I can't remember whose comment it was I read recently. Probably Bill Bryson, I think. Anyway, the point was that grown-ups know all these swear-words, and use them on occasion. Then kids grow up, and suddenly the grown-ups get all careful about not using these words. Then the kids go to school and learn the words. The kids swear a few times and get told off, so they don't use the words in front of their parents any more. So for about 10-15 years, there's a period where both sides are using these words freely amongst their own peer group, but the two sides are both pretending to each other that they don't really exist.

When you think about it like that, it's a pretty bizarre situation.

Re the specific incident with the specific kid, I guess we don't know how it went. Remember that it's perfectly possible to be offensive, cutting and hurtful without swearing. Even if you weren't, there's still a chance she could have interpreted it that way. There's a reason why smileys were invented, which is that when you're reading plain-text, it's awfully easy to misinterpret it and take comments personally which were meant more light-heartedly. In fact it seems that the reason you've got involved in the first place was a light-hearted comment from her which got taken the wrong way.

As far as bright kids go, plenty of them have encountered dumb adults. Life experience and intelligence don't necessarily go hand in hand. And kids are plenty full of idealism, bcos they know the theoretically-right answer and haven't had to beat that against the real world yet. If that's a bad thing, shoot all idealists... ;-)

Graham.