samantha,

35:16

Charlotte, and Miranda, we're talking to each

35:19

other. But it was interesting that when they were

35:21

talking to male characters on the

35:23

show, the amount

35:25

of swearing went down and the euphemism use

35:27

went up. But male characters when they were talking

35:29

still to the to the gal pals,

35:33

we're cursing more directly.

35:37

Aren't imitating life? Sort of Yeah,

35:40

yeah, yeah, I mean, I'm I know that I'm like completely

35:43

disgusting and open with my girlfriends when we're

35:45

having a conversation about whatever, you know, I mean,

35:48

but I not wouldn't necessarily say the

35:50

same things to guy friends exactly.

35:53

Well, and I think that we're seeing too

35:56

that girlfriend type

35:58

of language being

36:00

reflected in publications

36:02

specifically targeting us

36:04

as millennial women. I mean, there was an entire

36:07

New York Times trend piece that came out in January

36:11

about the rise of profanity

36:13

in women's media. I mean, if you go, if

36:16

you look on any lady blog like

36:18

Jezebel or The Gloss or the

36:20

Hairpin, you're gonna see cursing

36:23

even in headlines. Yeah,

36:25

and you have my attitude, but as

36:27

someone who curses all the time, my

36:30

attitude about that is kind of like, that's

36:32

a little forced. Yeah, I feel like it can be

36:34

forced. I think that you have to keep in mind,

36:37

especially and this is just getting nerdy about

36:39

writing in literary preference, I do

36:41

think you have to keep in mind the power

36:43

element of cursing and the desensitizing

36:47

effect that it can have, to where it's like, don't

36:49

you want to save powerful

36:51

words for making

36:54

powerful statements? Yeah? And then it kind

36:56

of makes me look at what at the point they're

36:58

making overall and being like, what is

37:01

that? Why is that even needed? Right? You're not enhancing

37:04

it? And I mean I'm I am the last

37:06

person to make the claim about well, people

37:08

who use vulgar terms just obviously

37:11

have a poor vocabulary, because hello, let

37:13

me just read you my resume real quick. I have

37:15

a fine vocabulary, but I understand

37:18

the power of a well placed curse word, even

37:20

when I do fly off the handle and use them too much.

37:22

That being said, I think in in the

37:24

written word, in the world of the written

37:26

word, I

37:29

think it's okay to pull back a little. I don't think

37:31

we need to unleash the hounds, like every time

37:33

we write a blog about you know, cellulite,

37:35

right, I mean? And I can see how with

37:38

blogging in particular, there is a particularly

37:40

conversational voice that you're often

37:42

going for, where it's it's almost as

37:44

though the writer is speaking directly to you.

37:47

And I think there is some shock value

37:49

that some people try to employ.

37:52

By what I what we might think of

37:54

is overusing curse words. But even in

37:57

more mainstream publications like Cosmopolitan

37:59

Maggazine Marie Claire, you are

38:02

way likelier to see

38:05

curse words, not only within

38:07

the pages, but even on the cover. Yeah,

38:10

they might have a well placed asterisk or something,

38:12

but it's still I think they're pursuing. They

38:14

want to talk to their audience the same way

38:16

that their audience talks to one another. Yeah,

38:19

it was funny though. That New York Times piece was

38:22

called fifty Shades of Vulgarity,

38:24

to which some women our age wrote

38:26

response pieces being like New York

38:29

Times, of course we're cursing. But when

38:31

you as two people who went

38:33

to journalism school as we did, and

38:35

also reading the responses of editors

38:38

at these magazines, yet

38:40

it's kind of a big deal that they

38:42

are employing more profanity

38:45

because you wouldn't do that. They're letting their hair down

38:47

in the New York Times is just clutching its pearls.

38:50

It's right, I haven't New

38:52

York Times reaching for a scrunchee to put that

38:54

hair back up really quickly.

38:57

Um. But in our day to day conversation

38:59

too, there is still,

39:02

anecdotally at least this

39:05

debate over whether, if

39:08

you are at least a

39:11

straight woman, okay, whether

39:13

or not cursing all the time. It's gonna be a turn off

39:15

for guys. Yeah,

39:17

there was a lot of debate. One of the first UH

39:20

websites I stumbled across when I was searching for

39:22

just you know, gender women cursing all that stuff

39:24

was like this whole message board.

