Cunt!

[Aurora Black]

What does the word mean to you as a writer? As an individual?

Do you see it as degrading or liberating? A celebration of a woman's sex or a great put-down?

What's your reaction when you hear it spoken or read it in print?

Personally, I cringed a little when I wrote the thread title. ( ) I was raised to consider "cunt" to be one of the biggest insults (if not the biggest) aimed at a woman, and for a long time I associated it with something dirty. Since joining Lit I've tried to dispel this feeling by using it for the first time in a piece I did for the Group Sex cat, but I still have issues surrounding that particular 4-letter word.

 

[minsue]

It is, for me, one of the few words that still retains a power and I very rarely use it. I have to be really angry to call someone a cunt.

Used in erotic stories, it always throws me off. It's just, just, ... icky.

 

[matriarch]

It is, for me, one of the few words that still retains a power and I very rarely use it. I have to be really angry to call someone a cunt.

Used in erotic stories, it always throws me off. It's just, just, ... icky.

What she said.
I dislike that word more than any other epithet.

 

[scheherazade_79]

I think it's just really rude.

 

[Antfarmer77]

I'm sort of torn really. The only time I ever use it is when I'm driving and I'm alone in the car, I do feel it's an almost too vulgar term for regular conversation. By the same token how many times have you, or heard someone' call a guy a Dick? It's happened to me more than once ( hard to believe I know...LOL). So why is it so bad to use the "C" word and less bad to use the "D" word?

 

[neonlyte]

It is, for me, one of the few words that still retains a power and I very rarely use it. I have to be really angry to call someone a cunt.

Used in erotic stories, it always throws me off. It's just, just, ... icky.

I think it can be used carefully and sparingly... I only use it in the context of shocking a character in the story by its use, just as I would in real life. And still, like 'Rora, I cringe slightly when I use it.

 

[Equinoxe]

I must say that I am not particularly fond of the word; I do not, in general, care for "word rehabilitation", but the word has never had the same effect, for me, that it clearly does for others -- I just think it's a cacophonic word, the sounds are not pleasing.

 

[minsue]

I'm sort of torn really. The only time I ever use it is when I'm driving and I'm alone in the car, I do feel it's an almost too vulgar term for regular conversation. By the same token how many times have you, or heard someone' call a guy a Dick? It's happened to me more than once ( hard to believe I know...LOL). So why is it so bad to use the "C" word and less bad to use the "D" word?

It's the word itself, not the body part that it represents. I have no problem with "dick", but I also have no problem with "pussy" either.

 

[minsue]

I just think it's a cacophonic word, the sounds are not pleasing.

You're quite right, Q.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

In the minority... again...

I wrote a poem about it once... Semantics?

The words don't matter... it's the intent and the love (or not) behind them... I can be completely swept away sometimes when he pins me to the wall on his way out the door and puts his hand between my legs and says, "Tonight, I'm going to fuck that hot, wet cunt until you can't walk!"

Being called a cunt by someone I don't know? Entirely different story...

 

[janiexx]

I hate the word and I never use it, but I don't know why I hate it so much.

I think I must have heard someone use it as an insult when I was younger and it had a strong effect on me.

But I also cringe when I write the word "pussy". And in fact, if I think about it, if cunt didn't have such strong connotations for me, I would prefer it...

Am I making sense here? Cunt seems to be a more appropriate word somehow...

janiexx

 

[Recidiva]

I was raised to hate this word, but here's the volume that changed my mind in this simple paragraph.

"Hygieia: A Woman's Herbal" - Jeannine Parvati

There's a power to language as well as with herbs. We purposely use the word "cunt" interchangeably with vagina, etc., in an effort to discharge the fear of patriarchal punishments. WE can only be embarrassed by our anatomy and the English descriptive words by keeping them hidden, unused except in situations of anger, hysteria and pain. "You cunt" can only hurt our little girls if we mystify the word by responding shamefully. Lenny Bruce said that if the President of the United States would introduce his cabinet as "The nigger, Secretary of State, the spick, Dept. Of Interior, etc.," that prejudice would lose its vehicle for transmission. Let us not prejudice our daughters to their own bodies by being embarrassed by the word cunt ever again.

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

Interesting that those posting here, including the thread author, apparently have "epithet" as the first definition in their internal dictionary. Understandable, though.

Unless the story is supposed to have a more sophisticated or purely romantic tone I like to use it sparingly in sex act descriptions to connote, "now we're really getting down and dirty." (Don't like the adjectivie "dirty" there, but that's how the saying goes.)

Churchill advised English-language writers to in general use the Anglo-Saxon term instead of the Latin-root one: "Fire! Fire!" instead of "Conflagration! Conflagration!" Note I specified in general.

Really, there is a something of a dearth of good words to denote the female sex. Latin-root terms such as "vagina," "pudenda," "vulva," etc. have a somewhat clinical sound; not so good in a "down and dirty" sex scene. "Cunt" is widely viewed as a epithet. "Pussy" seems adolescent to me for some reason (as does "boobs.") In my own "work" (doesn't feel like work!) I mix them up and do the best I can, depending on the circumstances.

