forum Gestures and swear words

Started October 24, 2018 by @yeetus

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By gestures I meant as in, for example, thumbs up means it's good, middle finger means f you. Like, what are your world's equivalent?
Also swear words because they are fun

I don't really have any rude gestures but in one of my universes there's a country where it's considered bad form to look people of a higher status in the eye while they're speaking. This has its roots in how the country treats their monarchy, and was kind of like a way of the people acknowledging that they're not on the same level as the royalty and aren't worthy to even look at them, so it's actually seen as a sign of great respect. There's obviously exceptions to this, like children aren't expected to not look their parents in the eye but many will anyways (especially when they're trying to suck up to them).

In the same country, there's a tradition where on a child's thirteenth birthday they get a necklace chain and get to start collecting battlestones. It's a tradition that started in the military where beads are given to represent positive virtues displayed by an individual, and it's a practice that's taken very seriously. Anyone can give out the stones, but it's done sparingly.
One of the most offensive things you can say to someone in this country is "You're not worth your stones." Saying that to someone pretty much implies that they're not a good person. It doesn't sound that bad explaining it, but because of how seriously the practice is taken it's an insult that carries a lot of weight.

That's almost like telling a veterinarian that they aren't the person any dog thinks they will be.
Jeez.

Well, I will have a lot of swearing in my thing, but I'll keep it in my made-up language or just "she swore quietly under her breath"

In one of my worlds, there are these two people who were born with this tattoo on their neck that indicates they're these huge warriors that are only born once every 100 years. Most of the time the tattoos are covered, either by hair, makeup, scarves, or other things. When someone with it bares the tattoo at you without anything covering it, it's basically like they're shouting every single curse word imaginable before promising to kill your loved ones

Other than that there's a bunch of curses in this language (that I made up) but there's a running joke that you literally never hear any of them because this one character, no matter where he is, yells "lanGUAGE!"

….Same
And one of my characters swears a lot and uses very colourful language that sometimes someone else will have to explain it

I need to think up some original curse words for my story. Anyone got an idea how?

In my world, a title ends with the suffix 'shidh' (sheeth)
By taking away this suffix, you strip the titled person of your respect verbally, and imply that they are not worth of human title, so it's a great insult.
So if my character's name was Dllushidh (I can't explain the pronunciation without going off on a spiel) someone who hated her might call her Dllu, basically calling her a whore (because women whores are looked down upon as animals). If you called a male my his name without the suffix, you'd be calling him something closer to a 'no balls' (because it's seen as superior to be male). If you called a card player without the suffix, it'd be like calling them a cheater. If you called a ruler without the suffix, you'd be calling them snakes who kill to get to the throne (therefore not worthy of their title). It's a bit complicated, and the insinuation depends on the occupation, status, age or gender of the person being stripped of the suffix.

Yo that actually sounds really cool

In my world you don't bow to show respect but instead you incline your head and clasp your hands then raise both them a bit like the surrender gesture

Basically in my story, depending on where you are, "Twyllo's sake!" "Ehre's sake!" or "Creston's sake!" is the equivelent of 'oh my God!" or "For God's sake!"
It's named after the founders of the countries, since the current rulers are viewed as being too low to even curse with the name of.
Samuel is sometimes referred to as a 'Glorified Errand Boy' by Joan or Therese due to his job of being a messanger.

I used "thrice damned" in place of "god damned" and replacing the "hell" swears with "Void"
Most of the swearing will be in my own language though
One of my (female) character is going to be so good at swearing that sometimes they require explanations

Parentage is fairly important in my universe, so people like Nich (son of a wealthy woman who eloped with a con artist), Huxley (whose father betrayed the organization he was part of), etc. are made fun of and mocked because of that, Huxley in particular is mainly known as 'The Traitor's Son' to his fellow DONT members.

In my world, the best reason when people don't want a certain Prince/Princess to rule is to say they are born out of wedlock

Names are also pretty important, and it's a sign of respect (in a way) to call someone by their nickname. So Nicholas is called Nich, Nella/Nell, Jonathan/Jon, Margaret/Meg, Julianna/Julie, Oliver/Ol, Darius/Dare, Winifred/Winnie or Win, Francesca/Frances, Isabelle/Izzy, etc., unless their name is already short, there's no nickname available, or they prefer not to. Duchess Marlott refers to almost everyone by their given name as a sign of disrespect. Last names are often viewed like this as well, such as Nich being called by his surname of Fox by people who distrust him, Jon being called Revis by Oliver when Oliver is angry with him, etc.

Every child has a birthday and a naming day about 1-2 months after that. Before their naming day every child would be referred to as son/daughter of [insert father's name] by everyone other than their parents while their parents refer to them by a generic nickname e.g Flower, Cloud, Ocean

Nich is frequently referred to by more rude terms, but he tends to bring that upon himself.

The equivalent for son of a bitch in my world is narvènionn (m)/narvèvienn meaning offspring of a Voidbeast

Dragons touching their own wingtips together is a jerkoff motion in my universe, though most of the standard rude gestures from our world apply. The Gunners (hunters with exceedingly large firearms for humans) have a saying, calling someone a "wet charge." This refers to gunpowder and the fact that it needs to be kept dry for it to explode, and it can mean that someone is a complete pushover. When referred to sexually, however, it means they are impotent, can't keep it up, or both!

Haha

In one of my worlds; in one species it is considered rude to have your tail up in the presence of an Elder, or someone of higher ranking depending on jobs. In their native language, they also say something that kinda translates to "You are such a Viltra," and Viltras are small (at least on their planet, to us dog sized flying creatures would be pretty big) creatures that live a life of eating trash and scraps off of bones, and are considered unintelligent and dirty.

Some greater insults involve insulting the victim's bloodline/and/or offspring, or ancestors.

The aliens are rudely referred to as (the specific race I was speaking about) "Genocide creators" or "Destroyers" by other races. The latter isn't that bad but both of these have to do with their pasts, which long story short they exterminated a bunch of races and attempted to kill off the human race before midway their gov. was overthrown. All of that happened 300 years ago (in the storyline) and many of the species are still referred to as that even though they executed most of those refusing to pay for their crimes so you can sort of see why those are such great insults to them.

Calling someone "King Elondur's bastard" is an insult to their bloodline. The King in question was a huge womaniser that had so many illegitimate children that he doesn't even bother to count them

In one of my stories, it's an obscene gesture to curl one's pointer finger (like making a hook) at someone else. In another, the characters say "bleeding" kind of like how the British say "bloody" - "I know what a BLEEDING sword is, thank you very much," etc

In one of my cultures, reaching back over your shoulder then opening your hand is basically the equivalent of flipping someone off. Origin of the gesture: warriors wear their swords across their backs so it's an imitation of reaching for your sword but not grabbing it, originally meaning "I wouldn't even fight/duel you" which is hugely disrespectful.

Nice stuff!