Mark Odegard -
"But for cursing, for delivering a strong line of disapproval to
another, English really is lacking. English is poor when it comes to
cussing-out another."
Sez you, ya <profanity snipped>.
Mark -
"English is perhaps the most polite of the world's current languages"
It's a much richer cursing language than Swedish anyway!
One thing, though. If you want to praise someone you call him a killer, as in "that guy's a killer", "killer application", etc., but if you want to curse, you use the word "fuck". Seems you got your priorities a little wrong here... :o)
Perhaps there's a general tendency in modern, "civilized" countries to use a more sanitized language? Did people curse more (or jucier) in the Middle Ages? People who are into history of mentality (I'm not sure about the proper English term; is anyone on the list familiar with the works of Norbert Elias?) should investigate this!
Hakan