: Re: Swearing in a book, within a context. Too offensive? I am currently writing a science fiction novel. The characters are almost uniformly pirates and/or miners in the asteroid belt. Having worked

@Annie587

People have brought up this question in several other writer's forums that I've been on. From all the answers posted here, apparently the question interests many writers.

Whenever I hear the question, I always think of a comment I once read from film critic Michael Medved. He said, "I've never heard anyone say, That could have been a good movie, but they just didn't use the F word enough." (Not necessarily an exact quote -- I'm quoting from memory.)

That is: What's the downside to using swear words? Some number of potential readers will not want to read your book. You will lose some share of your potential audience.

What's the upside? It may add some realism.

One could certainly imagine a story that sanitizes language to the point that it is completely unbelievable. Suppose you have a story where the vicious drug dealer discovers that one of the members of his gang has sold him out to the police or a rival gang. And he confronts the man and says, "You silly person! Why are you so mean to me?" Obviously that would not be very believable. In real life he would almost surely use a string of profanity. But still, if in a book or movie such a character said, "You moron! You're gonna die for this!", it wouldn't sound unbelievable. How many members of the audience would really be thinking to themselves, Whoa, wouldn't he have used the F word at least once in that sentence? Very few, I'd think.

Personally, I don't like vulgar language. I hear it from my co-workers every day, and more and more I hear it on television every day, so it's not like when I hear a bad word I turn red and faint. But I don't like it. If I'm reading a book or watching a movie that I find interesting, and every now and then a character uses a vulgar word in contexts where people really would, I put up with it. But when I start reading a book and every third word is a vulgarity, I generally throw the book away and read something else. I consider vulgarity unpleasant and I'm not going to subject myself to it when I am seeking entertainment. I have to put up with it when dealing with people at work, but I don't have to put up with it when reading a novel. So I don't.

Obviously, there are people who are not offended by vulgar language, or who are more willing to tolerate it.

But this takes us back to Mr Medved's comment: How many people will decide they don't want to read a book because it contains too much vulgar language? Many. How many people will decide they don't want to read a book because it doesn't contain enough vulgar language? Very few. Some might say, "This is just too unrealistic, nobody I know talks like that." But I think that's a tiny minority.

So in my humble opinion, you're better off using little or no vulgarity.

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