In May, a news release from the office of U.S. Sen. John Fetterman landed in the email inboxes of journalists around Pennsylvania.

It was headlined this way: “Fetterman on New Castle Train Derailment: Same S-t, Different Day.”

The train that derailed in New Castle was a Norfolk Southern train, and it happened just a few months after another Norfolk Southern train went off the tracks in East Palestine, Ohio, causing evacuations in that village and lingering concerns over chemicals that were released in the accident. Fetterman’s frustration was understandable, but it was hard not to be distracted by the use of a word that cannot be printed in this newspaper in the headline of a news release from someone who holds one of the highest offices in the commonwealth.

Simply put, Fetterman - and many other elected officials - are letting the profanity fly a little bit too much.

Of course, in Fetterman’s case, using the s-word is undoubtedly part of his straight-talking, Carhartt-wearing, every-dude persona, the kind of guy who doesn’t have patience for the circumlocutions that most lawmakers regularly engage in. And Fetterman is hardly alone among marquee politicians in deploying profanity.

U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene recently told a journalist to “f-k off” when she didn’t like a line of questioning. Former Texas congressman Beto O’Rourke dropped an f-bomb a handful of years ago when discussing media coverage of mass shootings. And, in 2019, U.S. Rep. Rashida Talib said that she and her colleagues would “impeach the motherf-r” in reference to then-President Trump.

But Trump himself is hardly a slouch when it comes to profanity. He has dropped the s-bomb and has said “bulls-t” in speeches, as well as “hell” and “damn,” both of which are kind of on the borderline now between being profane and being a benign part of everyday speech. When The New York Times reported in 2019 about Trump’s use of profanity, Melissa Mohr, the author of “Holy Sh (asterisk) t: A Brief History of Swearing,” observed that the profanity was actually part of Trump’s appeal to his followers.

“It helps create the impression that he is saying what he thinks, ‘telling it like it is,’” Mohr said. “We tend to believe people when they swear, because we interpret these words as a sign of strong emotions. In his case, the emotion is often powerful anger, which his supporters seem to love.”

Anyone who has spent any time in a newsroom knows that profanity can be unleashed in them, particularly on deadline, so not many reporters or editors search for smelling salts or a fainting coach when they hear words you wouldn’t have used in front of your grandmother a generation or two ago. And that’s undoubtedly the case in many other workplaces. We’re a much more open, less formal society than we once were, and that’s not entirely a bad thing. The way we interact with one another has become more informal, so perhaps it’s to be expected that the likes of Fetterman and Trump occasionally let loose with some expletives.

Still, it’s not necessarily prudish to think that they should be setting a better example and keeping the profanity to a minimum. We’re not expecting eloquence on the order of Benjamin Disraeli or Winston Churchill - just something that won’t require covering the ears of our children.

Uniontown Herald-Standard