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Tag: science

Eff, Yeah! Swearing Finally Has Its Day

It’s a damn good time to be a four-letter word in America. Last week, before President Obama revealed his softer side during a speech on gun control, he let his sailory side rip during an episode of Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee with Jerry Seinfeld.

“I curse,” Obama said when asked how he blows off steam. “Bad stuff or stupid stuff is happening constantly every day. So you have to be able to just make fun of a lot of that. … That’s when cursing is really valuable.”

You heard it here first, my friends: The expletive is on the bleeping rise, and I’m not just talking about my 10-year-old bellowing along with “S.O.B.,” the popular new throwback ditty by alternative radio darlings Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats. No, I’m talking about widespread institutional clemency on cussing.

Don't Say 'Gay'

It’s the love that dare not speak its name — especially if you’re in Tennessee, where it could land you in jail.

The state’s Senate just passed a bill that would make it illegal to teach about homosexuality in public schools from kindergarten through 8th grade. No gay-marriage chatter. No gay-rights banter. No gay gayness of any gay sort.

Dubbed the “Don’t Say ‘Gay’ Bill” by opponents, the measure insists that any instruction or materials provided to students on the subject of sexuality must be “limited exclusively to natural reproductive science.” Teachers who violate the rule could be fined up to $50 and sentenced to as many as 30 days behind bars.

Supporters say the bill allows parents, rather than teachers, to decide when and what (and, er, if?) their children learn about homosexuality. As if they didn’t actually learn all they need to know from watching Modern Family.

But to me, the whole gay gag just looks like a bunch of uptight Republicans trying to squash a squirrelly little slice of reality that makes them terribly uncomfortable. And maybe just the slightest bit tingly.