Insults

I live in England, and therefore am more than accustomed to a few bouts of banter in the form of "your mum" or "you're gay!" As with Nerdfightaria (DFTBA), this annoys me for one reason far superior to being a form of verbal abuse aimed towards myself: they're rubbish.

Seriously, they're terrible insults. These coal-fired nuclear-plants are so narrow minded that homosexuality is the worst thing to be. Shakespeare can one up them. Sorry, did I say one? I meant to say OVER NINE-THOUSAAAAAAND up them.

Take this modern insult: Your momma is so fat that she sat on a rainbow and skittles popped out!

Now compare: No longer hip from hip than from hip to hip: she is spherical, like a globe; I could find countries on her.

Now: She's so ugly, she looked out a window and got arrested for mooning.

Compare it to: She's the kitchen wench, and all grease; and I do not know what use to put her to, but to make a lamp of her, and run from her by her own light. ... if she lives 'til doomsday, she'll burn a week longer than the whole world.

Finally: Ireland's crap.

And then: (Where on her is Ireland?) In the buttocks: I found it by the bogs.

That's the expertise of Shakespeare's insults. It's far more well spoken and thought through. He only once made a 'yo mama' joke, and it was fairly definitely the original.

I love these masterpieces of wit, and will therefore refrain, as much as possible, from swearing. I say 'eff' more than the word associated with that phrase. I do say bitch, but that doesn't count. It's not that bad. If being called a girl is an insult, as is being called a dog, than a mix of the two is an insult too. It's our fault we consider a standard insult a swear word.

Bastard also fits this, as it means being born out of wedlock. That is a sort of social faux pas, and so wouldn't be a nice thing to be called. Heck, it can't really be an insult if a number of people I know actually are admitted bastards.

Arse is not a swear, as far as I'm concerned. If my kid says 'Arse', I'd be fine with that. If he said 'ass', I'd be annoyed. 'Arse' is British. 'Ass' is American. I must draw the line somewhere.

I also say bollock. Not bollocks. Bollocks refers to a pair of testes. Saying bollock is always going to be bad, as disliking bollocks will be nullified by the presence of one, but enjoyment of either seeing or owning bollocks will be nullified by the absence of the other.

Also, slight multilinguality helps. Swearing in a different language is pretty much a sure fire way to know that nobody will know what you're saying, or showing you're slightly more intelligent if they understand.

If all else fails, be immature. As much as everyone doesn't care to admit it, there's still the leftover programming that finds complete and utter aggravation behind the insult 'poo-head'. And you won't be disliked for it as nobody will seriously have a go at being called a poo-head, lest they reveal themselves as immature for getting angry over it.

Although, a certain webcomic has taught me that spouting nonsense is a good way of getting revenge. Profanity will irritate someone for a little bit, but insanity will confuse them for a while. The more abnormal, the better.