Word: use
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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What was the most notorious use of the word on TV when it's either been blurted out or said intentionally? Kenneth Tynan used it in England in a 1965 interview on a BBC talk show, and that was a tremendously prominent thing. The newspapers were outraged. He was then the director of the National Theatre. The BBC was forced to apologize, politicians attempted not only to remove Tynan from his post but to remove the head of the BBC because of it, to prosecute him for using obscene words. In America, it's been used a number of times...
...must have intensified because of casual use on the Internet, right? I don't really think so. The thing is, people do use this word all the time. The fact that before the Internet you weren't necessarily exposed to it doesn't mean it wasn't out there...
What psychological component goes with it? It has an effect because it is still taboo. If it lost absolutely all of its force, well, there wouldn't be any good reason to use it that much. As long as there is still some feeling that this is a sexual term, it will maintain some power. Sometimes I'm asked, like, what's going to happen when it becomes so commonplace that it doesn't really matter anymore, and I don't think that will happen in the foreseeable future. Even as taboos against it weaken, they are still there...
...use the word yourself? Yes. I don't use it overwhelmingly commonly, and most of the words that are in this book I don't use. But you know I use it from time to time as necessary...
...people expect you to use it? I'm never sure what they expect. I am personally a relatively formal man, and I wear a suit every day. I don't know if they expect me to be some wild and crazy guy because I wrote this book, so I don't know if they see me and are surprised that I might use the word. I'm just not sure. But there's no reason why I wouldn't. It's part of our speech...