{"id":37445,"date":"2024-08-20T13:14:00","date_gmt":"2024-08-20T13:14:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=37445"},"modified":"2024-09-18T23:27:51","modified_gmt":"2024-09-18T23:27:51","slug":"does-democratic-vp-candidate-walz-swear-too-damn-much","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/does-democratic-vp-candidate-walz-swear-too-damn-much\/","title":{"rendered":"Does Democratic VP candidate Walz swear too damn much?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Roger J. Kreuz<\/a>, University of Memphis<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Six minutes and 29 seconds into his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Kamala Harris\u2019 running mate, said it: \u201cMind your own damn business.\u201d Walz was describing the way his fellow Minnesotans don\u2019t impose their values on others, using the salty term that has become a familiar part of how he expresses himself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During a campaign event with Democratic presidential nominee Harris in Michigan on Aug. 8, Walz said \u201cdamn\u201d four times<\/a> during his brief remarks, including in two sentences in a row:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen you got a billion dollars, you don\u2019t give a damn about your Social Security check. But if you\u2019re like my mom and you depend on the Social Security check as your sole income, it\u2019s pretty damn important,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The following day, in Glendale, Arizona, Walz used the term eight more times<\/a>. A day later, at a rally in Las Vegas, he made use of the expression an additional eight times<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And in a social media post on Aug. 13, he declared that he was \u201cdamn proud<\/a>\u201d of his military service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These episodes clearly weren\u2019t mistakes or momentary lapses in judgment. What was the vice presidential candidate trying to accomplish by repeatedly using a term that some people find offensive?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m a cognitive scientist who studies and writes about language and communication<\/a>. One question that sprang to mind was whether Walz was speaking as he always had, or whether he was deliberately adopting a new way of expressing himself. https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/MQD-H08CwTQ?wmode=transparent&start=0 Candidate Tim Walz at a Wisconsin rally on Aug. 7, 2024, says, \u2018Mind your own damn business!\u2019 speaking of conservative attempts to curtail abortion access and LGBTQ+ rights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A consistent history<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It turns out that Walz\u2019s use of \u201cdamn\u201d in public is nothing new for him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2023, for example, he declared that \u201cMinnesota has been waiting too damn long<\/a>\u201d for gun control measures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At a news conference in Iowa two months later, he asserted \u2013 twice \u2013 that people should mind their own \u201cdamn business<\/a>\u201d when it came to abortion, LGBTQ issues and school curriculum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Earlier, in 2022, he said that the Supreme Court\u2019s 2022 ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade wouldn\u2019t \u201cdo a damn thing to prevent abortions<\/a>.\u201d In 2020, he stated that a decision to ban police officers from using chokeholds on suspects was \u201ca pretty damn low bar<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And even before that, in 2015, then-U.S. Rep. Walz was quoted as declaring \u201cpolitics be damned<\/a>\u201d when he cast his vote on free-trade agreements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Clearly, this term is part of the candidate\u2019s normal speaking style and has been for many years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even though research suggests that profanity causes people to be perceived negatively<\/a>, its use doesn\u2019t seem to have hurt Walz at the ballot box. He has won eight out of eight elections during his political career<\/a>, serving six terms in the U.S. House of Representatives and two as Minnesota\u2019s governor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During this period, there was also a marked increase in profanity<\/a> used by politicians on social media, and this may have made such language seem less objectionable to his constituents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Politicians and profanity<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Walz\u2019s salty way of expressing himself has a long history in American politics. One of the earliest chief executives who publicly employed such language was the populist Andrew Jackson \u2013 although the story that his foul-mouthed parrot<\/a> had to be removed from his funeral service in 1845 may or may not be true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the 20th century, Jackson would be joined by the likes of Harry Truman, who called Gen. Douglas MacArthur a \u201cdumb SOB<\/a>.\u201d Lyndon Johnson was notorious for leavening his conversations<\/a> with words like \u201cpiss\u201d and \u201cshit.\u201d And other candidates for high office, such as Barry Goldwater, observed that only a \u201cdamn fool<\/a>\u201d would try to predict the future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vice presidents have also been known to turn the air blue in unscripted moments. Dick Cheney famously told U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy to go \u201cfuck yourself<\/a>\u201d during an altercation on the floor of the Senate. And then-Vice President Joe Biden told President Barack Obama that passing health care reform was \u201ca big fucking deal<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And even presidents who didn\u2019t swear in public could be quite profane during their private meetings, as the transcripts of Richard Nixon\u2019s Oval Office conversations made clear. Nixon had a penchant for the word \u201cdamn\u201d and used it often<\/a> when talking with his staff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In short, many lawmakers have chosen to express themselves, in other settings, in a way similar to Walz on the campaign trail. https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/gyxSw7-BsQE?wmode=transparent&start=0 Tim Walz is not the only politician who uses profanity; Texas Democrat Beto O’Rourke does, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A newsworthy phenomenon?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Journalists seem to find these episodes notable enough to write about. In 2012, for example, Rolling Stone made much of Obama\u2019s referring to Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney as \u201ca bullshitter<\/a>\u201d in an interview with the magazine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2016, The New York Times ran a story about Donald Trump, Rand Paul, Jeb Bush, Bernie Sanders and Lindsey Graham under the headline \u201cFoul-mouthed and Proud of It<\/a>,\u201d detailing the candidates\u2019 use of terms such as \u201cdamn,\u201d \u201chell\u201d and \u201cbull\u2013it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And in 2019, a Los Angeles Times columnist complained that Democratic presidential candidates Corey Booker, Steve Bullock and Beto O\u2019Rourke were \u201ccursing a blue streak<\/a>\u201d by employing terms like \u201cf\u2014ed up.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why is such behavior considered newsworthy?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In part, this may stem from our high expectations about how political leaders should comport themselves \u2013 at least in public. When leaders use vulgar language, they stray from<\/a> this exalted standard. This seems to be the case even after generations of politicians have failed to meet this ideal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Benefits of blue language?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

People often employ transgressive language in order to create a certain impression. And in the case of Walz, he may be trying to establish \u2013 or to burnish \u2013 his persona as a regular guy, an everyman. Some observers have pointed to Donald Trump\u2019s use of profanity as a sign of the former president\u2019s authenticity<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Younger adults are also more tolerant<\/a> of profanity than members of older generations. The widespread use of profanity in hip-hop and other musical genres<\/a> may be one reason for this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Walz continues to campaign for the Democratic presidential ticket, it will be interesting to see whether he chooses to moderate his language or whether he views his plainspokenness as an asset rather than a liability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This story was updated to include reference to Walz\u2019s speech on Aug. 21, 2024 at the Democratic convention.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Roger J. Kreuz<\/a>, Associate Dean and Professor of Psychology, University of Memphis<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Roger J. Kreuz, University of Memphis Six minutes and 29 seconds into his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Kamala Harris\u2019 running mate, said it: \u201cMind your own damn business.\u201d Walz was describing the way his fellow Minnesotans don\u2019t impose their values on others, using the salty term that has […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":37446,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[46,10,36,4],"tags":[13922,7319,885,891,886,860,15583,14129,475],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37445"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/56"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37445"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37445\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37447,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37445\/revisions\/37447"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}