"She was so nice she wouldn't say shit if she had a mouthful."

[timepiececlock]

In lingusitics today we got to talk about swearing, and I found a book I decided was absolutely vital to my reading future: cunt by Inga Muscio.

My teacher read the introduction to us, and as soon as I stepped out of the classroom I jotted over to the library (where I am now) and picked it out. It's a cute yellow book with a big pink flower in the middle and the word "cunt" in nice, easy-to-read bold letters. It's a history of the word and an anlysis on the social aspects of the word in this day and age. I think it sounds amusing, painful, and fascinating.

I remember the first (and only, for me) time a person has called me a cunt. Don't you?

Seventh grade. Stupid jerk of a boy (of course) behind me, can't remember his name. I didn't even know what the word meant, but whoa did he spit it out like it was the most vile thing to ever sneak past his lips. I shrugged it off and called him a motherfucker and braindead asshole shit.

Weirdly, I learned what the word "cunt" actually meant much later from reading letters in a Playboy magazine. I've never called another woman a cunt before; I'm always quicker to use the word bitch. Not out of thinking hard on the subject-- that's just the word I revert to if I swear at another female.

I wonder, why is it that cock, which is the crude equivalent of a male's anatomy, seems to have only sexual connotation and not the overall demeaning and derogatory accompaniment that cunt has for women?

If I called a guy a "cock!" he wouldn't think I was calling him the worst name I could think of. But at the moment, sitting here in the library computer lab, it is hard for me to think up a cruder and more offensive word for a woman than cunt being spouted at me by a man. More offensive combinations, perhaps.

Comments

[jidabug.livejournal.com]

The whole "cunt" thing is definitely a by-product of the long-standing connotation of all things female being somehow evil and sinister in our society. The word hysteria, for example, is derived from the Greek husterikos, from huster, womb (from the former idea that disturbances in the womb caused hysteria). Because, of course, women are the only ones who get all emotionally rampagey. /sarcasm

fear the woman!

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

a by-product of the long-standing connotation of all things female being somehow evil and sinister in our society.

Ye gads, have I noticed that growing up. Earlier in the year I sat down and was reading a child's book where each two-page set was a short lesson/fable, personified in images by animals. There were 14 short stories or lessons, 6 positive (where a person is rewarded for cleverness/proper behavior), and 8 negative (where a person was punished for poor behavior or some kind of logical/ethical mistake). Of the 14 lessons, only 5 included animals protagonists that were characterized as female, and those 5 were all negative lessons. Pissed me off like you wouldn't believe.

You can see things like that all the time, if you pay attention. I didn't know that about hysteria; that's interesting.

[mrthursday.livejournal.com]

I don't think anything is more offensive than the c word (yep I am all english I can't even type the word Cunt..opps!).
It's basicly got to boil down to male prejudice, the use of it as an insult. Is it not also conected to the idea that women are just sexual objects, so men call women Cunts to demean them as people?

Ok I am rambling now so I will stop. Personally, I never use the word.

Re:

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

Is it not also conected to the idea that women are just sexual objects, so men call women Cunts to demean them as people?

That's exactly what it is. If a guy calls a woman a cunt, he's saying "To the world you are nothing more than a walking hole men can stick their penises in, useful for nothing except man's sexual gratification and on top of that, you're dirty too."

Like I said, I only had that one kid call me that once in sixth grade. I don't think he really knew at the time the significance of it (I didn't), and was just using it as the strognest cuss word he could think of. Middle school boys are like that. Hell, everyone in middle school is like that.

Re:

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

ugh. seventh grade. stupid mistyping.

[eee1313.livejournal.com]

I remember in college we all sat around at a sex seminar thingy and the woman running it asked for slang terms for male genitalia. We had dozens upon dozens of them. Then she asked for slang terms for female genitalia, and we had maybe five. Of those, almost all were derogatory.

Because of that, some of the girls in my dorm and I started calling each other puta. (I think that's the spelling. I believe it's basically the Spanish equivalent of the word cunt.) And we used it happily, because if we called ourselves that, then big deal, because WE were using it the way we wanted. We even drew pictures of ourselves as superheroes and had our own names, like Super Puta, Brainy Puta, Jailbait Puta... We thought it was funny.

And I guess that's the whole thing. If, as women, we don't let the word affect us, and if WE take control over it, then it doesn't have power anymore. At least, that's my theory.

Re:

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

I have a sneaking suspicion that's what this book is about. Haven't read it yet, though. :)

[doyle_sb4.livejournal.com]

I remember the first (and only, for me) time a person has called me a cunt. Don't you?


Hmm. My best friend (a guy) calls me it from time to time when teasing me. Doesn't bother me any more than "bitch". Then again, it's not as horrifically thought of in the UK and Ireland as in the US (I know the director of American Beauty was bemused when four people walked out of the test screening after Mena Suvari's character called another girl a cunt.)

Re:

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

Hmm. My best friend (a guy) calls me it from time to time when teasing me. Doesn't bother me any more than "bitch".

I've used it a few times in playfulness, usually oneline with another girl/woman. I've never cursed a woman to her face with it. Like all hurtful terms it's different if the situation is one you choose, between friends or family, because then you've taken the negative connotation out of it.

[bathsweaver.livejournal.com]

You know, it's kinda funny--I went to an all-girls high school, so I never even heard that word until I was a freshman in college. When I finally *did*, it was in a class discussion of a poem, and I didn't have to slightest clue what it meant. Then I figured it out; but still, I remember thinking how weird it was that that word was so derogatory, yet had no significance to me whatsoever, as I hadn't ever known what it meant, and had learned of it in an academic setting, rather than on the street.

Of course, a few years later, when someone called me that while I was innocently walking down the street at uni, I had quite a different reaction.

Interesting sidenote: "cunt" used to be spelled with a "q" in the front, instead of a "c." So if you're ever reading Middle English, watch out for the "q"-words!

Re:

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

Interesting sidenote: "cunt" used to be spelled with a "q" in the front, instead of a "c." So if you're ever reading Middle English, watch out for the "q"-words!

Huh. I'll pay attention for that, thanks. :)

[lanieday.livejournal.com]

There are quite a few words that essentially describe male genitalia that are used to insult them. Dick and prick to name two. It's just that *generally* words carry more weight with women than they do men.

Cunt? The only time is does offend me is when it's used in a derogatory fashion and usually by men. I rather like using the word in fic(because some of the word people use are giggle inducing). And unfair or not, I'm a woman and I have one and I'm all about using the word. *g*