Re: Curses!

[Jonathan Jones]

On Thu, Dec 15, 2011 at 9:13 PM, Jonathan Jones <eye...@gmail.com> wrote:

Is it just me, or is this group rather slow of late?

Well, in part to spark up some conversation on here, and in part because I'd like to be able to curse in Lojban, I'm proposing we come up with some Lojbanic curses.

And I don't necessarily mean shit, fuck, damn, etc. I mean more along the lines of "You pea-brained sack of twat-juice!", or "Cum-guzzling gutter slut!" or "Republican" (that last one was a joke).

So, to start things off, here's one from me:

tolmencrerai : x1 is a fucking retard (not in the mental disability sense) to x2 because of x3

i.e. {do tolmencrerai fi lonu lo do carce pu daspo lo mi rozgu} = "You fucking retard! You ran over my roses!"

Actually, a better translation would probably be "You're a fucking retard for running over my roses!"

--
mu'o mi'e .aionys.

.i.e'ucai ko cmima lo pilno be denpa bu .i doi.luk. mi patfu do zo'o
(Come to the Dot Side! Luke, I am your father. :D )

--
mu'o mi'e .aionys.

.i.e'ucai ko cmima lo pilno be denpa bu .i doi.luk. mi patfu do zo'o
(Come to the Dot Side! Luke, I am your father. :D )

[Jonathan Jones]

Is it just me, or is this group rather slow of late?

Well, in part to spark up some conversation on here, and in part because I'd like to be able to curse in Lojban, I'm proposing we come up with some Lojbanic curses.

And I don't necessarily mean shit, fuck, damn, etc. I mean more along the lines of "You pea-brained sack of twat-juice!", or "Cum-guzzling gutter slut!" or "Republican" (that last one was a joke).

So, to start things off, here's one from me:

tolmencrerai : x1 is a fucking retard (not in the mental disability sense) to x2 because of x3

i.e. {do tolmencrerai fi lonu lo do carce pu daspo lo mi rozgu} = "You fucking retard! You ran over my roses!"

[Lee Carlson]

This has been revisited from time-to-time and the outcome is always that curses and such are deeply invested in cultural context. As such a language that is designed to be culturally neutral does not provide curses outside of the cultural context of the particular user. For anyone is raised with lojban as their primary language, the concept of cursing, and expletives will likely be an intellectual exercise, rather than an emotional outburst.

mi'e brais

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[Jonathan Jones]

I don't believe a word of that. Especially the part about "intellectual exercise".

[Anton Golov]

On 17 December 2011 16:55, Jonathan Jones <eye...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I don't believe a word of that. Especially the part about "intellectual
> exercise".
>
>
> On Fri, Dec 16, 2011 at 5:10 PM, Lee Carlson <lord...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> This has been revisited from time-to-time and the outcome is always that
>> curses and such are deeply invested in cultural context. As such a language
>> that is designed to be culturally neutral does not provide curses outside of
>> the cultural context of the particular user. For anyone is raised with
>> lojban as their primary language, the concept of cursing, and expletives
>> will likely be an intellectual exercise, rather than an emotional outburst.
>>
>> mi'e brais
>>

It seems more likely that if people were raised with Lojban as their
primary language, they would develop a vocabulary of curses and
euphemisms of their own.

mi'e jesyspa

[Lee Carlson]

If you go to the lojban site you will find a couple of discussions on curses, and swearing. Since the language is based on creating logically verifiable statements, most curses simply do not parse, at least not IN lojban. The closest you may come is do bebna (you are a fool) though that does not fulfill the emotional catharsis of calling somebody a "fucking retard" even if it is logically equivalent.

mi'e brais

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[Jonathan Jones]

Okay, that's utter bullshit. Whether a sentence parses has nothing to do with its truth value. The grammar doesn't care about the content. "Lojban is based on logic" != "Lojban can't be used to say false or illogical things".

[Lee Carlson]

And there is the problem. The truth of most cursing is about cultural expectations. In our culture, calling a woman a slut is insulting whether or not the statement is true. However saying "you enjoy sex for its own sake" does not have the same visceral satisfaction, whether or not the statement is true.

mi'e brais

[Jonathan Jones]

No, that's not a problem, becuase "you enjoy sex for it's own sake" isn't cursing. In any language.

