Sci-fi swear words?

[tkdguy]

I've been wondering about how cussing was handled in various science fiction shows. They usually just substitute nonsense words instead of the usual profanity. Some of the ones I've heard were:

Smeg (Red Dwarf): The s-word; including things like "smeg head."
Frell (Farscape): Seems to be a catch-all phrase, since I've heard it susbstituted for both the f-word and the s-word.
Frack (Battlestar Galactica): The f-word, definitely.

Any others?

[BigJackBrass]

Farscape did manage a certain sincerity with its swearing, at least, despite the obvious "made-upness" of the terms. Maybe because they swore so frelling much in that show.

Fans of Red Dwarf have long been amused by a certain brand of refrigerator, by the way: http://www.smeg.it/international/collections.asp?CollName=CC

I'll have to have a think about other sci-fi swearing. Nothing else is coming to mind right now.

EDIT: Didn't Mork have a particular swear word he used? "Shazbat" (sp?) or similar?

[Zeropoint]

Farscape also had "yotz", which seemed to be equivalent to the s-word.

[keithcurtis]

"Oh, Grot!" from Quark (You must be at least 30 to remember this)
"Felgercarb" from the original Battlestar Galactica
"Shazbot" was indeed from Mork and Mindy
"Droog", "Ultra-V" from Clockwork Orange (Not really swear words, I guess)
"Tanj!" From Known Space
"Swut, "Foonting Turlingdrome", "jujuflop", from Hitchhikers Guide. And the very worst of the lot:


"Belgium"


Keith "Washing my mouth out with space soap" Curtis

[DrFaust]

Also Larry Niven's "tanj it."

EDIT: Aw, scooped.

[GothKidSamurai]

Firefly had pseudo-profanity all over the place.

Goram - GD
Rut - used in place of the eff word

And more that I can't remember off hand. Curse loaning my DVDs out.

[AliceTheOwl]

And, of course, the long strings of profanity in Mandarin Chinese in Firefly.

Though apparently, most were not, specifically, profanity or words that would've been bleeped. Most were long strings of unpleasantries.

In one of the Firefly panels at Dragons*con, every time people asked Ron Glass a question he couldn't answer for whatever reason, his reply was, "I don't know the Chinese for it."

[keithcurtis]

At first I thought Goram was Chinese. A Google search shows it is probably coined for the show. The derivation should be self-evident.
Rut however is an actual euphemism for intercourse.

Keith "Rut! Rut! Rut! ha! uncensored!" Curtis

[GothKidSamurai]

Yeah, I know that rut is an actual term for intercourse. But you don't normally here people say "rutting engine" or whatever.

[Gawain]

I think that Red Dwarf's "smeg" is a shortened form of the word "smegma" which would make a fine swear-word as is.

[SCUBA Hero]

""Tanj!" From Known Space
T here
A in't
N o
J ustice!

And from Heinlein,

T here
A in't
N o
S uch
T hing
A s
A
F ree
L unch

[Nyrath]

Wikipedia is your friend....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fictional_curse_words

[Major Tom]

Let's see... Judge Dredd (the movie) had "Holy drok!" as a curse phrase.


Major Tom :cool:

[Oruncrest]

T here
A in't
N o
J ustice!

And from Heinlein,

T here
A in't
N o
S uch
T hing
A s
A
F ree
L unch
Well, if we're gonna use acrostics, we might as well add Bend Over! Here It Comes Again! (or BOHICA, for short) From Negation

[McCoy]

Lilo and Stitch count? Gantu keeps saying something like "Blitznak!"

[TheQuestionMan]

FireFly Chinese Quotes and Translations
http://www.browncoats.com/index.php?parent=3e5aa2f800c31&line=3e546fb171d22

That's Shiny completely da bien hua.

QM

[Fenixcrest]

From Transformers:
Slag, being the general expletive taking the place of the S-word. "Aw, SLAG"/"What a slag-head."

