Why do we have words that we “aren’t supposed to say”? What decides what makes a swear word a bad word?
It can’t be meaning, because “poop” is fine and
“shit” is not. Or “sex” or “ruin” is fine, but “fuck” is not.
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It’s just the way language has evolved.
Swearing in the Middle Ages was just taking an oath to God in vain. So things like “On God’s Bones” and “By God’s Wounds” were the worst things you could say.
A lot of the swear words we use today were once common usage for certain things. But due to the Victorian mindset, these words were offensive and crude to use in public usage.
Some words started out as innocent terms for things but then people started using them as insults.
Bitch and Ass were the proper term for a female dog and donkey. However, people would use those words to compare people to those animals.
Shit originally meant diarrhea. Later on it would mean all sorts of poop and someone who is despicable. Men flung around the word shit as an insult all the time.
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