Patrick Ishmael has a great post on the potty-mouth posters on the Internet, who uses those words and how much.
But how different are the Rightosphere and Leftosphere when it comes to "dirty" language? Which side produces the most profanity-laced diatribes? Via Instapundit, I happened upon this interesting challenge from InstaPunk:I propose an exercise to be performed by those who have the software and expertise to carry it out. The exercise is this: Search six months' worth of content, posts and comments, of the 20 most popular blogs on the right and the left. The search criteria are George Carlin's infamous '7 Dirty Words.' [Click this link for the list of expletives.]
And this is what I found, using what I deemed -- through a mix of TTLB and 2006's Weblog Award lists -- to be the 18 biggest Lefty blogs, and 22 biggest Righty blogs. I couldn't account for the 6-month time period, and I even gave the Lefty blogs a 4 blog advantage. But it didn't make much of a difference.
So how much more does the Left use Carlin's "seven words" versus the Right? According to my calculations, try somewhere in the range of 18-to-1.
This isn't surprising to anyone who actually reads blogs. Just reading my blog, it is always the lefty bloggers who think they are being "edgy" by using words that used to cause your mom to wash out your mouth.
But why such a big difference? Is it really necessary for expression to use vulgarity 146,000 times on a site in six months?
It's not that I've never used that sort of language. I started out my career in journalism in a newspaper sports department (as one of two women, I might add). You get a potty mouth really quick when you're on deadline and don't have all the copy you need for your page.
But the people on Daily KOS, who use the seven words 146,000 times in six months, consider this to be the speech that the First Amendment is designed to protect. While the First Amendment may give one the right to use such language in common conversation, using it constantly shows a lack of maturity...and a small vocabulary to boot.
UPDATE: Acephalous runs the same tests and comes up with dramatically reduced numbers for lefties. I wonder if he ran it on righties (other than one or two?). My bet is still on moonbats being bigger potty mouths than conservatives.
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