Swearing As An Effective Painkiller?

Every language contains profanity and it is apparently universal that people use it in such situations.

Don't forget that swearing precedes and laces many brawls.

I wonder if yelling at someone, "Jesus loves you, honey!" also prepares the body and mind for fisticuffs.

The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in time of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality. -- John F. Kennedy (inspired by Dante's Inferno)

We learned in school by taking turns on each other. First time someone drew mine, I fainted!

So learned how to be as talented, careful and pleasant as possible- my patients over a dozen years ranged literally from 1 hour old (armstick with a 25 gauge butterfly for a gazillion tests) to 103 and eventually taught newbies how to draw, using myself as the guinea pig.  

Then, they were directed to an alley next to the psych building and invited to throw crockery at a wall a few yards away -- cups, saucers, plates and bowls that had scavanged been from local thrift shops and garage sales -- until they felt de-stressed. The researchers took note of how many throws of what the participants did, then gave them the same survey and took their blood pressure again.

The results showed, very clearly, that physically acting on stress and anger by throwing things makes us feel better. I remember this because, for a few years afterwards, a group of students would set up a non-profit "smash center" on campus during mid-terms and finals every semester, and that made the local paper.

I'm not surprised that language has a similar feature.

One more reason why torture DOES NOT WORK.  

Present in many species it allows wounded/stressed animals to escape threatening situations. Our current civilization places many stresses on humans, but this is a phyllogenetically old response.

As we know, it can also be harmful, if an organism cannot balance adrenaline stimulating stresses with nor-adrenaline/endorphin stimulating relaxations...their system breaks down and causes their own body harm.

I would presume it is the emotion stimulating effect of being able to perform a quick action that externalizes our stressrs... So WTF, go for it.