Pandora Scooter: Blog

SO...SOMEONE really pissed me off today. And this person - had he been in my grill, would have inspired such contempt in me that I believe

I believe, mind you

that I would have spit in his face.

How 19th Century, right? At least that's how it seems to me. When the greatest insult a woman could exact upon a man would be to spit in his face.

And then I started thinking, "Why is spitting in someone's face such an insult?" Or spitting on someone's grave or "spitting on the memory of your grandmother!" I mean, ok, it's messy. And the mouth is, actually, the most bacteria infested part of the body (I just wrote that - is it true? I'm too pissed off to even look it up right now) -- so, in essence, spitting on someone's face is the grimiest thing one could do besides pooping and smearing the feces on the person's face - which requires a gigantic amount of pre-planning and then quick access -- and I dunno -- by then the window of opportunity for comeback has passed...

What bothers me about this insulting gesture is that it is exactly that same spittle that we exchange when we like someone(enough to kiss them - ok, "French" kiss someone...why it's called "French" kissing, I don't know - another thing to look up at a time when I'm not fuming). So how come when someone tickles my fancy, their bacteria-riddled spit is something that I'm willing to voluntarily take into my mouth. But if that person finds me beneath contempt and spits on my face, I find that the gravest of insults?

It's the same spit.

It's the same with the phrase "Fuck You" right? To insult someone, we say "Fuck you!" To tell someone that we want to engage in some very pleasurable sex with someone, we (some of us) say, "I wanna fuck you." In one instance, the concept of someone being fucked is an ugly, insulting act to wish upon someone else. In the other, it's an act that someone(s) might desire greatly.

So, where are the insults that don't have this double meaning? That can't be turned around in another context and used as a positive gesture or be associated with something desirable?

"I'm going to kill you." That's pretty negative all around - although we do still say, "I'm going to kill you!" in jest. But there are few situations in which someone says, "You should be killed" and means it in a positive way. But then, there's the fact that no one wants to be caught having said something like that and then, goodness forbid, if the person in question dies... the speaker would be in a world of trouble.

There are cultures in which the insults are completely unambiguous: "I wish for your dead mother to be raped."

Which makes me wonder why we don't say, 'Rape you!" when we're pissed off. But that is SOOOOOOO Taboo.