 

[CharleyH]

What does the word mean to you as a writer? As an individual?

Do you see it as degrading or liberating? A celebration of a woman's sex or a great put-down?

What's your reaction when you hear it spoken or read it in print?

Personally, I cringed a little when I wrote the thread title. ( ) I was raised to consider "cunt" to be one of the biggest insults (if not the biggest) aimed at a woman, and for a long time I associated it with something dirty. Since joining Lit I've tried to dispel this feeling by using it for the first time in a piece I did for the Group Sex cat, but I still have issues surrounding that particular 4-letter word.

Its a word and like any word, I think it depends on the context under which it is said. I am not inherantly offended by it in any context, but then it has four letters that don't offend me on their own. The sound is a bit harsh, but then so is cock. I think it has come to mean something offensive to women, but it makes me wonder why similar male anatomy terms do not ever have the same affect?

In part I agree with Min. For me it's a word with little power on first thought, however, perhaps cunt is a word women should take power of, finally? I am pretty sure that's what African-Americans-Europeans, et al have done with the word nigger. By empowering an offensive word, I think in part we nullify the bad effects or affects of it.

Words, over time, will change in their meaning, after all.

Edit to add: but it depends on the culture and a politically correct one is only ever condusive to avoiding.

 

[impressive]

Its a word and like any word, I think it depends on the context under which it is said.

Bingo.

In the right context, I find it ("cunt" AND "bingo") incredibly sexy.

 

[CharleyH]

Bingo.

In the right context, I find it ( "bingo") incredibly sexy.

LOL - So that's the mysterious word you use during orgasm! lol joking, of course.

 

[Aurora Black]

Edit to add: but it depends on the culture and a politically correct one is only ever condusive to avoiding.

It's a vicious cycle. The more society avoids the issue of the offensive word(s), the more power they have.

 

[impressive]

LOL - So that's the mysterious word you use during orgasm! lol joking, of course.

No, that's my safe word.

 

[Guest]

B - I - N G O!




You're right. I'm all a-tingle.

 

[AngeloMichael]

From an episode of South Park

Stan asks Jimmy (who stutters) to tell Wendy she's "a continuing source of inspiration" to him.

Jimmy (to Wendy): Stan says your a cunt...Stan says your a cunt...your a cunt...

Wendy walks away seriously pissed.

Jimmy (to no one): ...a continuing source of inspiration...




I don't think I could ever say that word out loud to anyone, especially women. (Well, maybe Ann Coulter) However, when writing especially hot sex scenes I view the use of that word the same way I view using the word cock. In other words, it's ok to portray the intensity of the sex.

If a character ever calls someone a cunt in one of my stories, they are painted in a bad light.

 

[Recidiva]

From an episode of South Park

Stan asks Jimmy (who stutters) to tell Wendy she's "a source of continuing inspiration" to him.

Jimmy (to Wendy): Stan says your a cunt...Stan says your a cunt...your a cunt...

Wendy walks away seriously pissed.

Jimmy (to no one): ...a continuing source of inspiration...




I don't think I could ever say that word out loud to anyone, especially women. (Well, maybe Ann Coulter) However, when writing especially hot sex scenes I view the use of that word the same way I view using the word cock. In other words, it's ok to portray the intensity of the sex.

If a character ever calls someone a cunt in one of my stories, they are painted in a bad light.

My husband's said it twice, both after starting to post on Lit.

"That woman is a cunt. I don't think I've said that word in front of you before."
"No, but you're right, she is."
"Okay."

Then he said it again about another woman. But we pretty much agree on the assessment. So there you go.

 

[CharleyH]

No, that's my safe word.

How is no sexy? unless SSSarrahh tries to rhyme it with bingo. LOL

 

[rgraham666]

I'm in the situational pew on this one. It's the context the word is used in.

In the romantic or softer pieces I write I never use that word. It is rather jarring and nasty.

Use it more often in BDSM and Reluctance pieces, it sets the mood because it is jarring and nasty.

Rarely use it in real life and never out loud. But that neighbour a few doors down is a stupid, vicious cunt.

 

[Guest]

.....

 

[Lauren Hynde]

Here is a brilliant use of the word, found in Irvine Welsh's "Porno". Two excerpts, narrated by two different characters:

Simon looks upward and says, "The starry heavens above me and the moral law within me."

"Kant..." I say in a mixture of admiration and consternation (...) But he just turns around quickly and he looks vaguely insulted. He says nothing but there's an urging look in his eyes. "You used my favourite quote from my favourite philosopher," I explain, "Kant."

"Oh... it's a favourite of mine as well," he says, his face breaking into a smile.

That was a strange one outside hers when she caught me looking up at the stars. I gave that quote from a Nick Cave song and I thought she called me a cunt. I didn't realise that she was referring to Kant the philosopher. I even called Renton up about it. He reckons that Cave liften that line verbatim from a Kant book. What the fuck is the world coming to when your favourite lyricists let you down with such shoddy plagiarism?