Recently, I came across a Hindi movie about a gang of girl-friends celebrating friendship, going back to nostalgia and overcoming situations, good or bad together. Therefore, an underlying thought cropped up as an after effect of the movie that whether or not using cuss words makes us cool?
While spending 5 years in Uttar Pradesh, I remember that using cuss words in school to greet someone close was a fashion and words like “chudail” (which refers to a ‘witch’ in English) because using profane language was considered cool than obscene. But, I agree there was no creativity that can be done with them because either we didn’t know the new words or it was too blasphemous for us to use.
At times, cuss words were too boorish for anyone who was not used to those words or not actually deliberating to learn them. I am not saying we were the stereotypes of “miss goodie two shoes“, just that we were yet to realize that using those words make us into cool kids. But what do I know, I was a nerd in school.
Progressive people using progressive languages is likely to be a trend that happens to fit us in the society or perhaps people do it out of habit. No doubt, using profane language is one of them.
Embracing abusive languages in the inner circle- be it family or friends is a private affair. But I fail to understand why Bollywood is replacing dialogues with cuss words in hope to make it look more realistic? Do we really need that on the big screen?
Forget about making the story realistic, it looks like an uncomfortable pink feather boa teamed up with an outfit because it happens to be in trend and it is needless to talk about the frequent F***-bombs that drops now and then almost after every dialogue in the reel as well as in real life- so for the latter one I am not complaining.
Youths do like to express their feelings in an explicit manner be it anger, hatred, pain or happiness. There is no harm in that. Therefore, it is understandable while watching a movie that includes youths of today.
It’s not that we never behaved in that manner, we did but we had a very filtered, or say, a very subtle version of the cuss words that are in trend.
What one needs to realize that to bring out the flavors of the characters, it is not only the cuss words that make them look realistic or one that you can relate to, but the story and the plot form the base.
For example, it is very obvious that in gangster movies, a bandit or a robber will unlikely use any ornamental language to communicate, so when this character is using curse words, it is completely understandable. But, why do we need the extravagant use of these profane languages in certain movies, just to show urban coolness?
Do we always need to hear the “mother-sister” prefixed slang words and many more in every other line of a friendly banter or a moment of dejection just to validate the coolness of lifestyle and attitude? Using this kind of language or expression just to validate coolness looks too synthetic. It is like shoving bad food down your throat.
I understand that we all are different and that what makes us cool. When we are with a bunch of friends, we too have a different style or a tangled language of jargon, which others find it very difficult to understand. But, speaking of us- our conversation never involved or involves five cuss-words in every alternate sentence.
Does opting for extremity make us look appealing? I can watch a movie filled with obscene language and visuals as long as it doesn’t look synthetic. I can agree with ‘Guns and Thighs’, expletive language and much more. ‘Dev D’ and similar movies about modern youth talking in “Saaley-Kaminey” language, which is like a baby’s babbling or shooting Fs before you can catch your next breath.
When boldness is directly proportional to the use of profane language, you get a glimpse of the emotional intelligence of the society.
This makes me wonder often that how celebrities behave in their real life? What we need to understand that whatever we see on screen filters down to almost everybody’s life. Therefore, we need to choose wisely because not always foul people depict common people or make the characters look real on screen.
But then again what do I know. I am still a nerd.