SNEHA STANLEY

Using abusive words has become a fad, but it spoils our image.

Today’s youngsters have ‘discovered’ that they can light up an interaction by using abusive words. They do not realise that they are spoiling their own image. This practice is growing into a menace.

I often hear students in my college using abusive words among their friends and even with others. Some enjoy doing this while others concentrate on the abusive words to catch up with new ones.

Grabbing attention

There are also students who write such words on classroom desks, benches, on walls, etc. They think it is a cool way to grab attention. Google even gives results for websites relating to it, indicating how fast this trend is picking up among the youngsters.

Beeps

Even the elders are not lagging behind. A few lecturers sometimes use such words to insult students. When there is a fight on the road due to a minor accident you can just hear a series of abusive words from the ‘warring’ parties.

We can hear several “beep” sounds during reality shows on television which indicate that the TV channel has blocked dialogues that obviously contain abusive words, and youngsters are curious to know what those words are.

Speech is a collection of words which contain beauty, inspiration, advice, motivation, romance and more, so why simply spoil it by careless behaviour?

So, let us heal our speech by avoiding words which are not in good taste and encourage interactions free of abusive words.

(The writer is a first year PU student of St. Aloysius College, Mangalore)

Taken from The Hindu Newspaper: Dated Monday, April 19, 2010.