EDGE Chicago

WARNING: The following column is full of expletives and inappropriate language. If you are the type of person who is offended by curse words, then you may want to skip this column and instead watch a rerun of the HBO show, Deadwood.

Listen up, faggots.

The late George Carlin once said that there are seven words which cannot be said on television. The words in question are "s**t," "p**s," "f**k," "c**t," "c*********r," "m***********r" and "t**s." For those of you who are offended by reading asterisks, the words are "shit," "piss," "fuck," "cunt," "cocksucker," "motherfucker" and "tits."

It is true that these words may be too offensive for television or polite company, but the same thing could also be argued about fart jokes, Paris Hilton and Fox News. So are the "Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television" really that offensive?

It depends, of course, on who you ask. If you ask me, I’ll tell you that such words should generally not pepper everyday conversation, but gosh darn it, are appropriate in occasional circumstances. If, however, you ask a Catholic nun, she’ll tell you that such words should never be uttered at all. And then she’ll tell you to stop asking her so many fucking questions.

Dealing with language can be a tricky thing. Language is made up of words, words are made up of letters, and if you look closely you’ll also see that letters are made up of germs, which is why you should always wear gloves when handling the alphabet.

The "Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television" may be considered offensive, but they’re relatively banal when considering that the words themselves do not reference a specific person or group. Although directly telling an individual to "fuck off!" will hurt his or her feelings, saying "Fuck, this clam chowder is over salted!" to no one in particularly will hurt nobody (except for the person who made the clam chowder).

There are, however, certain words which can be hurtful regardless of the context. These are words which many of us say on a regular basis. To paraphrase Jeff Foxworthy, if you’ve ever said any of the following words ... beaner, brownie, chinaman, cheese-eating surrender monkey, chink, cholo, coon, cracker, cripple, cunt-eyed, dago, darkie, dyke, faggot, fairy, flip, frenchie, ginger, gin jockey, gook, greaser, homo, honky, hymie, injun, jap, jewish american princess, jungle bunny, jigaboo, kike, mammy, nigger, oreo, pancake face, pikey, polack, porch monkey, queer, raghead, redneck, redskin, retard, ruskie, sasquatch, slanteyed, sodomite, spearchucker, spic, tar baby, towel head, tranny, wetback, whitey, or white trash ... then you might be offending someone.

Or you might be a redneck. Except that’s also offensive. So nevermind.

Although we in the gay community regularly apply such words as "fag," "queer" and "dyke" to ourselves, we take great offense when such words are used by others. This is because these words belong to us and we, as a community, use such words to self-identify and build unity. However, it sometimes appears that we use our ’minority’ status as an excuse to use offensive language towards other minorities, whether directly or indirectly.

I once dated a guy who did not like Mexicans. He assumed they were all in this country illegally, and often used such racist language that Lou Dobbs would have blushed (little known fact: Lou Dobbs blushes quite easily. Another little known fact: I heard somewhere that Lou Dobbs has a third nipple. I don’t know if that’s true, but what if, right?). Even though there are more Mexican-Americans than there are Gay-Americans, he still felt as though he could single them out as a minority with his offensive and hateful opinions. Needless to say, we are no longer dating. He has since become the president of Mexico.

I would be a hypocrite if I were to claim that I’ve never said disparaging things about another group of people. In fact, the stories my roommate could tell about me would probably get me locked up for life. Perhaps instead of bribing my roommate to keep his mouth shut and/or moving, I should just learn to avoid saying hateful things about other people, groups and communities. If I detest being called a "faggot," then I should avoid similar language myself, whether at home or in public.

Don’t get me wrong - I believe life is far too short to be so politically correct that we feel as if we’re constantly walking on egg shells. However, I do believe that if the gay community doesn’t want to hear hate speech, then it should not use hate speech.

I think we can all learn a lesson from the late George Carlin, who knew what words were appropriate and what words were inappropriate.

God bless his soul, the motherfucker.