[DrFaust]

Another good "Farscape" one is "frennik," as in "That frennik Rygel got us in it again."

[keithcurtis]

Here is a pretty definitive-looking list:
http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=497833

Keith "not re-inventing the wheel" Curtis

[Basil]

"Felgercarb" should be "feldacarb" and is in use for "that, ya know, guck. The stuff whose name I forgot" in parts of the mid-west USA. I had a friend who came from south Indiana, used the word all the time. BTW, that means it's not a swear word, any more than "thingamabob" or "wossname" is.

"Flup" from Niven's Ringworld stories.

I, too, always though "smeg" was short for "smegma."

I'm trying to remember where I saw "ham it to dell". :rofl:

[keithcurtis]

Sources vary on the spelling of the classic Galactica word. Although it was never precisely defined, it's usage seems to indicate at least a pejorative, as in, "What is this feldercarb!?"

Here's a page that lists several spelling varients:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fictional_curse_words
I'd post the actual entry, but it contains a real swear word.

BTW, how long ago did your friend use the word? Galactica is over 27 years old.

Keith "Now I feel old..." Curtis

PS. Smeg is absolutely short for smegma, as verified in numerous interviews.

[tkdguy]

Oh drek, I forgot all about Belgium! :D

Age of Empires does have "Ahh, smite me!" And HM Murdock of the A-Team often called BA Barracus an "ugly mudsucker."

Of course, RA Salvatore wrote my favorite curse in The Crystal Shard. When translated, it means, "May the fleas of a thousand reindeer nest in your genitals."

Thanks for the links and suggestions, all!

[gewing]

"Oh, Grot!" from Quark (You must be at least 30 to remember this)
"Felgercarb" from the original Battlestar Galactica
"Shazbot" was indeed from Mork and Mindy
"Droog", "Ultra-V" from Clockwork Orange (Not really swear words, I guess)
"Tanj!" From Known Space
"Swut, "Foonting Turlingdrome", "jujuflop", from Hitchhikers Guide. And the very worst of the lot:


"Belgium"


Keith "Washing my mouth out with space soap" Curtis


My favorite is still "srizonified" (been 15 years, spelling uncertain) from Doc Smith's "masters of the vortex" more or less "descended from a thousand generations of dwellers in unflowering muck." I suspect muck was a polite translation. :D

Sthondat from Man Kzin iirc, "willing Slave" was good too.

[Captain Obvious]

Hammer's Slammers had "cop", which was used in the same way as the S-word. Which leads me to believe that "cop" comes from the same source as "coprophage" and "coprolite".

They had a couple of others, too, but I don't have my books handy to check.

[Nyrath]

Here's a page that lists several spelling varients:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fictional_curse_words
*sigh* I did post that link already here (http://www.herogames.com/forums/showpost.php?p=841134&postcount=12), so you must have me ignored. Was it something I said? ;)

[keithcurtis]

Huh? Did you say something?
Honestly, I must have read past it, looking for praise upon my bon mots and malaprops. :)

Hey boards! Nyrath said it first!

Keith "scooped" Curtis

[Brother Jim]

the BOHICA one is an actual military phrase









not that the "meaning" is any different mind you:D




man.....i miss crossgen comics.

[Lethosos]

Farg. Comes from the name of a planet named Fargnax. Lemme see if I can't retrieve the full explaination from the Creatorix Herself... here we go! (I love the Search function. :D )


Alright, Alright, I will tell the story of 'Farg'!

You are correct, I use 'farg' in the same way that 'frell' is used in Farscape...the creation of an alien language swear word is a very, very old tradition in Science Fiction, you know. Back during the fifities and sixties, author Zenna Henderson used to have her alien 'The People' use "Adonday Veeyah!" as a swear word, heck...in more modern times, programs like 'Alien Nation' had the Tenctonese 'Nk'Syks', Star Trek has the Klingon "Ptakh!" and...well...it is a very old tradition...and a tool, too.