39:27

I don't even know what it was on, but this whole message board

39:29

where men were like, yeah, bro, you

39:31

know, like I'm a like a woman and she's

39:33

hot and then she's like curses all the time, and I'm just

39:35

like, oh, I don't have any respect for you to

39:38

which, yeah, I mean, I think I think that was

39:40

an AskMen dot com message

39:42

board, which there you go. Um,

39:46

But I was thinking about

39:48

this, and in

39:52

my previous dating

39:55

life, I did pay attention

39:57

to how much the guy

39:59

curse on dates and how comfortable

40:02

he was if I curse. And

40:05

I think honestly that if you

40:07

are a woman concerned about

40:09

your cursing behavior, kind of like take the power.

40:12

Because for me, if a guy flinched

40:14

when I dropped an F bomb, listen, I'm

40:16

not no, it wasn't a deal breaker,

40:18

but it usually was

40:21

indicative of maybe the fact that we were

40:23

in a match because I'm not gonna have to do

40:25

I don't want to have to watch my language right

40:27

around you. Now. I I dated a guy years ago

40:29

who was like, wow, you

40:33

kind of curse a lot, and I was like, Okay,

40:36

alright, sorry, a little sensitive guy. Don't

40:39

mean to insult your ears. See you later,

40:41

Yeah, I mean, and we're not trying

40:44

to, you know, blast men

40:46

for wanting ladylike language.

40:48

I don't think that this is, you know, something

40:51

that applies to all guys, but it is

40:53

something that still crops up

40:56

in at least heterosexual

40:58

dating dynamic. Yeah. I mean,

41:00

it's the conversation about gender and

41:03

and cursing. I mean, it's framed in so many

41:05

conversations, whether it's about dating or

41:08

like about work, which we've we've touched on. I

41:10

mean, like the question is still

41:12

being asked over and over again about

41:14

like is it okay for women to

41:16

curse ladies? We shouldn't curse. We

41:18

don't want to put man off. We don't want to anger our bosses

41:21

and the men in our labs. Yeah, I mean, and and

41:24

say over and over again that this is we're talking

41:26

about, like straight dating dynamics, because

41:28

I have a feeling that, as with other

41:31

issues like this where it's

41:33

a lot of gender norms and

41:35

scripts that are coming into play, that it might

41:37

not be as pertinent of an issue refreshingly

41:40

for LGBT dating. And

41:42

I would love to know if it is, And in that case

41:45

it probably is simply a matter of oh,

41:48

I don't curse a lot, you don't curse a lot,

41:50

cool, you know, like, rather than being a thing.

41:52

Well, but

41:55

in a more formal setting of

41:57

a workplace, this is where cursing

42:00

behavior gets a little dicier. Yeah.

42:03

I mean a lot of people, as

42:05

you would expect, argue that cursing in the workplace

42:08

is bad. It's wrong. It makes you

42:10

appear immature and hot headed.

42:13

Um that it can damage morale, damp

42:15

and respect um

42:18

even coaches. There was a study looking at coaches

42:20

talking to their teams, and

42:23

they were rated less effective by their

42:25

players if they cursed, particularly if those

42:27

players were girls. There's

42:29

just all of this talk about how cursing is the worst

42:32

thing you could possibly do, especially if you're a lady.

