So many detailed and thorough debates here, I am impressed.

The discussion has grown so much in depth and in width; I feel I can no longer keep up with it if I am to reply to everyone individually. So let me elaborate something first.

The first, and strongest reason why the name struck my attention as well as sense of moral was that in my culture, it is very rude and unacceptable to use blatantly, explicitly, and directly profane words in public. So when I see the name pronounced like my language’s profanity (which can be used both for direct insult and swear exclamation, but the latter usage is not as popular), I was shocked. IF it is a person from my country, or whoever that learnt the language from someone, and they intentionally chose to use that word, it is awful in my opinion. The word is considered even more offensive than the English word “d-ckhead” itself, I believe. Because it does not just refer to that part of the body which is considered rude topic here, but it also carries negative attitude, and probably a sense of hostility of the speaker.

To give you a clearer picture of how strongly I feel against the word;

• If any of my friends would choose to insult me with that word, I am ready to punch him right in the nose and stop being friends.
• If a friend swears that in public (but not towards me or anyone), I feel embarrassed and do not want to be seen with him.
• If a stranger yells that word in public, probably 7 out of 10 people would look at him and frown in disapproval. 2 people might just raise their eyebrows and/or ignore. Last one might drop their jaws and bulge their eyes in shock at the person. I, personally, will frown and take mental note not to associate with the person.

That is why I can’t believe that a person would have chosen such last name (if they know what it means) and feel disapproving about the name.

One other thing that might be another reason why I feel strongly against vulgarity is that I am a woman, and here women tend to not swear, at least for people my age and older. (Teenagers here shocked me sometimes when I hear them swear in public or insult people in public without caring about other surrounding people who are giving them a look of disapproval.) I also feel that men here, in general, are more accepting towards rudeness, as in harder to be offended by profanity.

That being said, it’s not like I grew up in a temple and cannot listen to profanity at all. I do swear (online). I use shit, crap, hell, damn, WTF, freakin’, and some other swear exclamations all the time. I call people names (not in their face) on occasions and use words like bastard, jerk, bitch, asshole, douchebag, etc. when I write angry rants in my blog.

But would I shout those words out loud even in the game not real life? No. I won’t even say them in /say, because it feels rude and shameful to do so. Would I directly insult other players with those words? No. Yesterday someone yelled “fuck you” to me and my party because we claimed and killed an NM they wanted to kill for Ifrit quest, I didn’t curse back. I just said “You could have said so. How could I magically know that?” Although I was very mad at him for throwing insult so quickly. There is no need to present so much hostility to people. I can use civil statement to make it known that I am angry, without any need to use insults.


Phew, so much thinking and typing to do. Next reply (probably tomorrow) I shall discuss further about “words” and how I think they could harm or affect people.