Trigger Words

 

(This post is not intended for those who get the vapors from foul language.)

Now that the trigger warning is out of the way, let’s get down to business.

I probably talk about foul language more than I should, but the controversy surrounding it randomly intrudes on my consciousness until it becomes an itch I have to scratch. What some consider offensive language is still language. As a writer, I have nothing else to work with, so yeah. It’s a big deal to me.

I use (probably more than) my fair share of potentially offensive language; never for the purpose of giving offense. That is not to say the character into whose mouth I put those words doesn’t mean to give offense. Sometimes giving offense is the reason they opened their mouth at all. Whether a reader is offended is up to the reader. I have plenty else to worry about.

I submitted a story a while back in which a woman, a detestable person, called a male associate a faggot. He responded by calling her a cunt. The story was accepted, but I was asked to change “faggot” because it’s an offensive term.

“Cunt” was okay.

Here’s the thing: I meant no offense by using “faggot;” the character did. My job was to expose her for the detestable character she was, and dialog is an outstanding way to do so. I made the change – to “bitch,” which I felt was watered down in that context – but  it got me thinking.

Conventional wisdom says to avoid potentially offensive language, lest you scare away readers. Let’s look at that. Lee Child is known for not using foul language in his Reacher books, yet the streaming “Reacher” series is laden with it. Are viewers less sensitive than readers?

Maybe they are. Apparently not always, though. Dennis Lehane’s most recent, Small Mercies, is loaded with references to “niggers” by racist whites. That’s the point: these people are loathsome racists and that’s the word they would use. They wouldn’t say, “Those n-words are going to my kids’ school over my dead body” and it’s stupid to pretend they would. Lehane faces up to it and the book is critically and financially successful.

I write about crime. I do not wish to smooth the edges from a hardened criminal by having him – or her – refrain from language that might offend someone. Much of what people like that say is intended to offend.

While I do not use sensitivity readers, I do take suggestions from my editor, who I trust implicitly. When he asks, “Are you sure this is the word you want to use here?” I may not make a change, but I will seriously consider it.*

Since I brought it up, what Is the role of a sensitivity reader? To ensure the book offends no one? I hope not. If, as Lehane has said, crime fiction is the modern form of social commentary† – with which I agree – it’s not doing its job if it doesn’t offend somebody.  Maybe a sensitivity reader’s purpose is to identify when a particular group is unfairly characterized – which is worth knowing – but what are the qualifications for such a job? If you include women, gays, Blacks, Hispanics, and Innuits in a book, must you get a different reader for each? If not, who has the chutzpah to promote themselves as the universal arbiter of hurt feelings? (In case you’re wondering, my personal standard is “don’t be a dick.”)

Everything offends somebody, especially today, in what can reasonably be referred to as The Age of Umbrage. Maybe we should worry less about the potential for offense and more about the context and why someone considers the word offensive. “I don’t like that word,” or “It hurts my feelings” are not legitimate arguments.

A woman named Karen England roams the country recruiting and teaching people how to get books they consider to be offensive banned from schools, even in districts in which they do not live.‡ (Could she be more of a Karen?) By her standards, the Kathy Bates character in Misery is a potty mouth. If that woman isn’t a cunt, I don’t know who is.

---

* I will run ideas past people I know who will have insights and experience I lack. When writing The Spread¸ I contacted a couple of gay friends to ask how a gay character might resolve a situation, and why. Their input made it a better book, as they had things to say I would not have thought of. I also did not run the finished product past them to sign off on.

 † Paraphrasing. I can’t find the original quote.

‡ There is even a district in Florida where the banners seek to include dictionaries and encyclopedias.