On "Bitch" and other Misogynist language

[sigmasix]

93. linguistic realities

There are people that continue to claim that language has no real power over us- that words are just sounds or pictographic representations on a chalk board or peice of paper. I have listened to these sorts of trivializations of the impact and importance of language for years and find I am still amazed at the ability to self-deceive that this point of view represents. The point of the OP was not the notion that these words should be out lawed; the point is that certain words are linked to, and pervasive in, the cultural and emotional de-humanization of women. The OP goes on to suggest that individuals who choose to use these words cannot honestly make the claim that they are not a participant in the self-same dehumanizing act.
Language is the one tool that we recognize as a humanizing agent. In fact, there is strong evidence that the acquisition of language is what makes us human beings. Language enables us to exchange ideas, express emotive states, articulate visions of the future and past and influence the actions of others. Linguistics is the study of the way human languages work, where they may come from, and the function they serve. Other than fire, language acquisition and manipulation is probably the most powerful of the tools that enabled early man to overcome threats posed to mankind as a species.
There is no tool available to mankind that is more powerful than language- not even the atom bomb, yet many people continue to claim that language is a largely benign, passive part of the human condition as a whole.
Words like c#nt and bitch aren't just ugly pejoratives; they are powerful social tools used to legitimize and perpetuate a moral standard that places women in a box of preconceived notions and social strictures that seeks to dehumanize and trivialize them as important, productive leaders and human beings. Language has always served the social and political needs of the elite. The relationships between culture and language are not unidirectional; culture does not construct language and language does not construct culture- the relationship is a whole lot messier than that. As societies grow and change to reflect the various goals mankind shares, so does the language. The reasons behind those changes are not sufficiently explained by these sort of simplistic notions of representational reality being uttered by different and new agents- those changes are related to power structures within the culture and the linguistic defense mechanisms at work in sweeping intellectual and moral paradigm shifts.
Power does not give up it's advantages easily, and language will always be the last hiding place for those mechanisms that seek to defend power.
Feminist criticism is very adept at the discovery and articulation of these defense mechanisms. A time is coming when we ought to be rid of these out-moded linguistic entities that defend and promulgate a dead-end power structure that entails the exploitation and dehumanization of the "other"- in this case, women.
Why are there so many men that don't seem to understand this?
Answer: because men have been inculcated since birth to be the impetus behind the power structures within our culture. Not in a directed conspiracy, but in an organic personal way. It is difficult to see the forest when one is hiding in a hollow trunk.
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just my .02