Fracking Censorship
Anyone who’s been following the new Battlestar Galactica has undoubtedly crinkled their brow at one particular bon mot invented by the show’s writers: frack. The genius of this move is indisputable: take a gibberish word, add context, and let that off-color dollop of yogurt between your viewers’ ears transform it into an obscenity with a minimum of training.
Observe:
“The cylons look like humans now? What the frack?!?”
“This mission is a fracking nightmare!”
“Frack you!”
Ta-da! You can now enjoy primetime television programming, complete with actual adult conversations, cursing and all!
Let this be a lesson to the FCC that no matter how you try to regulate obscenity, the human brain can make anything into a dirty word. Until the time when they figure that out and implant us all with thought monitors, perhaps it’s time to update the classic treatise on the versatility of the human language?
Smegging Tanj….
Actually, not quite new. It’s been in existence since the original Battlestar Galatica movie.
Yes. I’m that old.
When you say “original” you mean the mini-series that was the pilot for the current series, or “Lorne Greene”-era Battlestar Galactica?
Yow. So the FCC moves really slowly. 😉
Well, we also got felgercarb from the BSG TOS. Farscape’s ‘frell’, the Chinese swearing from Firefly and not forget: ‘Nerf herder’ from Star Wars.
It’s nice to know that someone got here before me to mention Farscape’s vocabulary 🙂