Book Review #1

**Disclaimer**

This blog post is intended for Halfcookies readers between the ages of 18 and 49. If you are outside of this age range, please visit our other posts.

**Disclaimer**

Here’s something you’ve always known but may have been too goddamn stupid to realize—profanity is hardwired into the human brain, and could even be one of the fundamental components of language. Well, no shit—my first words were, “That fucking hurts, you pedophiliac asshole!” And now, thanks to Steven Pinker’s book The Stuff of Thought, you finally have something tangible to turn to for ammunition (or, at several pounds in hardcover format, to use as an actual weapon) against any dumbfuck who tries to tell you otherwise.

According to Pinker, swearing is rooted in the ancient, or reptilian, part of the human brain. Damn. I don’t know exactly what that means, but Reptile was one kickass bastard in Mortal Kombat 2 (or in the original Mortal Kombat, if you knew what the fuck you were doing). So, as a guy who can string together a god-damn-mother-fucking-son-of-a-bitch or two, I’ll take Pinker’s neuroanatomy lesson as a compliment.

Plus, being the reptilian brain, not the squirrel or candy-ass brain, it must be some pretty serious gray matter, right? I mean, I bet a T. Rex could buttfuck a brontosaurus while letting shit fly like Richard Pryor on speed at a Klan rally. Total hyperspace mega-shit. And velociraptors, those motherfuckers hunted in packs, so you know they had their shit together—physically, mentally, profanally.

Don’t believe me? Think back to Jurassic Park. Now, can you imagine an assload of velociraptors stalking their prey, saying bullshit like, “Oh my gosh, there’s a tasty triceratops, let’s go take down that emm effer.” No, you can’t—because if that were even possible, it would singlehandedly ruin my childhood dinosaur fantasies, along with everyone else’s. In a child’s mind, all dinosaurs—even those pussies the compys—curse like hung-over Irish sailors with jellyfish strapped to their cocks.

Thanks to those imaginary foulmouthed dinos (and some Irish ancestry), I’ve always had a soft spot for hard language. So it’s tough not to take it personally when people say things like “What the F,” “What the Freak,” or “F-Bomb.” Hey dickheads, either curse or don’t curse. But please, don’t befoul the purity of swear words—words that people like me have worked so hard to cultivate—with those euphemistic abominations.

So back to that Pinker jerkoff, that’s got to be a pretty goddamn good book. Oh, and I almost forgot… wait for it… cunt.


This post was inspired by Josie Glausiusz’s Dirty Minds blurb in the September 2007 issue of Wired magazine.