I don't give a fuck about swearing, but it does make me sad that it'll discourage parents from letting their kids watch Star Trek.
Swearing in Star Trek - Steve Shives
- Thread starter Tuskin38
- Start date
In the few instances it has occurred I found it very jarring. Fuck just isn't part of the language of Star Trek for me. I understand that Patrick Stewart was unsettled as well. To some degree I consider it's most egregious use (in Picard) to have been lazy.
I'd add that I myself swear like a trooper. I just don't think people in Star Trek should.
I'd add that I myself swear like a trooper. I just don't think people in Star Trek should.
Starfleet brass is the epitome of sheer fucking hubris in every major decision they make.
What parents? Seriously, I work with many parents and most kids I know have heard it from various video games.
What harm can hearing swear words possibly do to a kid? Sooner or later they'll learn then anyway, no matter what people do to prevent it. Short of locking them up in a cave, there is nothing you can do about it.
Going back to TOS films and Kirk talking about "Klingon bastards" - now for me in the context it is a perfectly understandable thing to call them but would this qualify as being outside of the language of Trek?
If I remember rightly Ent was the first series to have regular swearing in its episodes - Trip loved to say "son of a bitch" - and I guess with it being closer to our time it is meant to show them as a bit more rough and ready.
The only swearing in Trek that has ever felt uncomfortable for me was Jake saying the N word in "Far Beyond The Stars" as I was a child when I first heard it (BBC2 in the 90s apparently didn't clock it.
Even that usage though makes sense to me due to the setting of the episode, Jake's role in the episode, and the fact it was meant to make people uncomfortable.
Now someone further up the thread tried to conflate the use of fuck and shit vs the n word. There is a reason fuck and shit are used more and it isn't a bad thing
I think it's all relative. Back in the day 'Klingon bastard' was, I think, of a similar level to 'Shut the fuck up' today. We've all grown more used to swearing as the world keeps turning, rightly or wrongly. Is the world a worse place because things like swearing has become more commonplace or is it the other way round? Is the world even a worse place? My kids don't think so just like I didn't think so when my folks told me it was....
In culture/world where globalisation means crossing the channel to invade France or going up North to invade Scotland, then yeah, in a universe where 'globalisation' means living in Paris and getting the transport or shuttle to meet your internet date in Lagos four times a week, then probably not.
Absolutely and all taken onboard.
In the case of 'Klingon Bastard', it works because we are seeing the usually unflappable Kirk lose his shit a little.
Tilly swearing in Discovery was like a persistent fart in an elevator. There was no need for it and essentially we received an F-Bomb for a cheap gag. What's worse, a gag that isn't even all that funny, if at all.
I know for some, they are upset because they feel the Star Trek Utopia is damaged by cussing. For me, it's different. It's much like (and this will go over the heads of many on here) when Virgin started publishing adult Doctor Who novels in the early nineties and peppered them with sexual content and explicit language. Or, again to use Doctor Who, the first few seasons of Torchwood. Swearing in an attempt to look edgy and adult can backfire and make that same thing seem trite.
Would the scene in The Search for Spock work if Kirk said "You Klingon Blinder, you killed my son!"? Absolutely not. Would the scenes in Discovery or Picard work as well without the F-Bombs? Absolutely they would. It's why I think of it as 'shock' writing, not because swearing in itself is inherently shocking to me, but more because as I said, 'Fuck' has never been part of the vocabulary of the show. It survived without it for 50+ years. God, the crew of the Discovery go through Hell and don't resort to it ever aside from when we need a cheap laugh.
That's fair mate.
I think, the way I perceived it at least, with Tilly they were trying to get across how young, impressionable, raw she was and the shock on people's faces was meant to be because they couldn't imagine this nervy kid saying it like that.
The presumption given to us in Star Trek IV is that swearing is just not a common occurrence in Starfleet and an oddity to Starfleet officers that they generally only encounter in ancient literature.
Thus, Tilly swearing in the 23rd century and the response to it makes absolute, complete sense. It was exuberance meant for shock value, not to us, but to Stamets and the others around her. They were surprised to hear the word, not just because she was some "nerdy girl" (oy vey), but more importantly, it's not something they expect from anyone.
The reasoning for swearing in STPicard points to a cultural shift, not just in language over 100 years, but also in setting, with Picard on the real frontier with real frontiersman, and adapting their mannerisms.
Thus, Tilly swearing in the 23rd century and the response to it makes absolute, complete sense. It was exuberance meant for shock value, not to us, but to Stamets and the others around her. They were surprised to hear the word, not just because she was some "nerdy girl" (oy vey), but more importantly, it's not something they expect from anyone.
The reasoning for swearing in STPicard points to a cultural shift, not just in language over 100 years, but also in setting, with Picard on the real frontier with real frontiersman, and adapting their mannerisms.
At the time of Star Trek IV, I'd just chalked it up that maybe by the 23rd-Century, Humanity and the rest of the Federation society had matured to the point where they saw really explicit swearing as immature or unprofessional at best. "Hell" and "damn" were still on the table, but f-bombs may have been considered "barbaric language" (by Federation standards). It was hard to reconcile that with how common and seemingly a part of our very nature swearing is for us today, but I thought that was indeed one of the differences between us and that so-called more enlightened and civilized society.
Since Star Trek IV, though, I've come to think of swearing as "whatever..."
Since Star Trek IV, though, I've come to think of swearing as "whatever..."
That's an interesting attitude that swearing is a mark of the uncivilized.
Or unimaginative. Kids peppering their dialogue with F-words in an effort to sound tough, or "cool".
I overheard a few f-bombs from some pre-teens(?) recently and it was just cringeworthy to me. It was like they were trying too hard...
Maybe. But, I don't see that as reflected in Star Trek. If anything it is starting to sound like "get off my lawn." Swearing, as demonstrated repeatedly, has been a part of human language for centuries. And it's not like current Trek is even at Kirk's description of "swearing every other word." They were moments to punctuate human emotion.
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