Check out how the Kansas City Star treated the latest Jose Guillen sound bite.
“We still (stink),” Guillen says. “How about that? We still (stink), simple as that. We still (stink). You got it. If you want to know the truth, you got it.”
Parentheses should never show up inside quotes, but this particular usage had me in puzzle-solving mode for a bit longer than one should usually expect from the dangerous combination of sloppy writing and stupid athletes.
I finally figured out Guillen must’ve been using the most unholy of all curse words: suck.
In my lifetime, we’ve made a good deal of progress in the War On Prudishness – side boobs and Sipowicz ass on NYPD Blue, bloodier video games and movies, unavoidable quantities of Internet smut – yet I can’t read the word “suck” in the sports section.
How does a word like “suck” get villified, while a word like “stink” becomes a clean substitute? Unlike other legit curse words, “suck” doesn’t have an inherently nasty connotation. In fact, “stink” has a filthier definition at its core than “suck.” To an impressionable mind, “suck” is a glorious word associated with candies and ice cream men. The word “stink,” however, is rooted in excrement and general animal filth.
What led us down this unrelenting path?