Surely the offensiveness of a word is the product of how and where it is used, it is not intrinsically offensive in itself. Asking for information about the Motherfuckers Ball for resaerch purposes, on a folk music forum, is surely a completely different kettle of fish from going up to someone in a bar and saying "Out of the way, motherfucker". The latter is rude, and will get you your nose broken. The former, as far as I am concerned, isnt.
    B ut I do recognise that some people have deep seated taboos,(and I include "me" in "some people"). So maybe John should consider writing "M....f....." or something similar, in the thread titles. Quite why one is less offensive than the other is beyond me, but if it will please people, and not reduce the information content of the post in any way, perhaps it would be a good compromise. If a tad hypocritical....but then you have to be, sometimes.