Originally posted by khuon
While I am not usually offended by obscenities, I do find that the majority of time, liberal use of obscenities seem to indicate lack of intelligence or verbal skills. In other words, I've found that people who tend to just throw out obscenities within the course of normal conversation do so because they lack the capability to construct proper sentences.
I think you're talking about adults, right? Because the reasons children and adults swear are pretty different, IMHO.
I think a lot of adults throw out obscenities in normal conversation where it clearly is inappropriate most of the time are just clueless. When I think about how little most people pay attention to what's going on around them that could simply kill them or someone else (not just during driving, either), it makes it much clearer to me that this could be the case with many adults.
I think kids often swear because they mimic adults and not just their parents. So many adults swear around children, it's pedestrian and children pick up that it is.