A culture is defined as much by its swear words as by any other cultural artifact. Perhaps even greatly so, because what is forbidden, or nasty, tells us instantly something of the values of a given culture!

However, 'Farg' is actually a private, inside 'gag'. I could have used any word in it's place in Unicorn Jelly. It is not important to the story in itself, other than it suggests that the Gryrnese have a different, non-earthly sense of what is good and what is bad, or forbidden. Which is important because the reader must realize that the people in Unicorn Jelly have their own, unique rules and beliefs, ones that are not always expected.

So where did my placeholder word 'Farg' really come from, and what did it mean originally?

For that, we must go back to my days as a Dungeon Master, and the campaigns I ran in my own universes. One of these universes was the Gorbald Universe, a median-entropy, Mundis-like pocket universe that featured galaxies of about 100 stars, and about 50 galaxies in the entire cosmos. It was a 'recycler' style cosmos...big black hole at one 'end' that sucked in matter, and a big white hole at the other 'end' to spew out that very same matter to form new stars and galaxies. It had all kinds of details, and I have a set of handmade books that list those details, for virtually every planet in the universe. I had a lot of time back then, and I was much sharper than I am now.

Anyway, one of the many worlds in the Gorbald cosmos (which was my standard game cosmos at the time) was a little planet (all the planets were little, by that I mean about 4000 mile diameters) called 'Fargnax' which circled the stars Nexalibur, Chrysthinimee, and Velderfar. The Fargnax system was only a short jaunt from one of my most poetic inventions, 'Balocampaspe' the World Of Forgotten Dreams. Goddess, that was a cool place. Anyway, I digress...

Fargnax was home to the Fargnaxians, the Kfyll, who were a purplish biped about seven feet tall. They had dolphin-like heads on a vaguely reptillian body, six fingers arranged like a Venus-Fly Trap on each arm, writhing tendrils where eyes would normally be (these could percieve electrochemical variations in their surroundings, including moods and even distance) and a set of five eyestalks at the top of their elongated skulls that could sense four-dimensional space.

The Kfyll were super-intelligent artisans who built hyperdimensionally folded houses, and they were kind, generous, wise, and utterly without guile. Lawfull Good. Nice folks, if a bit alien on the whole.

They had one thing about them that upset my human cultures in the Gorbald universe though: how they ate.

The Kfyll raised sheep-sized animals called Glicks. A Glick looks like a bright red mass of squirming sea-anemone tenticles all wrapped up into a ball...their body is hidden inside the tendrils...and the only things that peek out of the mass of tendrils are two big floppy ears, five eyes, and a long, twin-tubed elephant-trunk with which they feed.

Now the Fargnaxian Kfyll who breed the Glicks have these dolphin-like faces, only with the 'beak' or 'snout' ending in a long, flexable trunk as well... all animal life on Fargnax follows a similar morphology, as you can imagine...its only logical.

This trunk is used to feed...on Glick fetuses. The Kfyll use their snouts to root about inside pregnant Glicks and gobble their unborn fetuses. This is how they feed, and it is natural to them. It does not harm the rapidly reproducing Glicks at all, and makes for a pretty bloodless way to get meat.

However, at the first human-Kfyll confederation banquet, there was an unfortunate incident of culture clash involving the pregnant wife of a human diplomat and the Kfyll ambassador, and well.... the Kfyll were never admitted to the local version of the 'Federation' in the Gorbald universe. Ever. Their planet was listed as forbidden, and the word 'Fargnax' became one of the worst epithets known. Dirty rotten Fargnaxian Fetus Eater. They could Detect Fetus By Smell, as a basic ability, you know.

Which is all a shame, because the Kfyll had long ago figured out the solution to issues like immortality and the elimination of all disease, as well as multiversal travel and how to achieve lasting peace and so forth.

Fargnax was oft abbriviated to simply 'farg', and so it was in my games, in my worlds, in my campaigns for many years.

