Oh dearest me. How I pine fondly for the days of yesteryear when polemical, vitriolic, diatribes were offered with wit, charm, a sweet dash of sorghum, and a tad of sarcasm. The days when a mindful and clever response to such an affront would be seen by the upper class and the classless, the educated and the illiterate, the Kings and the jesters as a delightful touché.
My sole gentle soul yearns for the days when a curmudgeonly recipient of such mental sharpness would recognize the tongue in one’s cheek. The days when insults and dubious expressions were presented with a considered array of fan and flury yet would not end a worthy exchange of human verbal dribble. The days when dexterous lingual surprises were met with suitable intellectual ability and emotional stability to maintain tasteful human connections.
I have been around longer than forever. Sweary acronyms and initialisms have been around a long while too. However, I’ve learned when it comes to humans — it is often just another SNAFU¹.
Some of my memorable summers were spent in Strafford and London to assist the prolific Jacobean writer, the Bard of Avon, the great William Shakespeare (anagram for “I am a weakish speller”), where he penned hundreds of brilliant, witty barbs often repeated with joyful jolly by those who heard them. Here’s a small sample of my favorites:
“Thou art a base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited, hundred-pound, filthy worsted-stocking knave; a lily-liver’d, action-taking, whoreson, glass-gazing, superserviceable, finical rogue; one-trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a bawd in way of good service, and art nothing but the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pandar, and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch.” (King Lear, Act 2, Scene 2)
“Thou art a boil, a plague sore, an embossed carbuncle in my corrupted blood.” (King Lear, Act 2, Scene 4)
“If you spend word for word with me, I shall make your wit bankrupt.” (Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act 2, Scene 4)
“Your brain is as dry as the remainder biscuit after voyage. (As You Like It, Act 2, Scene 7)
“You are as a candle, the better burnt out.” (Henry IV Part 2, Act 1, Scene 2)
These “21st Century” humans seem giddy when they accelerate an unfortunate degradation of effective human communication evident by the charge some humans believe “bad letters” stifle the overbearing, pedant, sneering recipient of “bad letters”. This lamentable conundrum remains a self-imposed human obstacle to collaborative progress.
Are you familiar with the expression, “There are no bad words only bad letters”? If not, wait for it. Soon to be the howling rage amongst the fragile, timid, and indignant humans who would quit a conversation because “bad letters” were used rather than stay on point to seek reconciliation.
WTF² Humans‽‽
I remain astonished. WTAF³ is wrong with the GD⁴ MF⁵ humans? And by “human” I mean the English-speaking kind. Mostly the overly sensitve, ineffectual, pseudointellectual Americans who get tongue tied trying to put a meaningful sentence together on a visit to the laundermat while they salivate for another opportunity to display self-righteous indignation. The type of human who claims they’re “woke” but can’t take a joke. The easily frightened human who believe their time on Earth is horribly unpleasant because things do not go their way. The type of human who fights to change the world but not themselves. The zombified somnambulists who see injustices everywhere even though foggy eyes. You know, the sample of humans in America the Canter Poll⁶ says are increasing in number faster than the population of Gwagwalada.
Even I (the one, the only, God of Imagination) cannot fathom how the popular Roman letters A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Z and sometimes Y are deemed offensive by the unenlightened.
It is clear some humans still do not know what WTF references. Other humans understand what WTF references and are grateful for using only the letters. There are other humans who don’t understand why the letters WTF need to be used instead of the actual words. There are other humans who are offended by the letters and their usage.
So, my dearest and lovely Mistakes, letters that replace English words deemed offensive by some humans are now offensive too? OMFG⁷? Get over yourselves for God’s sake. WTF is a harmless expression. The thoughts and messages accompanying the letterful expression are what matter.
Remember the Wisconsin Tourism Federation? These folks thought their initials WTF were not suitable for tourism. I disagreed. I told them it could be turned into a marketing coup! Since humans rarely heed my suggestions the folks at the Wisconsin Tourism Federation changed their name to the Tourism Federation of Wisconsin. Quite cheesy, I’d say.