[Lee Carlson]

And therein lies the problem. Cursing always involves a component of emotional manipulation, which is not a component of lojban. You can make statements which you can determine are either valid, or invalid, and whether or not you choose to imbue them with emotional content is entirely up to you, not a function of the language. What to you is a logical curse?

mi'e brais

[Jonathan Jones]

Anyone who says you can't express emotion in Lojban is wrong. And you, sir, are a fanza cinki. .i.e'o do jmina lo do se finti le se casnu gi'onai sisti lonu do tavla fi ti Your opinion on whether it is possible to curse in Lojban does nothing to contribute to the purpose of this conversation, i.e., to come up with Lojbanic curses.

[Lee Carlson]

If you feel that way, then I shall withdraw from the conversation. I never said that you could not express emotion in lojban, only that lojban does not lend itself to the emotional manipulation of others that is the purpose of cursing. I may say: oonai do bebna ; however that is for my emotional satisfaction. I just want to know why you feel it necessary to attach this kind of baggage to lojban?

mi'e brais

[Jonathan Jones]

Cursing isn't baggage. Every culture, every language, has cursing. It's a human condition.

[Lee Carlson]

Does "you are the son of a dung-eating flea" mean very much to you?

Leland

[Jonathan Jones]

I don't personally take offense to it, but it does sound like an insult.

[Chris Patrick]

To be honest, I would be offended if someone called me that. Sometimes, insults/curses do translate into other cultures. I believe what Mr. Jones is trying to argue here is that we should have specific, intensified, derogatory terms for various insults/curses that are fairly culture-neutral, i.e., I don't think anyone would take kindly to being called the equivalent of a "fucking retard" or the like. Concepts like "slut" or your example of the offspring of a flea who was confused about his nutrient sources would be harder to translate, obviously, and we might do well to leave out those kind of curses all together.

[Lee Carlson]

I suppose that my confusion stems from a lack of understanding as to why lojban needs curses and insults? Mr. Jones states that cursing is part of the human condition though my experience is that all curses come from cultural expectations and are learned from context and the modelling of your family unit. My example of "(derisively) you fool" is the only example that I could come up with for a meaningful  insult. Other than that all we are talking about is a desire to exhibit our emotional venting. I will point people to the article by Arnt Richard Johnson at http://people.fix.no/arj/lojban/swear.html if it is still up.

mu'o mi'e brais

[rden...@gmail.com]

On , Lee Carlson <lord...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I suppose that my confusion stems from a lack of understanding as to why lojban needs curses and insults?

I would be very surprised if lojban wouldn't allow curses and insults. Considering how rich is Lojban in expressing emotions, why should cursing and swaring be left out?

I would dream of a vocative, say {do'au} of selma'o DOI. You could say {do'au plise} and everyone would understand that it is intendend to be an insult, whether or not to be an apple offends them. Of course {do'aunai xalci} would not be meant to be an insult even if I would be probably offended.

Alternatively an emotional (say {zo'au} of selma'o UI5) could be used with the meaning of "offensively - no offense intended".

To me, it would seem the most lojbanic way to swear/course. The point is not if a particular analogy or name is offensive but if the intention is to offend.

remod

[Lee Carlson]

I can appreciate your argument here, though my confusion stands. Insults and swearing appear to have two goals. The goal of the first is emotional manipulation of the person you are directing the insult at; the goal of the second is to vent emotions in an exhibitionist display. Neither of these things appear to be necessary to the function of lojban. However I do appreciate that there are people who cannot communicate without peppering their speech with expletives. I will admit that when I was younger I worked construction and developed the habituation of swearing constantly. As I have grown older I have worked to find more logical and mature ways of expressing myself. To date I have become quite fond of my son's preferred expletive: "taxes and wet socks!" as well as one of my close friends' usage of: "audit you!" (as in his estimation wishing someone "fuck you," would provide them all too much pleasure). I like the idea of using do'au and zo'au as attitudinals to mark intended/unintended insult or offense. I am interested in what pundits like xorxe and robin have to say on this subject.

mu'o mi'e brais

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[Jonathan Jones]

Okay, firstly, please don't call me "Mr. Jones". I would much prefer being referred to as {.aionys.}, or if you must use English, "Jon".