In doing Unicorn Jelly, I knew I needed a proper, common swear word for folks to use. It would be too cliche to just have everyone say '****' or 'damn; or whatever all the time...a unique word can express so much, give such a feeling of otherworldliness. I remembered the poor Fargnaxians and their Glick herds, and the word that came from them. I remembered how much fun those old games were that I once ran....

So...since some word had to be used...I used 'Farg'. Happy memories for me every time any character swears.

That is the story of the word 'Farg', and where it comes from.

[keithcurtis]

Farg[ing] was also used in Johnny Dangerously. As was bastich and icehole.

Keith "Did you know your middle name's an adverb?" Curtis

[SuperKlaus]

If you count Shadowrun as sci-fi you get a delightful variety of odd curses.

"What the frag grenade is going on here?"

"Slot off!"

[Cancer]

Going back a long, long ways ... the human protagonists in the Lensman books swore by Klono frequently.

[Dan Brown]

How 'bout Stang! and Blast! from Star Wars?

[AndyStaples]

I seem to recall that in one of Moorcock's Dancers at the End of Time books, a group of alien invaders made liberal use of the word "ferk".

I can't remember what it meant in their language, but it definitely wasn't a swear word - which didn't lessen the severity of their punishment whenever the robot nanny who tamed them heard them using it...

Gotta love Moorcock. ;)

[CSgeekHero]

A Clockwork Orange: Bratchny.

[Duke Bushido]

If you're still keeping track, Firefly's use of 'rut' was not invented; it's more in keeping with the western influence of the show. It's a rural expression, particularly farm-related, and is used most often as a mild version of "the F word."

I grew up getting slapped for using it myself.....

[Fredwidge]

I like inventing mines from my game's culture and then handing them to players for abuse. It helps reinforce the immersion of the game.

Say you're making a game in a world which was ruined by the greedy powers of federated megacorps and their full scale corporated war... The S-word could be replaced by "fedcred"... for federal credits : the currency which lead people to that dreaded apocalyptic war. I'm sure you can come out with better ones, even though it's a bit off topic. ;)

[Tiree]

the BOHICA one is an actual military phrase

not that the "meaning" is any different mind you:D

man.....i miss crossgen comics.

True, one of my favorites from the military is SNAFU and FUBAR - oddly enough both were businesses in the same shopping center when I was growing up...


Situation Normal All F'd Up
F'd Up Beyond All Recognition

Now go get me some batteries for the Chem Light

[BigJackBrass]

Federation starships in TWERPS Twek fire Phubar Torpedoes, by the way.

[Brother Jim]

True, one of my favorites from the military is SNAFU and FUBAR - oddly enough both were businesses in the same shopping center when I was growing up...


Situation Normal All F'd Up
F'd Up Beyond All Recognition

Now go get me some batteries for the Chem Light


okay, but you gotta get me a bucket of steam :D :D

i'll see you after liberty call with those batteries, they might take all day to find :eg:

[Phil]

Let's see... Judge Dredd (the movie) had "Holy drok!" as a curse phrase.
Major Tom :cool:

Judge Dredd universe actually has quite a detailed list of swearing:
Grud - God (as in Holy Grud! Grud Almighty etc.), Stomm, Spug and Drokk. I'm pretty sure there were others. The Games Workshop JD game had a list of the legal and illegal words, not sure if Mongoose's D20 version does the same.

I'm 99% certain that smeg derives from smegma. And I was tremendously amused by the suggestion the "blast" is a futuristic swear word, because my mother has been using this for as long as I've been alive, and that's definitely before Star Wars!

[Rapier]

Lilo and Stitch count?

Let us sincerely hope not. :)

[DrFaust]

I'm 99% certain that smeg derives from smegma.

Back when I was reading about "Red Dwarf," the newsgroup FAQ reported that Grant and Nayloy maintain they invented the word on their own. Whether that's the case or not is up for debate.

