Are legislators and guests really so clean-mouthed in daily practice, or is it that swearing in English is somehow more offensive than swearing in other languages? Is anyone else surprised that Chairman Steve Shieh (of First Financial Holding - some hugely important position I suspect) had to step down for saying ‘shit’ during a Q&A session in the legislature? I guess he was a guest, not a lawmaker, but it all seems pretty extreme. He didn’t even take a swing at anyone.
I think it is because people here don’t understand usage. I remember a guy saying “shit!” to me after he crashed into me on his bike and I, but he obviously meant “F*ck you!” “Shit” is usually uttered in reference to a frustrating experience, not directed at a person. You forgot the meeting with your boss? Shit! But what do you say to the guy who just kicked your dog? Not “shit”, that’s for sure.
ridiculous… I’ve heard people saying “shi-te” on countless local TV shows, and even a couple of “fha-kew maaan” outbursts on shows like 小S’s talk show etc etc…
when the hell did the Taiwanese develop delicate sensibilities for anything at all, let alone something as innocuous as swearing… as for the legislators and their consistently low brow antics you
Shit is an excellent word. I even caught my father in law saying it on the weekend and he’s very straight laced.
Full of shit
Shit for brains
Give a shit
Don’t give a shit
Getting shitty
Shitty Weather
Little shit
Big shit
That’s the shit
This tastes like shit
You look like shit
I feel like shit
Good Shit
Bad shit
Not too shitty
It was ridiculous. I agree that noone seems to have understood the word ‘shit’ properly. Except for Xie himself. He used it so perfectly. It was pure class. If I was in charge I would have given him a raise.
I heard from a prosecutor that some British person is being criminally prosecuted for cursing out a fucking local using the “asshole” word. I say “fucking local” because this is the kind of thing that just works one way; the locals can refer to foreigners any way they want but–turn it around and you could be facing a criminal case. The “crime” is apparently “felony hurt feelings of tender Taiwanese” (that is the Brian translation, not the official one).
I know about all this because I was called as a consultant re: use of word “asshole” and whether it was a crime back in California. I had to bite my own tongue when I was asked “is it okay to call Taiwanese an asshole”–my response was “depends”.
take care and do not let the law discourage cursing out the locals. Unjust laws are meant to be broken, it is a type of civil disobedence.
When I was in London a few years ago, I went to hear a case at the Old Bailey. When the accused was giving his testimony, he would insert ‘f’ or ‘c’ into his recollection of a conversation instead of using the actual words. The Judge scorned him, and said “well son, we’ve all heard the words before, so tell it like it really was - the full version.”
The testimony sure got real interesting after that, especially when the lawyers were quoting him under cross examination.
The plot thickens. That’s really interesting about the indictable A word. I just asked my girlfriend if she’d heard of the case. She haden’t, but she said a few months ago someone sued a Taiwanese woman for swearing (“bitch” or “son of a bitch” perhaps) at another Taiwanese in the dreaded language English.
But no one has answered the question. Haven’t Chinese and Taiwanese swear words been tossed around in the legislature before this? Is ‘swearing in English’ the issue really?
It seems hard to imagine something so strangely racist. Why would Mr. Shieh go down so easily if it is the case? Apparently his words were also said to be offensive to women. It wasn’t just the expletive.
[quote=“brianlkennedy”]I heard from a prosecutor that some British person is being criminally prosecuted for cursing out a fing local using the “asshole” word. I say "fing local" because this is the kind of thing that just works one way; the locals can refer to foreigners any way they want but–turn it around and you could be facing a criminal case. The “crime” is apparently “felony hurt feelings of tender Taiwanese” (that is the Brian translation, not the official one).
I know about all this because I was called as a consultant re: use of word “asshole” and whether it was a crime back in California. I had to bite my own tongue when I was asked “is it okay to call Taiwanese an asshole”–my response was “depends”.
take care and do not let the law discourage cursing out the locals. Unjust laws are meant to be broken, it is a type of civil disobedence.
Henry Thoreau Brian[/quote]
Of course. The technical term for this is Arrogant Wankerism, strictly defined as “telling a native fucking speaker how to fucking speak his own fucking language”.