Secondly, no, I am not trying to argue that we should have "culturally neutral" anything. I'm not /arguing/ anything. I am suggesting that we come up with specifically LOJBANIC expletives.

My example, {tolmencrerai}, comes from {to'e menli certu traji}, which translate to English as, basically, "Superlatively (opposite-of (skilled mentally))", or colloquially, "Really, really, really, really stupid", "As dumb as it is possible to be".

My reasoning is that, we being humans, there will be occasions in which we will desire to use expletives. I'm not saying we /need/ them, I'm saying we /want/ them. When you come home to find your house has been robbed, are you going to say "Oh dear, it seems someone has removed my belongings.", or are you more likely to say "Damn it, some asshole motherfucker stole all my shit!"?

That's why every language has expletives- not because they are /needed/, because they are /desired/.

[Lee Carlson]

coi .aionys
    Now that I have a firmer picture of what you are talking about, I also have a better understanding. For the record when I say that you are arguing a point, I mean that in the sense it is used in formal debate: that your are stating your position in the debate, and wish to convince me that your position is more valid than the one I am stating, nothing more than that. Having said that I will admit that there are times when you need to say something like do tolmencrerai (which I happen to like as it adds up to my spouse's "You are too stupid to live), and I want to thank you for adding that to my vocabulary.
     As to your comment about being robbed, I've been there, and my comment was more along the lines of: "How could I have been so stupid as to have provided the thief the opportunity to steal from me." However each to their own. BTW I also have a pre-school aged daughter, who repeats everything that she hears. Nothing like that to get you to begin thinking about what you say, before you say it. This is the reason her mother says: "Bad Words," and her brother has chosen his expletives as he has.

mu'o mi'e brais

[Luke Bergen]

It sounds like .aionys. is basically just asking if we could start developing some lojbanic culture around cursing much like robin asked us to come up with some lojban nursery rhymes.

"culturally neutral" doesn't mean "complete absence of culture".

For instance, nikyge'u
http://jbovlaste.lojban.org/dict/nikyge'u

[Pierre Abbat]

On Thursday 22 December 2011 15:30:46 Luke Bergen wrote:
> It sounds like .aionys. is basically just asking if we could start
> developing some lojbanic culture around cursing much like robin asked us to
> come up with some lojban nursery rhymes.

There is, of course, "mabla", which is defined as "x1 is a derogative
connotation/sense of x2 used by x3" but several of us think it should be a
general-purpose cussword.

Pierre
--
Jews use a lunisolar calendar; Muslims use a solely lunar calendar.

[Luke Bergen]

Well sure but that's kind of akin to saying "no need for nursery rhymes. Just use {cifselsa'a}".

I'll throw in some things I've found myself using in the past:
cmamenpre
latpinca
tolmencre is a classic
maltolpi'o

Usually if a thing is inherrently unpleasant I won't bother with the "mal" since it seems unlikely for a person hearing "doi latpinca" to get confused and think that I actually believe that I'm addressing cat piss.  But in cases like "tolpi'o" I'll throw the "mal" on just to clarify that I'm not merely stating a fact.

[Jonathan Jones]

Yup, pretty much.

[Jonathan Jones]

I'm sorry, what's the opposite of a piano?

[Marjorie Scherf]

lu .i lo cevni be do cu cevni fi noda li'u is one of my favorites.

[Jonathan Jones]

You're god is the God of no-one?

[Luke Bergen]

Blech, I'm always forgetting that pilno doesn't own pi'o

[Jonathan Jones]

Oh! Useless! I get it now.

[Lee Carlson]

I now have a better feel for what aionys is looking for, and I can appreciate it more fully. For m'self I use the construction le cevni kurji ko in place of the traditional pagan "blessed be." Since we are looking at expletives that will fit the lojbanic culture, perhaps blessings can also be derived. I happen to agree that culturally neutral does not mean culturally absent; 'tis just that the culture of lojbanistan is still evolving and I had not considered curses to this point.

mu'o mi'e brais

[.arpis.]