I once hoped for a common-sense approach to the English language that included entertainingly, witty use of grammar, syntax, spelling, phraseology, character, subject, and tone; without opposing petulance by juvenile self-appointed judges of effective communicative standards who seek the punitive for the speaker. My hope for levity within invectives amongst the humans is greatly diminished by the sense and insensibilities of the few. Typically FUBAR⁸.
Well, WTF is one of my favorite American human expressions. Right up there with Jesus H. Christ and Holy S(***)⁹. Dubs TEEEE eff! Nothing Romeo would say, I’m sure.
I am aware the letters used are matters of personal preference. I am not fond of the C-letter or the N-letter. But, WTF remains a favorite of mine! If only the low-key and high-strung would accept Earth is a small place where the shanannagins are usually not about you.
I’m not encouraging a careless disregard for situational decency nor do I wish to minimize the significance of eloquent civil discourse. But when the recipient terminates a dialog because WTF or other renowned initialisms showed their serifs, the problem is with the recipient not the speaker.
To communicate, one must be able to speak with an ability understand the topic and stay on topic. Effective communication seeks reconciliation. One can not effectively communicate when one must tip-toe around the ultrasensitive because they feel another offense coming their way they prefer did not exist.
WTF should not be an impediment to dialog. To those who champion the disuse of “bad letters” may I offer an oberservation going back as far as the beginning of human fancy? Please remove your heads from your blind spots, loosen up, and let life pass through you. Still, it remains your choice when to meet the challenges of life as a brick wall, a gentle filter, or neither.
The rapidity by which humans are devolving into their prideful “Cancel Culture” will eventually yield the cancellation of humans themselves!
I used to spit tabacky. Can’t do that anymore. Why? It’s disgusting!
Oh dearest me. Too many humans have yet to cross the longest yard — the slave prison of their own mind.
There are oodles of people who believe they are good yet suffer a deep “Woe is me” misery because they have good intentions but dopey actions.
Huffy puffy indignation is a feeling born from a troubled mind regarding unfair treatment, blameworthy attributions, and a violation of percieved social norms. One purpose of indignation is to help aghast humans feel good about themselves. It provides the toe-tapping, hands on hip, nose in the air folks an imaginary lofty perch from where their sense of moral superiority may rest. It is facinating to watch how something as simple as a few spicy letters can create an intense emotional state of mind which leads to unpleasnt reactive indignation. To wallow with indignation over preferable reconciliation is a crooked path toward the declination of humans willfully serving humans. There is no trophy for those who suffer most.
However, there is an abundance of affrontation within the human creation that beg for human service. “Bad letters” is not one of them.
I am hopeful more humans will enbrace acceptance, understanding, celebration, camaraderie, trust, and a desire to be of service to the rest. Always remember, you fail when you quit. Rumors suggest some actually learn from this.
Your one precious life. What will you do with your one precious life? Will calmness, forbearance, and patience triumph over annoying, acrimonious, aggrevation? Will indignation, anger, and a troubled mind give way to kindness, understanding, and love? The time is now to recognize joyful gratitude that is yours as you pass through life. Especially, if you are one of those kind and effortful souls reading another of my silly little rants. Anyway, it is up to the humans to decide how much exasperating indignation you wish to endure.
I’ll end this wary numenesque rant with another quote from one of my preferred humans, you know, the great Bard himself, “For there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” – Hamlet: Act II, scene 2.
FWIWTFGN¹⁰.
Struggling with BLII, “Bad Letter” Induced Indignation? Call: 1 (800) 555- WTAF (9823)
NOTES:
1. Situation Normal All Fucked Up
2. What The Fuck
3. What The Actual Fuck
4. God Damn
5. Mother Fucking
6. Predates Gallup
7. Oh My Fucking God
8. Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition
9. Censored
10. For What It’s Worth Time For God’s Nap
Got rants? Please direct them to this human: Ken Hurley at Kenhurley88@gmail.com
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