[keithcurtis]

The mild vulgarism smeg is a shortened version of the word "smegma", a particularly unpleasant bodily secretion. It gained greatly increased prominence through its use as a supposedly inoffensive expletive in the British sci-fi/sit-com Red Dwarf, together with a string of derived words including "smegging", "smeghead", etc.
Some fans' theories notwithstanding, the creators of the Red Dwarf series deny that "smegma" is the etymology of the term and claim that it is an invented word. However, lexicographer Tony Thorne, in his 1990 Dictionary of Contemporary Slang (ISBN 074752856X), reports instances of "smeg" (and derivatives) being used as a term of "mild contempt and even affection" among "schoolboys, students and punks" as early as the mid-1970s – a decade or so prior to the inception of the Red Dwarf phenomenon – and claims unequivocally that the etymology of the term traces back to "smegma". Observers who can personally recall using the term "smeg" during the Punk boom of the 1970s see the Red Dwarf creators' claims as the result of either independent parallel development, selective memory, or dissembling.

I have seen interviews with the cast/creators where they are asked about the word and their reactions seem to indicate that the word dervied from smegma. So go fig.

Keith "smegologist" Curtis

[Basil]

BTW, how long ago did your friend use the word? Galactica is over 27 years old.

Um, about that or maybe more. Perhaps as much as 30 years back. In any event, he explained it as common where he came from.

[keithcurtis]

It was really popular immediately after the series premiered. I'd be curious if anyone else has experience with this word that pre-dates BG.

Keith "SF Etymologist" Curtis

[Phil]

Age of Empires does have "Ahh, smite me!" And HM Murdock of the A-Team often called BA Barracus an "ugly mudsucker."

Reminds me of a spoof by British comic Harry Enfield (pseudowikipedia entry: Sketch comedian, funny in the 90s, not thereafter). At the time, the BBC used to voice over objectionable language in films, and he provided an interpretation of how they might present Goodfellas, along the lines of:

"You fun my wife?"
"I fun your wife!"
"Suck my cake, you cake sucker"
"Kiss my knees, muddy funster"

A big part of the humour being that the speech was in broad NY accent (or bad British impression thereof!) but the replaced word was provided in the crispest, 'proper' BBC English.

[Suleyman Rashid]

In The Fifth Element, one of the characters uses the phrase "Smoke you!" when confronted by a cop.

[HeroPink!]

Well, if we're gonna use acrostics, we might as well add Bend Over! Here It Comes Again! (or BOHICA, for short) From Negation

Uh-uh.
Bend
Over
And
Spread
Them,
Here
It
Comes
Again,
Right
Up
The
A--:hush:

BOASTHICARUTA


Not swearing 'zactly, but "mucker" from Stand...
Stand...
Oh no I can't remember!:stupid: I feel so BLONDE!:idjit::doi::cry:


And "simpleton" is used interestingly in A Canticle for Liebowitz.

[Basil]

Not swearing 'zactly, but "mucker" from Stand...
Stand...
Oh no I can't remember!:stupid: I feel so BLONDE!:idjit::doi::cry:

Stand On Zanzibar. :)

Which also gives us "slotting bleeder."

"Om take it!" is in one of the Diskworld books; I forget which.

[Tiree]

okay, but you gotta get me a bucket of steam :D :D

i'll see you after liberty call with those batteries, they might take all day to find :eg:

I'll get you that steam, but I need some Brake Light Fluid and some Spark Plugs for that HMMWV.

[garou]

Heinlein uses "fraki" in Citizen of the Galaxy. It is a "harmless, rather repulsive little animal", but it is used as "stranger", in a dirogatory manner. It's not really a curse word, but it is an insult.

[Michael Hopcroft]

"Beligum! That's so Un-Hoopy!"

[Citizen Keen]

I'm such a horrible reader. I got really excited about a post about "Sci-Fi Wear Swords?"

Now that I think about it...

