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> Swearing is a strong tool. Mr. Holman has a lot of growing up to do. Don't swear in a professional conversation, specially in front of an audience. It's unbe

> Swearing is a strong tool. Mr. Holman has a lot of growing up to do. Don't swear in a professional conversation, specially in front of an audience. It's unbecoming of yourself and an insult to the listener who took the time out of their day to listen.

sp332 15y ago
Expletives are an expression of strong emotion. What other tools do you use, to replace swearing without sacrificing expressiveness?
- SoftwareMaven 15y ago
  The English language is full of a lot of words (over a quarter million, in fact). When somebody says "this is f-ing useless" in a presentation, I think it is lazy. Somewhere in those hundreds of thousands of words are words that express the what and why of the afore mentioned frustration; and that person had the time to look them up before the presentation.
  - ugh 15y ago
    But why specifically should swearing be taboo? I don’t understand the reasoning behind that.
    - itguy1 15y ago
      It isn't necessarily the swearing, but the stupidity of using the word. A person may as well say "This software is acrylic useless" The swear word used has absolutely no place in the sentence, the definition of the word is what makes it useful, not the "shock" value.
  - mirkules 15y ago
    Indeed, the problem is that the f-word, in your example, is a purposefully vague adjective to add shock value without working hard to captivate the audience and add meaning. "Lazy" was a great word for that.
  - fbuilesv 15y ago
    Take the phrase: "This piece of software is fucking useless". What word would you replace "fucking" with that conveys the same emotion, despair and rage that the word has in that sentence? I'm not a native speaker so my vocabulary is pretty limited, but I don't remember coming across a word that would help me express that feeling.
    - cscheid 15y ago
      You can replace it with descriptive words: "This piece of software is as useful as wings on Shamu" "This piece of software makes me want to skewer needles up my thumbs for a relaxing break." etc. There is value in shock. The problem with profanity is that it it only shocks whoever is not used to reading it (and in public writing it's hard to tell who is and who is not).
      - burgerbrain 15y ago
        I am unconvinced. Whales like to jump, surely Shamu would rather like to have wings, and the second is a great deal more distressing to me than just a silly little word could possibly be. I don't think either of these are an improvement upon the first at all. Judging by this entire tizzy HN has worked itself into, I'd say profanity doesn't run the risk of running out of "shock potential" anytime soon.
        __david__ 15y ago
        It'll shock people, but it's still a cheap shock. The 2 example the grandfather post gave weren't great, but I think that in itself is the issue--coming up with effective emotional charged speech without using profanity is difficult, but completely possible. It takes work! And I think that is what a lot of people here are saying--cussing is cheap and lazy. And so it's offensive not because the actual words are offensive, but because the writer is clearly not putting any effort into their writing.
        burgerbrain 15y ago
        I still do not understand how this argument works. Why is it that people only seem to be offended at mediocre vocabulary when 'profanity' is involved? If, as you state, emotionally charged speech without profanity is difficult, why should we become offended when people are unable to achieve it? I don't think anybody goes to technical talks to appreciate high grade word-smithing. I honestly believe this is an instance of generally rational people becoming offended for a reason they don't quite understand, and inventing a theory to explain the data.
  - burgerbrain 15y ago
    Unless you register offense when people use unimaginative vocabulary in their presentations in the general case, then I do not believe that this is really your primary concern with so called 'profanity'
- anjc 15y ago
  Lots of things can be an expression of strong emotion...but swearing is often an expression of frustration. It's not professional, it's not cool, and in the wrong context it's childish. I swear every day, in the right contexts.
