On Thu, 8 Apr 2021 at 08:07, Lieven L. Litaer <levinius@gmx.de> wrote:
Am 08.04.2021 um 00:03 schrieb De'vID:
> The unnegated version, {pIHoHvIp} "we are afraid to kill you", is
> without question culturally taboo. However, does the fact that {-vIp} is
> negated by {-be'} change this?
>
> What do others think?

I definitely agree that saying {jI...vIpbe'} is NOT culturally taboo, as
it negates the taboo version.

Remember that Klingon is not math.

That argument cuts both ways, though. *I* think it's logical that negating a taboo statement makes it non-taboo, but then someone else can also reasonably say "logic doesn't matter, the rules are the rules regardless of logic...". And I would agree with that statement in some other cases, but not in this one. (For example, it's logical that a verb which has {'e'} as its object can take an aspect suffix, but TKD says it never does, and that's the rule regardless of how illogical it is... even though the rule has been broken in canon.)
 
I would even go a step further and say that even without -be' you can
negate the phrase and make it a non-taboo version:

{not jIHeghvIp} "I am never afraid to die!"
{jIHeghvIp 'e' DaQub'a'?} "Do you think I'm afraid to die?"

Exactly. I think the reason that TKD 4.2.2 says {-vIp} is "rarely" used with a first-person prefix (and not "never") is for these kinds of situations. But that's just my interpretation, and apparently others interpret things differently.
 
By the way, if you need evidence, it's very small, but think of it this
way: If it were a taboo combination, then why was it used as a prominent
example in TKD in chapter 4.3? It even explains when those phrases can
be used.

That was exactly what I said. The other person's counterargument was that those statements *are* taboo, and TKD contains taboo statements as examples of usage (which is true that it does), so the fact that they're used as examples doesn't demonstrate that they're not taboo.

He's not on the mailing list (which is why I didn't name him), but you can see his comment to me in the Learn Klingon group on Facebook. I think his position is also reasonable (if, to me, a bit odd), which is why I asked if anyone else thinks this way.

--
De'vID