'Saturday Night Live' cast member Jenny Slate drops F-bomb in premiere episode

[snopes]

A brand-new "Saturday Night Live" cast member dropped the f-bomb during the show's live season premiere featuring Megan Fox and U2.

Comedian Jenny Slate let slip the mother of all swear words in a biker chic talk show skit that was already generously laced with "freakin's" and "frickin's."

http://www.nydailynews.com/gossip/20...ring_skit.html

[Roadsterboy]

Anyone on the West Coast catch the broadcast? IIRC SNL isn't broadcast live in the Pacific and Mountain time zones-did they beep it? It was definitely here in Central, although she said it so fast that the audience didn't appear to catch it.

-RB

[Stan The Man]

I definitely caught it. I said to my daughter, "Did you hear that?" She didn't, so I replayed it to confirm.

[effo5231]

I heard it too... The best part was her reaction. A sudden "Oh dead God!" look and then right back into the sketch.

Poor kid, here's hoping this doesn't derail her TV career.

[Errata]

I saw it on the West coast and reviewed it on DVR, and I don't hear her saying it, and I also don't hear a bleep. But I do see the part where she puffs out her cheeks, and everything else looks the same, so I don't think they used the dress rehearsal version or anything dramatically different like that. I think in the 3 hours between broadcasts they dubbed over it with the word "freakin" like she was supposed to say, and it sounded pretty seamless instead of noticeably censored.

[Starla]

Originally Posted by effo5231

I heard it too... The best part was her reaction. A sudden "Oh dead God!" look and then right back into the sketch.

The way her cheeks puffed out was hilarious. I rewound that bit about a dozen times just to watch her reaction.

It almost seems inevitable, with all the psuedoswearing that sketch entailed. I don't think she'll get fired because she provided the highlight of an otherwise incredibly crappy show. It was seriously bad, far worse than normal. She deflected the talk from, "Can you believe how bad that was?" to, "Can you believe the new girl swore! Dude, I didn't know they weren't on delay! Maybe I'll watch next week to see if there's another mess up."

[snopes]

When a sketch is full of "freakin'" and "friggin'" and everybody knows full well what those words represent, is there really any point to the euphemisms? To me it's about as absurd as saying that it's okay to blaspheme as much as you like, as long as you don't actually say the word "God." Since the intent is clearly there, what's the purpose of pretending that form makes a difference?

[diddy]

Originally Posted by snopes

When a sketch is full of "freakin'" and "friggin'" and everybody knows full well what those words represent, is there really any point to the euphemisms? To me it's about as absurd as saying that it's okay to blaspheme as much as you like, as long as you don't actually say the word "God." Since the intent is clearly there, what's the purpose of pretending that form makes a difference?

Well I am sure that the cast and writers of SNL are very well aware of that. Thats not the problem. The problem is that the NBC execs probably don’t take kindly to being fined by the FCC (I think they are the ones that issue fines) and being lambasted by family groups who cry “Owww, My freaking ears!”.

To me I think its really silly that we have these decency rules, but I can also understand that SNL is not targeted to an adult only audience and their advertisers might not be comfortable with that kind of stuff. I personally don’t give a rip about swearing, but the fact is, the network has clear guidelines about what is defined as “swearing” as defined by the FCC and NBC probaly wants to follow them.

[Silas Sparkhammer]

Originally Posted by snopes

When a sketch is full of "freakin'" and "friggin'" and everybody knows full well what those words represent, is there really any point to the euphemisms? To me it's about as absurd as saying that it's okay to blaspheme as much as you like, as long as you don't actually say the word "God." Since the intent is clearly there, what's the purpose of pretending that form makes a difference?

It seems odd, dunnit? But a lot of religious formalists are fine with "Gosh darn you to heck," and a lot of Jews are okay with writing "G-d," because, in the finest legalistic sense, the name of the Lord (and other terms regarding consignment to infernal regions) has not been uttered.

It shows how prevalent is the legalism -- the "pilpul" formalism -- of our society. We like playing these games!

(A friend of mine told his young son, "Don't set foot outside this door!" So the kid lay on his belly on the floor, all of him outside the door except for his feet! My friend had to grant that one: his son had followed the rule he had set forth.)

Silas (freakin', fleakin', frackin', crackin', muckin', ruckin', rhymes with puckin' -- but ya doesn't has to call me Mr. Johnson!)

[snopes]

Originally Posted by diddy

Well I am sure that the cast and writers of SNL are very well aware of that. Thats not the problem. The problem is that the NBC execs probably don’t take kindly to being fined by the FCC (I think they are the ones that issue fines) and being lambasted by family groups who cry “Owww, My freaking ears!”.

My point isn't that NBC shouldn't care if an SNL cast member says "f*ckin'" instead of "friggin'" or "freakin'"; it's questioning why the world at large should care.

[diddy]

Originally Posted by snopes

My point isn't that NBC shouldn't care if an SNL cast member says "f*ckin'" instead of "friggin'" or "freakin'"; it's questioning why the world at large should care.

I agree. I don’t think the world at large cares, but rather its the fact that US television has such silly rules about indecency that aren’t kidding anyone. Its rather silly, but unless you watch HBO or the like, most broadcast TV censors the F-bomb. It is very rare that I ever hear that on cable even which has far looser standards regarding decency compared to broadcast TV.

[diddy]

Originally Posted by Silas Sparkhammer

It seems odd, dunnit? But a lot of religious formalists are fine with "Gosh darn you to heck," and a lot of Jews are okay with writing "G-d," because, in the finest legalistic sense, the name of the Lord (and other terms regarding consignment to infernal regions) has not been uttered.

I tend to think that the more religious you are, the more literal about things you can get. It can excuse them from doing a lot of things as long as they don’t cross a certain line. At that point, its just a childish game of seeing how close you can get. Its almost like Foghorn Leghorn setting up a line on how far the barnyard dog’s leash went. He would abuse the dog and run when chased until he reached that line, and stand for a few seconds until he could really rub it in with a “Aww shut up!” and knock it out. Classic bit.