What Is Bad Language?

What is bad language? Different people will give different answers to this question, usually involving part of a theory, or maybe even just a list of bad words with no explanation.

One theory is that bad language is bad because people do not want to hear it. The reality is, though, that most people want to hear and use it. This is evidenced by the fact that people laugh at comedians instead of gasping at them. Only polite society, which is a minority, shuns bad language. It would follow that it is okay to use bad language in the right crowd. According to this theory, the reason why some people do not want to hear bad language is that their feelings are based on an arbitrary decision by society.

According to this theory if society as a whole was to accept all language as okay, there would be no bad language. This is because according to this theory the badness of bad language is based on what people think of it.

Another theory is that the badness of bad language comes from its meaning. To explain, bad language is language whose use does not match its official meaning. This is why “ass” was considered bad; its official meaning was donkey and it is used to mean butt. It is becoming more accepted because its new definition is slowly becoming more accepted, which results in the word no longer being used in a bad way.

To put it another way, bad language is language that does not communicate an idea that comes from the language itself. This is bad because the language itself is not fulfilling its purpose, which is to communicate ideas. In other words, when bad language is used, the meaning of what is said does not come from the meaning of the words used; it is implied from the situation and the fact that something was said. The words themselves carry no meaning, and are therefore thought of as empty.

Also part of this theory are bad words. Bad words are words that have been used in a bad way so much that their actual meaning has diminished in value. This means that even when they are used in what would normally be considered a good way, they are still bad.

One consequence of this theory is that the badness of using God’s name in vain can be explained. The most common application of using God’s name in vain is the phrase “Oh my God.” The reason that using God’s name in vain could be considered wrong, aside from being in the Ten Commandments, is that one is using God’s name in bad language, which in theory affects the value of His name similarly to how it affects the value of the meaning of normal words.

Another consequence of this theory is that people sometimes use bad language without realizing it. This is because according to this theory the badness of bad language is based on what it means, not on what people think of it.

One obvious difference between these two theories is why bad language is considered bad: becuase people do not want to hear it and because the language is not fulfilling its purpose. However, the most important difference and what will decide which theory a person agrees with is how language should be chosen to be considered bad. In other words, it is whether and which criterions are needed to consider language bad.