On Profanity in Social Media

Frequently, I run across gratuitous profanity on otherwise professional blogs or websites. While I’m as laid back as the next guy, the trend bothers me.

  

I’m not talking about amateur blogs or the too-cool-for-school crowd of rock bands. I’m talking about people who should know better.   

Joel Postman, a business consultant who blogs about social media (http://www.socializedpr.com) – and who states he spent four years as the speechwriter for the CEO of Sun Microsystems – recently wrote an online column about online ethics. He can’t quite make his point without using an obscenity.  

  

“Some in our profession claim to be confused about the rules for using blogs and other social media in marketing and public relations,” Postman writes. “This is unfamiliar territory. We’re on the frontier of communications. The rules are being written as we speak.’” Bullshit. New media does not require new morality. Most of us know right from wrong, and just because we’re using a blog or an online forum doesn’t release us from our responsibility for ethical behavior.” 
 

The irony, of course, is the writer violates the very behavior he espouses. I don’t think a professional would use the word “bulls###” in a printed trade publication or annual report, so why is it acceptable just because it’s online? Surely a speech writer can generate something more creative than schoolyard profanity. (EDITOR’S NOTE: After this blog appeared, Joel rethought his use of the profanity and deleted the offensive word from his post.)

  

I’m not picking on Joel, as the problem abounds everywhere. For example, I subscribe to a very good communications/public relations website called ragan.com. Unfortunately, the site subjects readers to the occasional “a##hole” or “bulls####” or other obscenity, usually in its headlines no less. I guess the editors assume they’re being hip or edgy, but it only distracts from their message. 

  

Profanity isn’t helping to advance dialogue in social media; it’s a crutch used by those too lazy or immature to recast their sentence. Readers deserve better.