{le cevni kurji ko} isn't an expression, but two sumti stuck side by side; if you use {cevni kurji ko}, you are commanding someone (or something) to [let it/him/her-self} be taken care of by god, which is closer to the meaning, but still not quite there.

On the topic of curses: even though it's important to be able to understand novel phrases and to be able to come up with them when necessary, it's also important to have a cache of canned constructions for expressing oneself without needing to think too hard about it.

mu'o mi'e .arpis.

[Pierre Abbat]

On Thursday 22 December 2011 22:07:08 Lee Carlson wrote:
> I now have a better feel for what aionys is looking for, and I can

> appreciate it more fully. For m'self I use the construction *le cevni kurji
> ko* in place of the traditional pagan "blessed be." Since we are looking at

> expletives that will fit the lojbanic culture, perhaps blessings can also
> be derived. I happen to agree that culturally neutral does not mean
> culturally absent; 'tis just that the culture of lojbanistan is still
> evolving and I had not considered curses to this point.

You mean "le cevni cu kurji ko", right?

Pierre
--
I believe in Yellow when I'm in Sweden and in Black when I'm in Wales.

[Lee Carlson]

I thought that the cu could be left out if it did not create confusion. As it appears to do so, I will amend my phrasing to reflect this and say: le cevni cu kurji ko
As to arpis comment regarding the need for phrases that require no thought: This is one of my concerns/gripes/disquiets with regard to cursing/swearing. From my experience people use expletives when their desire is to vent emotionally with something that sounds a bit more civilized than a wordless scream of frustration/rage. Expletives, whether curse words, swearing, or otherwise seldom carry any true semantic content other than to provide a purely emotional label for the object of the user's frustration. Most people resort to cursing/swearing when they do not wish to be bothered to cerebrate around their rage/frustration though they want to express their feelings to others around them, or often just themselves. This is why my first responses to this thread were to question why we would need cursing. I can understand nursery rhymes, as these all started out as cautionary tales or lessons for children even if we have lost their original meaning through the years. So my question still stands as: what purpose does cursing fulfill, other than a cathartic release?

mu'o mi'e brais

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[Jonathan Jones]

Why does it matter what purpose it serves? If you don't like cursing, don't. I am full agreement that there is a such thing as too much expletive. But I also think there is a such thing as not enough.

[Lee Carlson]

aionys, if language does not serve a purpose then it is nothing but noise. If the presence of expletives will strengthen lojban, make the language more expressive and more useful, I am all for it. If you can tell me what expletives will express, other than rage/frustration (which I feel that oi does quite well) then I will be happy to come on board. Otherwise I feel that expletives are just another example of malglico that we can do without.

mu'o mi'e brais

[Luke Bergen]

I don't think that anything as universal as swearing can be said to be malglico ;)

[Jonathan Jones]

Okay, I've said this before, but obviously you've forgotten.

Contribute, or get out. If you don't want to use curses, fine. Stop harping on those of us that do.

[Lee Carlson]

Thank you for your time, I apologize for wanting to understand your interest in this particular linguistic exercise. I will not take up your time further.

mi'e brais

[Jonathan Jones]

People curse. Lojban doesn't have any curses (that I am aware of, excepting those posted to this thread). I think it would be nice if Lojban /did/. That's my interest. How is that difficult to understand?

[Betsemes]

On Fri, Dec 16, 2011 at 12:13 AM, Jonathan Jones <eye...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Well, in part to spark up some conversation on here, and in part because I'd
> like to be able to curse in Lojban, I'm proposing we come up with some
> Lojbanic curses.
>
> And I don't necessarily mean shit, fuck, damn, etc. I mean more along the
> lines of "You pea-brained sack of twat-juice!", or "Cum-guzzling gutter
> slut!" or "Republican" (that last one was a joke).
>
> So, to start things off, here's one from me:
>
> tolmencrerai : x1 is a fucking retard (not in the mental disability sense)
> to x2 because of x3

ko malxaigle ko