42:34

Yeah, because the workplace too. If

42:37

you want to put gender and

42:39

power dynamics under the microscope,

42:41

just walk into the office. Because

42:44

you know, while there are those assumptions

42:46

that maybe cursing might be bad, they're

42:48

also conflicting studies that have

42:50

found that cursing makes bosses

42:53

in particular more relatable,

42:55

it builds employee solidarity. Hey,

42:58

we can all blow off steam together by talking

43:00

about how this meeting is blanking

43:02

terrible. You know, it

43:05

probably was a terrible meeting. It probably was,

43:07

and even some speeches were

43:10

were rated to be more effective when the speaker

43:12

delivered a well placed or well timed

43:15

curse word. But again,

43:18

especially if you are in a leadership position

43:20

at work, your

43:22

amount of cursing and or the

43:24

acceptability of your cursing is gonna

43:27

be seen probably through a gendered lens,

43:29

where in, if you're

43:31

a woman, the penalty for cursing,

43:33

the negative penalty is probably gonna be stronger than if

43:35

you are a male boss. Right,

43:38

or in the case of former Yahoo CEO

43:40

Carol Bart's, the

43:43

use your use of a curse word could shape

43:45

how the entire world sees you, and in

43:47

an instant, Yeah, when she was

43:50

fired from her position as CEO,

43:53

she essentially made an F bomb

43:56

laced exit speech, which I remember hearing

43:58

about this on the news and I

44:00

thought it was kind of amazing. I

44:02

totally think it's amazing. When I was revisiting

44:05

all of that too for this episode, I was

44:07

like, God, I just want to give her

44:09

such a big high five, because

44:11

yeah, because she was now great, I can understand

44:13

why. Some people say, well, if you're overseeing a

44:15

company, you don't need to publicly be saying all

44:18

of these horrible words. But

44:21

yeah, I don't know. I mean, I think

44:24

this is a terrible comparison. But if it had been like

44:26

Donald Trump or somebody, everybody would have just rolled

44:28

their eyes and been like, there's that old man ranting

44:30

again. But instead it was like, she's

44:33

a woman and she's at the head of a company and she's saying

44:35

all this stuff. Obviously she's a B word. Well,

44:38

and she's angry. Yeah, scary,

44:40

Yeah, it's that danger element that who

44:43

was it? The loft Key brought

44:45

up um in terms of how

44:48

swearing for women has always been perceived

44:50

as dangerous because we're being

44:52

angry, right, women are not

44:54

allowed to express that. Men

44:56

can yell and they can throw their fists, but women

44:59

just have to, you know, you

45:01

cut their eyes over to you and roll their eyes.

45:03

We're not allowed to say anything. You can throw shade,

45:06

we just can't say it out loud. But

45:08

I mean, obviously, for any

45:10

cursing, no matter where you are, there's a time and a place,

45:13

um, And I think that should be it. I

45:15

don't think that it should be determined

45:18

by virtue of you being a man or

45:21

a woman. Yeah, I mean

45:24

it's it's it's

45:26

unfair if women are put at a

45:28

disadvantage for cursing over men, But

45:31

it is what it is, And so I guess it's helpful

45:33

to be aware. Well, it's always helpful

45:36

to be aware of how people perceive you. Yeah. So

45:38

with all of this research on

45:41

gender and power and swearing in history

45:43

and our brains in your

45:45

brain, Caroline, that has

45:47

this given you any pause at all about

45:50

your own cursing behavior?

45:53

Um it? Well, I

45:57

want to say that I'm going to try to

46:00

clean up my act a little, but

46:04

it's not going to be for fear

46:06

of like scaring someone.

46:09

I mean, I think it's worth it to pull back at work

46:11

a little, you know, when we're at

46:13

work, Um but

46:15

because I mean, you know, you don't really know who's around.

46:18

You don't know every single coworker,

46:20

and I mean the general you you don't know every single

46:22

coworker exceptionally well to

46:24

know whether or not you're offending that person. But

46:27

I mean, I just still it's like God,

46:29

when I'm in my car in Atlanta traffic

46:32

and I'm just screaming something, it just feels

46:34

right. Yeah. Yeah. I think

46:36

the one area where

46:38

I consistently want to do better

46:40

in terms of not cursing is

46:43

talking to my parents, because

46:45

by this point I have I

46:47

really enjoy the fact that we have an

46:49

open, you know, honest relationship.

46:53

But when I

46:55

go over there, maybe I've had a rough day. We're having dinner,

46:57

and I go off on a rant, and

47:00

it feels really good to say exactly what I'm

47:02

thinking. But then later I'm thinking, oh, they

47:04

must be horrified by their

47:06

dear daughter dropping

47:08

those heinous

47:10

phrases. And I will all get into

47:12

a stretch of like getting really stressed out and calling

47:15

my mother and she's like, oh, honey, what's going

47:17

on? And I will just unleash

47:20

like verbal, angry,

47:22

curse word laden vomit all over

47:24

her and be like, Okay, well I gotta go. I love

47:26

you back. It's like we just leave them with the mess,

47:29

like, okay, you clean it up. I feel so much better, thanks,

47:32

Oh Heaven, love you well.

