On swearing

The Loon is not typically a profane bird in public environments. (In less-public ones, sailors step aside for her!) However, occasionally a point needs making about silencing and the overpolicing of so-called “professional” behavior, particularly by and of women.

So.

Anyone who thinks mere swearing outside a professional context makes a professional less of a professional can simply fuck right off. Anyone who thinks “professional” demeanor must be worn twenty-four hours per day, seven days per week, can similarly fuck right off. Anyone who uses behavior occurring outside a professional context in a professional context in order to discredit someone is a shitheel and is invited to fuck off. Anyone who thinks all online contexts, public and gated, are automatically professional can fuck off as well.

Here. The Loon has some freshwater pearls you may clutch, if you wish.

It’s true that some of us are held to absurd standards of innocuousness by our environments. (This is one of many reasons the Loon wouldn’t be caught dead anywhere near a K-12 environment, or in a major leadership position.) The Loon contends that this should not be true—even professionals are human and/or avian!—but she acknowledges and pities the necessity.

She will fight the extension of that necessity into arenas where it is not, in fact, necessary with every last fucking pinfeather she has.

On swearing by Library Loon, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License.