In the novel “How the Steel Was Tempered” (in fact, a talented one in my opinion), the central character, reaching a certain level of consciousness, convinces his party friends that they should cease the habit of blasphemy. Korchagin was sure that it was a hangover of the past, which should be overcome. Which apparently he was successful because parallel to deterioration of the health state he had started reading philosophical books.
The habit, however, is not historically fought down, one of the evidence of which is the secretly filmed video appeared on the internet. A senior officer of the Russian Pacific Fleet, perhaps, a Rear Admiral, is giving an explanatory guidance to his subordinates, reiterating a swearword after every second word. Moreover, the overall “pathos” of this monologue, so to speak, is humanitarian, the leader explains his subordinates that they cannot drive drunk, spicing his counsels with description of terrifying events. The senior officer is not get angry at all, simply it is his form of being expressed.
The opponents of this rear-admiral are also very fond of the word starting with «f», which, in particular, the U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Victoria Nuland used to characterize the European Union, as I understand, for the fact that the latter had not performed sufficiently hard line against Russia. It was a few months ago, afterwards the Europeans “pulled their socks up.”
Well, such things also happen in our political life. I remember about 20 years ago, in the summer of 1994, during the opposition NDU gathering, Ashot Manusharyan several times named the first President Levon Ter-Petrosyan, Speaker of the Parliament Babken Ararktsyan and Minister of Interior Affairs Vano Siradeghyan a “whore” and a “sham”.
The agenda of these rallies was the immediate change of regime in order to be free from the criminal government and to rescue the country from destruction. The agenda, as we see, has not been changed, so as the blasphemy style. Only, now, the blasphemy “objects” are turned into blasphemy “subjects.” And using swearword during the rallies is normal, or else how to explain the crowd that you are a radical opposition and are “for the people”.
I reminded all of this because one of my young colleagues asked me today, “Can we say a swearword to Liska?” My answer was: in public oral and written speech, no.
ARAM ABRAHAMYAN