47:35

Now I want to hear though from listeners

47:38

about this. What is your

47:40

stance on cursing? Do you are

47:42

you a woman who curses and and

47:45

doesn't see any problem with it? Guys, you

47:47

find it a turn off for

47:49

other women to curse. What

47:52

are your thoughts? Let us know them. Mom

47:54

Stuff discovery dot com is where you can send

47:56

your letters. And by the way, if you do use profanity

47:58

in the subject line, it will get

48:00

spam filtered out, and just keep that

48:02

in mind you might want to keep your letters clean. So

48:05

mom stuff at discovery dot com is where you can

48:07

email us. You can also tweet us

48:09

your thoughts at mom stuff podcast or send

48:11

us a Facebook message, and we have a couple

48:14

of messages to share with you right

48:16

now. Well,

48:20

I've gotta let her here. From Jessica about

48:22

our gender reveal party episode,

48:24

She writes, Hey, ladies,

48:26

I really liked your podcasts on gender revealed

48:28

parties. We had a reveal party in July for

48:31

our baby. We saw it as a fun way to

48:33

announce what we were having, but we also

48:35

had other motives. Throughout my pregnancy,

48:37

my mom and my mother in law have been strangely

48:39

competitive and jealous of one another. The

48:41

party was a way to ensure that everyone found out

48:43

the sex together in an attempt to be fair.

48:46

The things you hit on were definite concerns when planning

48:49

our party. The invitation said no gifts,

48:51

so no one felt they had to bring us a present.

48:54

I know the difference between sex and gender

48:56

being a graduate of a liberal women's

48:58

college. Sex or old party just

49:00

doesn't have the same ring to it. We

49:02

didn't have a cake, but instead we picked out two

49:04

outfits and had the store rapid correct one.

49:07

I'm glad we had everyone together because it was a special

49:09

moment, this baby being highly anticipated

49:11

as the first grandchild. That being said,

49:14

it did stress me out and make me wonder if it was really

49:16

worth all the trouble. I think it was, but probably

49:18

wouldn't have another party with future pregnancies.

49:20

Oh another interesting fact, my nine

49:23

pound one ounce baby girls movements

49:25

could never be described

49:27

as a delicate ballet, so that study

49:30

completely cracked me up. He's

49:33

Jessica, I know, I love that nine

49:35

pounds and I had a friend who just

49:37

gave birth to a ten pound baby. He looks

49:39

I mean, he looks like a toddler who just walked out of her

49:42

But anyway, um, okay, I have

49:44

a hilarious email from Jennifer

49:47

Um. Her seject line is very

49:49

straightforward. It is gender

49:51

revealed parties equal sign stupid.

49:54

So here we go. Jennifer. She says,

49:57

I'm a mom. Most of my friends are

50:00

ms. I love babies, my own,

50:02

my friends, nieces and nephews. I

50:04

love the baby who was gurgling at me in the grocery

50:06

store yesterday. He was really cute. I

50:09

have traveled long distances to

50:11

attend baby showers or visit new babies.

50:13

I bring food to new parents and lend my support

50:15

in any way I can. I use social media.

50:18

Gender reveal parties are

50:21

stupid. George Packer was right. They

50:23

reflected creeping narcissism in our society.

50:26

At the end of the day, no one outside of the immediate

50:28

family cares boy, girl, whatever. It's

50:30

just another excuse to be the center of attention.

50:33

Come to my house and cheer for me. I procreated

50:36

calm down people. And then Jennifer

50:38

has a smiley face. So thank

50:40

you for writing in and telling us just

50:43

what you think, Jennifer. We appreciate it, and

50:45

thanks to everybody who's written into us. Mom Stuff

50:47

at Discovery dot com is where you can send all

50:49

of your emails and if you want to find out all

50:51

of our other social media properties and

50:53

check out all of our podcast, blogs and

50:56

videos, there's one place to go. It's

50:58

stuff Mom never told you dot com

51:04

For more on this and thousands of other topics.

51:06

Isn't how stuff works dot com

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