Rules that Rot

I have been thinking about that "s---"" rule mentioned below, and really it's only contributing to the overall decline of the site.

Bear with me.

Fantasy as a genre (or sci-fi, I just tend more towards fantasy) can be incredibly stagnant. Mostly because budding writers are drawing on existing systems, storylines, styles, etc. They have the illustrious kingdoms, the Holy Trinity of races (humans, elves, dwarves), patrilineal monarchies, feudalism, but overall, a scrubbed feel.

The "good guys" are unflaggingly "good": they don't swear, have pre/extramarital sex, kill anyone who isn't immediately aligned with the "bad guys", beat their horses,get cranky--in fact, odds are, if some jack-off gets in a hero's face and starts being...well, a jack-off, the hero will coolly turn the other cheek until struck or provoked to a point by which 98% of us would have kicked this joker in the balls. And he'll never kick them in the balls. It's unsportsmanike.

By outlawing any possible interpretation of swear-words, they are encouraging this scrubbed and watered down fantasy. I've heard arguments that "people back then didn't swear like we do now and people in the future won't." *Buzzz* Wrong--our swears have largely been around since 1066 and the Norman invasion of England: in particular "shit."

Another argument is that people ought to invent their own swear words, be "imaginative." Well, generally, swear words are pretty graphic, swear phrases doubly so. Just because Anne McCaffrey cleaned her swears up by referring always to dragons and their eggs doesn't always mean that's the best course.

Take Rayln for instance. I am definitely in need of some shock value for her. She makes people uncomfortable and is happy about it. Would it make any sense if she said, "oh bilgewater!" and people blushed? They are largely seafarers and fisherman, so it would "make sense," but the fact is it is a stupid curse because it's something that the people constantly deal with and have to say. Same with swearing on dragons and eggs. Does no one say "shards" in this culture except as a curse? It works for McCaffrey because she isn't trying to use it as a curse word but as an exclamation or expletive. Just something you shout.

And her stuff has some non-victorian approved sex anyway.