I wonder if any word more concisely summarises the state of English-speaking culture than 'fuck'. It's everywhere, used in any context, lacking any sort of definition. In any functional sense, it is punctuation rather than language: its function is to create emphasis and change the cadence of an expression rather than add meaning. It's a mid-sentence exclamation point.
Among those who use it most frequently, it is offered as a sign of iconoclasm. The word is all over protest signs and ideologically-driven opinion sites. I'm a rebel, the author intends to say, social niceties and rules mean nothing to me. Fuck Trump, fuck the patriarchy, fuck the alt-right and fuck all the other meaningless buzzwords spreading across Twitter at any one time. This protest is serious, thus it must also be obscene! The problem with iconoclasm, though, is how quickly it turns into conformity. Rebellion by definition must be driven by destruction rather than creation and defines itself entirely by that which it opposes. All it can do is create its own mirror image because it has no substance of its own to establish anything new. All it can do is express reaction. It is the functional embodiment of the word 'fuck'.
Among those who use it most frequently, it is offered as a sign of iconoclasm. The word is all over protest signs and ideologically-driven opinion sites. I'm a rebel, the author intends to say, social niceties and rules mean nothing to me. Fuck Trump, fuck the patriarchy, fuck the alt-right and fuck all the other meaningless buzzwords spreading across Twitter at any one time. This protest is serious, thus it must also be obscene! The problem with iconoclasm, though, is how quickly it turns into conformity. Rebellion by definition must be driven by destruction rather than creation and defines itself entirely by that which it opposes. All it can do is create its own mirror image because it has no substance of its own to establish anything new. All it can do is express reaction. It is the functional embodiment of the word 'fuck'.
That's not to say there aren't contexts in which 'fuck' can be useful, creative or funny. The transgressive symbolism of the word still carries some weight when deployed creatively. Conor McGregor's pinstripe suit lined with the words 'fuck you' was a sartorial masterpiece, both in its relative subtlety - the words were not emphasized and left waiting for an keen-eyed observer to spot - and its character-building of McGregor as a pantomime villain. Back when the word was still somewhat taboo, Richard Curtis undercut the performed British niceness of Four Weddings And A Funeral with a sequence of escalating frustration driven by repeated 'fucks'. Armando Ianucci's The Thick Of It, and US-based spin-off, Veep, both get laughs from vomiting out the word in linguistically convoluted ways. Swearing can also be an excellent source of stress relief, of course. There's even a word for it: lalochezia.
The problem is that the common use of 'fuck' has become anti-creative. Like all protest culture, the word is used for the sake of using it and making a point without having a point to make. Those holding up signs saying 'Fuck Trump' haven't got anything to say, but want to show their allegiance to one side through their opposition to a symbol of the other. The lack of specificity is a convenient shortcut around having to think through complex issues for themselves and express those thoughts coherently. It's precisely as easy to oppose something without defining what you stand for as it is to scrawl an obscenity on a sign.
(It should be specified that those on the political right are often similarly guilty of failing to define their terms and also use protest as allegiance-signalling. However, the nature of conservatism being one of preservation rather than destruction, the use of 'fuck' and obscenity is less common in their protests and thus excludes them from this article. Where the left goes, the right follows, though, and vice-versa.)
The contradictory and ill-defined convictions of protest culture have spread from the streets into popular culture, leading to an increasingly common use of the word 'fuck' as a way of expressing rebellion for no other reason than to do so. The first season of Star Trek: Picard mercifully comes to an end tomorrow, with its frequent use of the word coming to symbolise how the show, and Discovery, represents a bastardisation of the principles and integrity which defined Trek as the most venerable institution of intellectual science-fiction. Picard usually throws out one 'fuck' per episode, which showrunner Michael Chabon has justified on the grounds that the only reason previous iterations of Trek weren't riddled with obscenity was because of censorship rather than intent.
(It should be specified that those on the political right are often similarly guilty of failing to define their terms and also use protest as allegiance-signalling. However, the nature of conservatism being one of preservation rather than destruction, the use of 'fuck' and obscenity is less common in their protests and thus excludes them from this article. Where the left goes, the right follows, though, and vice-versa.)
The contradictory and ill-defined convictions of protest culture have spread from the streets into popular culture, leading to an increasingly common use of the word 'fuck' as a way of expressing rebellion for no other reason than to do so. The first season of Star Trek: Picard mercifully comes to an end tomorrow, with its frequent use of the word coming to symbolise how the show, and Discovery, represents a bastardisation of the principles and integrity which defined Trek as the most venerable institution of intellectual science-fiction. Picard usually throws out one 'fuck' per episode, which showrunner Michael Chabon has justified on the grounds that the only reason previous iterations of Trek weren't riddled with obscenity was because of censorship rather than intent.
"No human society will every be perfect, because no human will ever be perfect," Chabon says, "The most we can do—and as Star Trek ever reminds us, must do—is aspire to perfection, and work to make it so. Until that impossible day, shit is going to continue to happen. And when it does, humans are going to want to swear."
This statement inherently contradicts Gene Roddenberry's conception of the human inhabitants of Star Trek's future representing an idealised version of our higher selves, who have risen above their base impulses. People probably would still swear in a perfect society - even if, as Chabon correctly points out, such a society is not possible in reality - but the act of swearing in Trek very pointedly goes against the idealism at the franchise's core in a way even the morally-complex Deep Space Nine never did.
Chabon's statement also inaccurately reflects how swearing is used in his show, where it is not part of common parlance but very much used to undercut expectations and (yes) as a shortcut to create emphasis, even when undermining character. There is a Starfleet admiral who has appeared twice in the series, both times serving little purpose beyond saying 'fuck' to Picard. That this is the same way the word is used in Discovery, the parallel-running show under a Star Trek banner, suggests not simply one showrunner's way of naturalising dialogue, but a mission statement: the old cliché of 'this is not your grandfather's Star Trek'.
Admittedly, one sympathises with writers trying to create compelling realistic dialogue without overusing lazy obscenity while reflecting a world where such words are overused. It would be patently absurd for the writers of Top Boy, for instance, not to throw swear words around with abandon because that is exactly what real-life equivalents of its characters would be doing. I broadly try to keep swearing to a minimum in my work, but there's plenty of it in this article and in my most recent novel, Last Line, because there's contextually no sensible way around it.
When used properly, the word builds character or makes a specific point. When used frivolously or in the wrong context, it takes on an off-putting prominence in a scene. Even when potentially justified by character and situation, its use can be distracting: in the otherwise excellent James Bond film, Skyfall, Judi Dench's M notes that she's 'really fucked [her and Bond's situation] up'. It's not unreasonable that a hard-nosed character like M might use that word in such a situation, but the use of a word in a Bond film, even one as quietly transgressive as Skyfall, makes it feel as out-of-place and dishonest as it does in Star Trek.
It's common to say that swear-words are a reflection of their user's lack of vocabulary. I would argue that they are instead a reflection of their user's lack of thought. If one is able to form an independent opinion, one must by extension have the words to be able to express it, even if only to oneself. Those with sincere, personally-developed reasons for disliking Trump or any other facet of modern life will have the capacity to detail their arguments, not always with perfect eloquence or cohesion - articulating arguments is a separate art from independent thought, after all - but with a greater degree of specificity than through the use of meaningless buzzwords, of which 'fuck' has become king. Those who can express themselves through nothing but obscene tweets and slogans have nothing to say about anything but themselves. In lieu of anything witty or worthwhile to end on, I'll simply say: fuck that.
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