Question for the UK

is anyone here from the UK? i need to verify an argument w/ my sister that words "hell" & "damn" are not swears in UK. Australia (etc).

This thread seems more like Yack Fest material to me. Moving...

If you want an example of a British person using "Hell" in a way that is not intended as a curse (but is used as an interjection,) you could find Queen's No one but You (Only the good die Young). It contains these lines:

edited 8th Jul '12 6:16:36 PM by BestOf

Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.

'Hell' and 'damn' are to us as 'heck' and 'darn' are to Americans.

'Heck' and 'Darn' are to us...er...silly words that nobody uses.

'All he needs is for somebody to throw handgrenades at him for the rest of his life...'

Actually Heck and darn are mostly just used by 5 year olds for us as well,I'd say Bloody is a better example.

Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter

Hell and damn are punctuation to most non-highly-religious Canadians, as well.

Anyone under 35 won't blink at anything stronger, either.

Except for one particular word...

"Lock up your girlfriends, lock up your wives, Grim's on the loose so run for your lives." - Pyrite

"Hell" and "Damn" are swear words? Where? Since when?

And let us pray that come it may (As come it will for a' that)

Yeah, hell and damn aren't really swear words here. Neither is bloody.

Be not afraid...

Would you say those words match the level of "stupid", "idiot", or "dumb"?

"Hell" isn't really a swear word, and neither is "Damn".

They're more expressions that you use when something goes wrong, or when you're shocked. Like in Harry Potter, "Bloody hell" is used a lot.

ಠ_ಠ

Hell and Damn are my polite swears, when I'm in public.

When I'm at home, they're my commas.

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"Hell" and "damn" haven't been hard swear words since the 1700s, or thereabouts. "bloody hell" is seen as a mild term. Saying "bloody hell" during class would get you a raised eyebrow from the teacher, but nothing would happen to you.

My parents would tell me off for using "bloody hell" when I was younger, but it's nevertheless rather mild.

"Damn" is of course technically swearing, but milder still.

With cannon shot and gun blast smash the alien. With laser beam and searing plasma scatter the alien to the stars.

I find it amusing/surprising that the US is the only place where it's not okay to use "hell" and "damn".

I also find such that "ass" and "arse" have reverse strongness (for lack of a better word) between the US and the UK.

Uh only the Deep South won't use hell casually,....and everyone except five year olds will say damn,it's everywhere.

But yeah the ass,arse thing is a bit odd,I try to avoid both,but then again I try not curse too much anyway.

Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter

I remember in Elementary school the teacher told me not to use hell once.

ᐅᖃᐅᓯᖅ ᐊᑕᐅᓯᖅ ᓈᒻᒪᔪᐃᑦᑐᖅ

Technically, they're swear words, but they're not particularly strong swear words for people above the age of 10.

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Uh...strength?

'All he needs is for somebody to throw handgrenades at him for the rest of his life...'

Strongness is a better word!

But, yeah, they're not really swears for the most part. Sure, the "think of the children" crowd thinks they are, but they're the kind who would make the swear jar a law.

edited 9th Jul '12 11:38:09 PM by Malph

So, in the U.S., randomly stripping is a signal that you want to sing the national anthem? - That Human

Don't get too fancy.

Programming and surgery have a lot of things in common: Don't start removing colons until you know what you're doing.

Pffft. I'd have to set up a Swear Savings Account.

'All he needs is for somebody to throw handgrenades at him for the rest of his life...'

I'd be bankrupt within the fucking day.

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Y'know, if there ever is a censorship of swearing law passed, I'm gonna feel so smug, since I never curse (nothing stronger than "bastard" or "ass", and even those I use extremely rarely), and it'd be funny to see people who curse all the time trying to keep themselves from cursing

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'Bastard' is medium-strength swearword, on a par with 'crap', I'd say.

'All he needs is for somebody to throw handgrenades at him for the rest of his life...'

I dunno, I always saw "crap" as much weaker. Especially considering how Nickelodeon cartoons were able to get away with it.

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@"strength": I was thinking about "intensity" but even then, I don't know if that's the right word.

@terlwyth: Er, I guess I'm basing this off TV, where programming for kids doesn't usually involve even the mildest swear words (unless you're watching, like, Gargoyles or The Mysterious Cities Of Gold), in that if it's not on TV, it's probably not allowed... or something.