OPINION — If you have sensed that our politicians are using more vulgarity in public discourse in the last 10 years, you are right. In the past, politicians have only occasionally used slang or made a quick off-color remark.
As Joseph Phillips of Cardiff University points out, in 1919 Woodrow Wilson said that he had made a “conspicuous ass” of himself. At the time, that was considered shocking.
However, in the last 10 years, coarse language has become fashionable in American political life. Why is this happening? What is going on?