  - burgerbrain 15y ago
    Regardless of how it is often used (and I would disagree with your assertion in this case), if you're not using it as an expression of frustration in the presentation, it's completely fine.
    - anjc 15y ago
      I guess that depends on whether you want it to be ambiguous about whether you're frustrated or not.
      - burgerbrain 15y ago
        If I said "Node.js is fucking awesome", would my meaning be ambiguous?
        anjc 15y ago
        It's unambiguous that you're enthusiastic about node.js, it's ambiguous about whether you're able to express it well or not without cursing and are therefore frustrated.
        burgerbrain 15y ago
        There really must be some sort of cultural difference here. If I heard that phrase in a presentation and the presenter wasn't displaying signs of agitation, it would never cross my mind that they might be frustrated. And if they were displaying signs of agitation, I would likely suspect them of being frustrated regardless of the words used.
burgerbrain 15y ago
Why would it be an insult to your audience? Edit: To respond to both of you and not be repetitive, I would like to refer both of you to the comment that I have made here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3217649 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3217649
- nathanb 15y ago
  I can't answer for jsavimbi, but I think it insults the audience because it takes the easy way out. It would be like not proofreading your slides and showing up with typos or txt abbrs rather than well-thought out phrases. Swearing works in private conversation for the same reason that other slang and spoken shortcuts work, and it works in casual written conversation for the same reason that abbreviations, shorthand, and inattention to capitalization, spelling, and punctuation work: there's no real expectation of quality. Sure it's lazy and shows a lack of caring, but if a friend is shooting me an email to ask if I'm up for Thai tonight, I don't expect her to proofread and capitalize before sending. That's an appropriate amount of effort for the situation. If you're putting that much effort into a presentation to someone you hope will give you money, however, that's just plain rude. (Some folks, and I suspect this is true for HN commenters at a much higher proportion than it is true for the general population, prefer to spend the time on all communication, regardless of formality or venue, to make it decent. I believe this is a good habit to cultivate, but I don't insist upon it in others).
- jsavimbi 15y ago
  It's an insult to pepper your audience with profanity when they took the time out of their day to pay attention to what you had to share. It shows that you did not take the time to properly prepare and present your arguments. It shows that you are immature. It shows that you have a complete and total disregard for even the most basic of social forums. And it shows that Mr. Holman is so self-absorbed that when confronted with what in polite society is considered ill-mannered and poorly timed swearing in a presentation, he doubled down and bereft of supervision decided to lecture the audience even further as to why he was entitled to swear at them. In a time of crisis, some swearing is appropriate to convey urgency to the listener. At a nerd meetup? Hardly.
yesimahuman 15y ago
I consider myself part of his audience (as a github customer) and didn't find it notable until this whole thing got blown out of proportion.
- jsavimbi 15y ago
  > didn't find it notable Exactly, and neither did I, as a Github customer. As a matter of fact, I've probably used one or two of his arguments in the past and not thought twice about it because a) I'm experienced enough to know when and where to use profanity if I so desire, and most importantly, b) I'm experienced enough to know not to cause, enable or further fuel a situation where I cannot win no matter the logic employed. This is where Holman lets the developer community down: justifying and promoting his unacceptable behavior in order to self-promote a fake persona. That alone implies a total disregard for his audience and alerts me to the fact that aside from colorful language, he isn't that bright.

