Jimmy Saville uses the f-word on UK G2 before 9pm

UK G2 have just shown the Louis Theroux documentary of when he met Jimmy Saville. During one of the scenes Jimmy is talking candidly about when he worked in a dance hall.

The language included at least two uses of the f-word and b*llocks.

Surely this shouldn't be going out at 8.27pm on a widely watched digital TV station?

Am I right in thinking that UK G2 was in the wrong by broadcasting it without bleeps over the expeltives from Sir Jimmy at 8.30pm?

Oh come on.....where you offended by it. Just open your window and you'll hear worse from your 6 year old neighbour. Complain to the ICT about it if you where emotionally hurt.

1. It's ITC
2. It's Ofcom

3) Its "were" not "where".

And besides, its a perfectly valid question. Surely it should have been bleeped.

If you knew Mr Prout (A Major Setup), you would realise he's said much worse

Well I f***ing hate ba***rds swearing their b****cks off, I think it's f***ing disgusting and you'll never hear me swear one f***ing sh*tty word.

My Mum is in the Salvation Army and she swears at least once every 15 minutes. If she can do it...

Widely watched? I cant really see the complaints flying in myself.

1) It's "it's", not "its".

Definitely not - no f-words before 10pm usually, and then only when preceded by a warning from presentation, and on a subtitle at the start of the programme. It was almost certainly an "oversight"

http://www.ofcom.org.uk/contact_ofcom/tv_radio_other

"N*bhead" was uttered twice during The Royal Family sketch on Alistair McGowan's Big Impression tonight at just after 6pm on UK Gold. Surely that was an oops too?

The Sky movie channels manage to have an 8 O'Clock watershed, so perhaps it's earlier for satellite channels? I think that you only need to be advised of 'strong language' if it's a constant part of the programme. AFAIK, a solitary throwaway use of any swear word doesn't need any warning.

It is high time they started thinking quite what the point of the watershed (as far as swearing is concerned) is anyway. Casual swearing is now commonplace at an earlier and earlier age. The youngest adult generation isn't remotely offended by it and unlikely to see a need to 'protect' their children from it either (indeed I do seriously believe that casual swearing will eventually become so commonplace that it will become a normal and acceptable part of language in the end). Pretty much everyone who finds swearing seriously offensive (even though they may not swear much themselves) is going to be in the 35+ age group, in which case I fail to see what is achieved by restricting swearing to after 9PM. I often feel that things like Grange Hill would be much more realistic if they were allowed to use the actual language that is in use in schools (I did notice a C4 schools programme quite freely using the term 'f**k off' at 10AM in the morning the other day thoug - well done to them, it was appropriate to the setting and made the programme far more effective than if the concept of swearing had been airbrushed out because it was before 9PM).

*Puts Lu-x-ton-esque hat on* (I can't believe his name has been censored!!)

Well if the f-word is now becoming the norm (and amazingly I did feel rather uneasy about hearing it so early in the evening) then are we to expect more expeltives becoming more mainstream?

Maybe in a couple of years we'll have Huw Edwards wishing us a "Merry F*cking Christmas" while drunkenly adjusting his party hat!

Well it's already happened with other words. In the 21st century, no one is going to bat an eyelid at someone prefixing 'bloody' onto something. Sure, it's hardly elegant highbrow language, but it's also not generally offensive and would be acceptable to the vast majority of people. That certainly was not always the case.

And even now, the word 'crap' is now becoming acceptable as a general purpose expletive, still classed as swearing but certainly not offensive to the great majority of people. Again that was not always the case.

It's surely therefore not inconceivable that other words will go the same way.

The whole concept of swearing is something that's always intrigued me. All swear words are, at the end of the day, functional words with meanings. The reasons why they are taboo are almost universally based on events happening hundreds or even thousands of years ago - I don't really believe that modern people haven't the faintest idea why f*ck or c*nt are offensive words, they just know that they are. But if they don't know why they are offensive, then what's offensive about them? Swearing is perhaps the daftest concept to exist in language.