EER wrote:Apparently, native speakers hardly ever use the word 'fuck' as it is very offensive in English. Over here though, it's just a word.
It depends on where you are at least as much as whether or not you are a native speaker.
Around here, of the seven words (shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker, and tits) probably I would point to cunt as the one people hardly ever use. Probably cocksucker is the next most uncommon. Then fuck, motherfucker and shit occupy about the same level, though fuck is usually understood to be more offensive than shit so might be used a bit less. Piss and tits are everyday speak.
I read somewhere that in England things are different, Fuck sits alone atop the list of profanity, and all others are tied for second. On the other hand I think I read somewhere else that that was bullshit. Perhaps one of the natives can tell us.
However, I've heard that dutch is the only language in which diseases are used as profanity, so we may be used to a lot of verbal abuse to be bothered about trivialities like 'fuck'.
Fuck isn't trivial. It isn't trivial because it is profanity. Being profanity is, in itself, enough to make a word non trivial. That is because profanity isn't like other words. Your brain must go through a different process to speak it and, more importantly, your brain processes it in a different way when you hear it. Which means that by speaking a word the listener's brain considers profane you can cause a biological reaction that no other type of word can create.