[SCUBA Hero]

Robert Heinlein, in 'Friday' and possibly others:

Slitch

Used in a sentence, "That sleasy slitch has locked some of the files."

I assume it's a combination of two derogatory words, both of which are probably verboten here.

[Kaeto]

okay, but you gotta get me a bucket of steam :D :D

i'll see you after liberty call with those batteries, they might take all day to find :eg:

Don't for get the chow line and prop wash while you're at it.:ugly:

[McCoy]

I'll get you that steam, but I need some Brake Light Fluid and some Spark Plugs for that HMMWV.
While you're getting those spark plugs, can you see if they have an extra clutch pedal? Mine's missing one.

[gamerz123]

"Beligum! That's so Un-Hoopy!"

"Oh, Grot!" from Quark (You must be at least 30 to remember this)

"Belgium"

Keith "Washing my mouth out with space soap" Curtis

Oh drek, I forgot all about Belgium! :D

Of course, RA Salvatore wrote my favorite curse in The Crystal Shard. When translated, it means, "May the fleas of a thousand reindeer nest in your genitals."

Thanks for the links and suggestions, all!

I am aghast that the board moderators would allow such expansive use of the "B" word :shock:

With that said, I'll get back to reading The Collected Works of the Great Volron Poets (2,354.33333 pgs, Snootcourt and Quadriday Intergalactic Press) :D

[dbsousa]

"Oh, Grot!" from Quark (You must be at least 30 to remember this)
"Felgercarb" from the original Battlestar Galactica
"Shazbot" was indeed from Mork and Mindy
"Droog", "Ultra-V" from Clockwork Orange (Not really swear words, I guess)
"Tanj!" From Known Space
"Swut, "Foonting Turlingdrome", "jujuflop", from Hitchhikers Guide. And the very worst of the lot:


"Belgium"


Keith "Washing my mouth out with space soap" Curtis

Droog is Russian for friend, as in: "I was hangin' out wif my droogs the other day..."

David "learned it from my future children" Sousa

[keithcurtis]

Now that you say that, it occurs that I've been told that before. Memory like a steel seive!
I just did a web search on it and found an interesting article on "Nadsat", the fictional teenspeak of A Clockwork Orange. Here it is (http://soomka.com/nadsat.html), for anyone who's interested.

Keith "Bezoomy Nazz" Curtis

[Captain Obvious]

Well, every time I think of Nadsat, I then think of Newspeak. Although there's not much in the way of swear words there, except maybe "thought criminal"....

http://www.newspeakdictionary.com/ns_frames.html

[Suleyman Rashid]

Niven's kzinti use "sthondhat" as an interpersonal curse, and certainly take it as an insult when they are called one.

"Hey, Chuft-Captain... what sthondhat was your sister?"

[Killer Shrike]

"Droog", "Ultra-V" from Clockwork Orange (Not really swear words, I guess)


Droog is actually a phoenetic pronunciation of the russian word for friend/comrade, IIRC

[Killer Shrike]

True, one of my favorites from the military is SNAFU and FUBAR - oddly enough both were businesses in the same shopping center when I was growing up...


Situation Normal All F'd Up
F'd Up Beyond All Recognition

Now go get me some batteries for the Chem Light
And 500 yards of flight line, and go ask Gunny if he can find a PRC-E7

[keithcurtis]

Droog is actually a phoenetic pronunciation of the russian word for friend/comrade, IIRC
Scroll up to post #58

Keith "me droogy-woog" Curtis

[Major Tom]

I found one curse word in the rulebook for the Rebellion mecha miniatures
game (which is based on the Starsiege computer game): "glitches". This
word is used in the same sort of context that the term "toasters" is used in the
new Battlestar Galactica. It's appropriate in a creepy sort of way, since
Starsieges basic premise is that the human race is fighting for its survival
against the "descendants" of robotic war machines they created. Even the name
of the mechanical enemy is close to that of BSG's -- Cybrids.


Major Tom :dyn