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<title> A HISTORY FULL OF LANGUAGE CLEANERS </title>
Having read Shirley E Peckhams article Cleaning up the language , I am left with a feeling of disappointment. At first I thought her article would develope into sensible criti-cism over those who fear a devastating damage caused to our language by our young ones, simply by their speaking it. 
	I thought I would find some comments in Mrs Peckhams article regarding the fact that adults who fear degeneration to a language have expressed their fears for as long as there have been news papers publishing letters to the press - and that yet no language anywhere, at anytime, is known to have degenerated due to influence of its younger spea-kers.
	I was looking forward to find some arguments - based on common sence and research - against statements such as: "For if children are to be allowed to continue in this foul anti-social way [to swear and use words like "fucking"] for much longer it will become general practise for all and everyone in future years to behave in like way."
	As I red on, my sensation of disappointment developed, nurished from the fact that Mrs Peckham herself turned out to be one more in the endless line of people who feel called upon to state their opinions on the subject of the young causing ruin to our lang-uage. The quotation above is from her own article.
	The quotation clearly shows Mrs Peckhams opinion about the danger with a "slack" language, but it is, however, important to acknowledge the difference between a personal opinion and an overall wellknown fact. 
	A fact it is - as mentioned above, that the language of juvenails seems always to have caused irritation and rage among adult speakers, maybe to a higher degree the older the adult.
	Irritation is fine. Disaproval is fine. There is no call for everybodys immediate acceptance of a style of language one does not improve of. But - a bit of picking under the surface shows that in most cases the real reason behind the complaints is that "I want things to be as they were when I was little, no one needed swear words when I was a kid so no one should need them now. 
	Well, we don't. The actual use of swear words has no explicit quality in itself that we cannot bear without. We can very well function without them. 
	On the other hand, the fact that we can function without swear words does not mean that they have no function. When Mrs Peckham shoots away her litany on our children's "foul anti-social way" she is, social-psychologically, in the right field, but all the same - mistaken. Mrs Peckham regards childrens "ways" as an anti-social behaviour when, within the group, their "ways" is rather a social behaviour! Mrs Peckham must ex-cuse me, but I seriously doubt she is part of such a group. The swear words were never meant for her ears. 
	Even if only for the ears of the one you are actually talking too, why swear words at all? To answer that question we must look into the different functions swear words have. 
	At some occassions using a swear word is the only way to add enough emphasis to what is beeing said, the only way for instance, to give words to a very strong and overwhelming feeling, this simply because no regular word posesses the mysterious strength of a swear word. Nevertheless, the art of swearing is a difficult one, the occassions when a swear word is right at place are few, and far to many people use them far to much - but in most cases though, for other reasons then to get the right expression.
	Another, and probably the most common function of a swear word is as a fill-in for another word. When so, the reasons behind the use of swear words could be habitual or due to poor vocabulary, or, as Mrs Peckham suggests, due to the "Smiths"-effect - we want to belong to, be part, of a group.
	In all aspects, when a swear word functions as a fill-in for another word, the thing to do, is not to beat up the children - even if the boxing around the ears is just metaphorically speaking, or "not quite" as Mrs Peckham would put it. The thing to do 
- is to read around their ears, a responsibility, a God damn duty, -"if it can be termed that" - of all parents. 
	For anyone who is interested in facts there is research on the matter, displaying a significant difference in verbality and reading ability between schoolchildren who where read to when they were little, and those who were not. Experts suggests that we start to read to our children within their first year!
	Read to or not, people will use swear words even in the future, but it would be nice if this could be done by their explicit choice and not by lack of alternatives. Instead of an "almigthy cleanup", I suggest, that as adults and parents we dust ourselves off, and help our children to become able to make that choice.
	Read to your children, and if you must swear, do it right!
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