There is no doubt that swearing is very widespread in today’s world. In fact, many swear much more often than others.

I asked a survey to teachers and students about their own habits and tendencies when it comes to swearing. The questions I asked were as follows: In most cases, why do you swear? In what circumstance are you most inclined to swear? How do you excuse your swearing?

The answers I got were very mixed. Between these three primary questions, I also got the opportunity to mix in some more. I got to ask how many times (estimate) they each swore. I even got to know what they thought on how the exclusion of swearing in our world would affect us. Since most teachers and students seemed to relate to each other, I used one of each to show you our school’s swearing habits.

Whenever I asked the first question, “In most cases why do you swear?”, the teacher said that she only swears to express anger or frustration. The other response I received  from the student was that he swore a lot and that he did not really have one.

When I asked “In what circumstances are you most inclined to swear?”, their answers once again contradicted. The teacher said that she mostly swears when she is alone. She even said that she probably swears about three times a day and usually keeps it in her head. The student replied with a particularly long pause when I asked the question. Finally he answered, saying that he didn’t really have  control over his swearing and mostly swears whenever he feels like it and didn’t feel that any certain type of situations prompted him to swear more often.

The last question I asked them was “How do you excuse your swearing?” The teacher said that she only swears around those who are not bothered by it and did not really have a problem with others swearing around her. The student said that they were just words and felt that it was okay to swear.

Some other interesting things I observed were that swearing habits between teachers and the students were opposite for the most part. The teachers tend to swear a lot less than the students. I do not think that it is a coincidence that this is the case.

Whether it is realized or not, it seems to me that adults have realized that swearing constantly may seem foolish. Of course, for those still in high school, like the students I asked, swearing may not seem as a big deal as it is so widespread. Adults, on the other hand, have experienced much more outlook in general than just in school and have witnessed better balance of word usage than you might find in the BPHS hallways or any other school for that matter.

My opinion on swearing seems to be a little different you could say. I see no point in swearing at all as it does not make sense in context more than half of the time. I see speech as a gift that not all of us are fortunate to have. I think language can be used in different ways than it is today and come off more respectable as humans if we were more “clean.” I admit that I have not been living up to my own expectations myself and could do better.

Most of those I interviewed had expressed that swearing is not that big of a deal. I differ greatly, as you can see, with their opinions, and I think that there are many other ways to express yourself than swearing.

I am not going to lie but when I walk past someone much younger than myself, I don’t feel comfortable and even cringe whenever I hear them swear. I am sure that others may feel the same about us as students and maybe on all people.

Even though some may feel like it does no harm, I think swearing does have an impact on how people see you as a whole. At that, a negative one.