sp332 15y ago

Expletives are an expression of strong emotion. What other tools do you use, to replace swearing without sacrificing expressiveness?

SoftwareMaven 15y ago
The English language is full of a lot of words (over a quarter million, in fact). When somebody says "this is f-ing useless" in a presentation, I think it is lazy. Somewhere in those hundreds of thousands of words are words that express the what and why of the afore mentioned frustration; and that person had the time to look them up before the presentation.
- ugh 15y ago
  But why specifically should swearing be taboo? I don’t understand the reasoning behind that.
  - itguy1 15y ago
    It isn't necessarily the swearing, but the stupidity of using the word. A person may as well say "This software is acrylic useless" The swear word used has absolutely no place in the sentence, the definition of the word is what makes it useful, not the "shock" value.
- mirkules 15y ago
  Indeed, the problem is that the f-word, in your example, is a purposefully vague adjective to add shock value without working hard to captivate the audience and add meaning. "Lazy" was a great word for that.
- fbuilesv 15y ago
  Take the phrase: "This piece of software is fucking useless". What word would you replace "fucking" with that conveys the same emotion, despair and rage that the word has in that sentence? I'm not a native speaker so my vocabulary is pretty limited, but I don't remember coming across a word that would help me express that feeling.
  - cscheid 15y ago
    You can replace it with descriptive words: "This piece of software is as useful as wings on Shamu" "This piece of software makes me want to skewer needles up my thumbs for a relaxing break." etc. There is value in shock. The problem with profanity is that it it only shocks whoever is not used to reading it (and in public writing it's hard to tell who is and who is not).
    - burgerbrain 15y ago
      I am unconvinced. Whales like to jump, surely Shamu would rather like to have wings, and the second is a great deal more distressing to me than just a silly little word could possibly be. I don't think either of these are an improvement upon the first at all. Judging by this entire tizzy HN has worked itself into, I'd say profanity doesn't run the risk of running out of "shock potential" anytime soon.
      - __david__ 15y ago
        It'll shock people, but it's still a cheap shock. The 2 example the grandfather post gave weren't great, but I think that in itself is the issue--coming up with effective emotional charged speech without using profanity is difficult, but completely possible. It takes work! And I think that is what a lot of people here are saying--cussing is cheap and lazy. And so it's offensive not because the actual words are offensive, but because the writer is clearly not putting any effort into their writing.
        burgerbrain 15y ago
        I still do not understand how this argument works. Why is it that people only seem to be offended at mediocre vocabulary when 'profanity' is involved? If, as you state, emotionally charged speech without profanity is difficult, why should we become offended when people are unable to achieve it? I don't think anybody goes to technical talks to appreciate high grade word-smithing. I honestly believe this is an instance of generally rational people becoming offended for a reason they don't quite understand, and inventing a theory to explain the data.
- burgerbrain 15y ago
  Unless you register offense when people use unimaginative vocabulary in their presentations in the general case, then I do not believe that this is really your primary concern with so called 'profanity'
anjc 15y ago
Lots of things can be an expression of strong emotion...but swearing is often an expression of frustration. It's not professional, it's not cool, and in the wrong context it's childish. I swear every day, in the right contexts.
- burgerbrain 15y ago
  Regardless of how it is often used (and I would disagree with your assertion in this case), if you're not using it as an expression of frustration in the presentation, it's completely fine.
  - anjc 15y ago
    I guess that depends on whether you want it to be ambiguous about whether you're frustrated or not.
    - burgerbrain 15y ago
      If I said "Node.js is fucking awesome", would my meaning be ambiguous?
      - anjc 15y ago
        It's unambiguous that you're enthusiastic about node.js, it's ambiguous about whether you're able to express it well or not without cursing and are therefore frustrated.
        burgerbrain 15y ago
        There really must be some sort of cultural difference here. If I heard that phrase in a presentation and the presenter wasn't displaying signs of agitation, it would never cross my mind that they might be frustrated. And if they were displaying signs of agitation, I would likely suspect them of being frustrated regardless of the words used.

burgerbrain 15y ago

Why would it be an insult to your audience? Edit: To respond to both of you and not be repetitive, I would like to refer both of you to the comment that I have made here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3217649 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3217649

nathanb 15y ago
I can't answer for jsavimbi, but I think it insults the audience because it takes the easy way out. It would be like not proofreading your slides and showing up with typos or txt abbrs rather than well-thought out phrases. Swearing works in private conversation for the same reason that other slang and spoken shortcuts work, and it works in casual written conversation for the same reason that abbreviations, shorthand, and inattention to capitalization, spelling, and punctuation work: there's no real expectation of quality. Sure it's lazy and shows a lack of caring, but if a friend is shooting me an email to ask if I'm up for Thai tonight, I don't expect her to proofread and capitalize before sending. That's an appropriate amount of effort for the situation. If you're putting that much effort into a presentation to someone you hope will give you money, however, that's just plain rude. (Some folks, and I suspect this is true for HN commenters at a much higher proportion than it is true for the general population, prefer to spend the time on all communication, regardless of formality or venue, to make it decent. I believe this is a good habit to cultivate, but I don't insist upon it in others).
jsavimbi 15y ago
It's an insult to pepper your audience with profanity when they took the time out of their day to pay attention to what you had to share. It shows that you did not take the time to properly prepare and present your arguments. It shows that you are immature. It shows that you have a complete and total disregard for even the most basic of social forums. And it shows that Mr. Holman is so self-absorbed that when confronted with what in polite society is considered ill-mannered and poorly timed swearing in a presentation, he doubled down and bereft of supervision decided to lecture the audience even further as to why he was entitled to swear at them. In a time of crisis, some swearing is appropriate to convey urgency to the listener. At a nerd meetup? Hardly.

yesimahuman 15y ago

I consider myself part of his audience (as a github customer) and didn't find it notable until this whole thing got blown out of proportion.

jsavimbi 15y ago
> didn't find it notable Exactly, and neither did I, as a Github customer. As a matter of fact, I've probably used one or two of his arguments in the past and not thought twice about it because a) I'm experienced enough to know when and where to use profanity if I so desire, and most importantly, b) I'm experienced enough to know not to cause, enable or further fuel a situation where I cannot win no matter the logic employed. This is where Holman lets the developer community down: justifying and promoting his unacceptable behavior in order to self-promote a fake persona. That alone implies a total disregard for his audience and alerts me to the fact that aside from colorful language, he isn't that bright.