http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2 … 24956.html
Angus reid poll wrote:
How do you tell Canadians from Brits or Americans?
%*!$#&@% if I know.
But an Angus Reid online poll released Wednesday found Canadians curse more, especially while talking to friends, less with relatives.
About one-quarter of the 1,012 Canadians, 1,013 Americans and 1,992 U.K. adults reported friends frequently swearing, with about one-third stating they avoid expletives in public.
The cussing category winners, however, were chatty Canucks — especially Quebecers.
About 56% of Canadians said they utter words to pals that others blanch at, compared to 51% of Britons and 46% of Americans.
“I’m surprised,” Walter Denning, of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, visiting Toronto for a week with his wife Cathy. “I’ve heard some swearing but it’s about the same as back home.”
In the U.K., where English blossomed, a slight majority were more likely than Canadians and Americans to experience strangers swearing, especially while chatting. But 61% insisted they don’t originate nasties, compared to 58% of Americans and 55% here.
“Certainly the ones we’ve met so far have been really, really lovely,” Mel Nailor, of Stratford-upon-Avon, England, said of Canadians outside the CN Tower. “I can’t imagine them swearing at all.”
Asked if they might relax into naughty nouns with friends, boyfriend Stewart Colmer chuckled, saying “it depends how many bottles of beer you have.”
Toronto resident Guy Nokes, 56, couldn’t believe Canadians ranked behind Brits.
But while admitting he sometimes tosses out a tart word with friends, “I don’t think I swear to get a rise, but maybe to add a bit of colour to a statement...only in a humorous way.”
Angus Reid vice-president Mario Canseco said Canada would have matched Americans and Britons except for La Belle Province.
“Quebec pushes us over the edge,” he said, with more respondents — 21% compared to 15% of other Canadians — admitting being unlikely to drop conversational swearing or fret over a faux pas.
The poll found 17% of Quebec women, compared to 14% of the men, "are more likely” not to change or worry.
It also found lower income earners twice as likely to rip ripe ones, Americans citing more vulgar relatives, but claiming politer co-workers.
Some people believe “swearing leads to the impression that you really do care,” Canseco said. A noteable surprise in all three countries “was the more you know people, you may swear more...as you develop a rapport.”
Seven in 10 respondents cried foul if politicians, lawyers, doctors and cops curse, even if unaware they were overheard, with half condemning actor and auto mechanics’ profanity.
Headlines blaze over luminary’s outbursts: Actor Mel Gibson’s leaked tape of a phone conversation with his ex-wife; Mississauga city Councillor Carolyn Parrish’s infamous “damn Americans” and “I hate those bastards” anti-Iraq war outbursts in 2003 while an MP.
But Canada’s most infamous political cursory case was Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau insisting in 1971 that he said “fuddle duddle” in Parliament instead of, well, you know.
Trudeau’s f-expletive didn’t land him in a political pillory.
His outburst illustrates “people may actually have a different impression of you,” Canseco said.
