Drinking, swearing and social transgressions can lead to good things.
Kath and Kim (aka Jane Turner and Gina Riley): the suburban hornbags used swearing in clever ways in their 2002-2007 TV series.
Riley Turner Productions
Long regarded as guardians of morality, women who swore were often policed and punished. But whether protesting or parodying, they have used bad language in creative ways.
Using minced oaths became a habit in NBC’s The Good Place.
YouTube/NBC
Danny Lim, Sydney, was convicted of ‘offensive behaviour’ for a sign that referred to Tony Abbott and alluded to the c-bomb. The conviction was dismissed in August this year.
Neal Jennings/Flickr
Adam Briggs and Trials from A.B. Original, winners of this year’s AMP Australian Music Prize, use swearing to make a political point in their music.
Tracey Nearmy
The pervasiveness of profanity in popular culture underscores the absurdity of punishing people for using words broadcast on our screens and heard in our music.
Studies show swearing might be big and clever after all.
Africa Rising/Shutterstock
The "Fuck Fred Nile" case highlights the absurdity of criminalising "fleeting expletives" while allowing speech that depicts homosexuality as abnormal, unnatural and sinful.