Some years back, I was driving with my niece from Australia, her husband Simon and another niece when I had to stop abruptly when the car in front of us did the same.

“S—,” I exclaimed, then, remembering the young women in the car, quickly said, “I mean shoot.”

“S—’s acceptable,” Simon said matter-of-factly.

That is, of course, a matter of opinion, and I was reminded of that again while driving home from handball Monday evening, listening to Portland radio station KGON (92.3 on your FM dial).

A brief aside: KGON is the same station — and still features the same music and many of the same DJs — that I listened to in high school 30 years ago. Back then, though, it was just 92 FM — tuning was a much less exact science — and the music was simply referred to as “rock,” not “classic rock.” I guess what that mainly says is, I’m getting old.

Anyway, on the drive home Monday, I was pleased to hear the familiar guitar and violin intro to one of my favorite songs, by one of my favorite artists, about a boxer with one of  the greatest nicknames in sports history.

We are of course talking about Bob Dylan’s “Hurricane,” the ballad of middleweight contender Rubin “Hurricane” Carter, portrayed by Denzel Washington in the 1990 film, “The Hurricane.” Here’s a photo of Rubin Carter, before he was wrongly convicted of a 1966 triple murder in his  hometown of Paterson, N.J.:

hurricane

So I hear “Hurricane” come on the radio and promptly, as I am wont to do, turn up the volume. “Pistol shots ring out in a barroom night, enter Patty Valentine from the upper hall, she sees a bartender in a pool of blood, cries out my God, they’ve killed them all. Here comes the story of the Hurricane … .”

Two verses later:

“Meanwhile, far away, in another part of town, Rubin Carter and a couple of friends are driving around. The No. 1 contender for the middlweight crown, had no idea what kind of s— was about to go down.”

Only, much to my shock, KGON’s version said: “… had no idea what was about to go down.”

I just about lost it. Since when did KGON give a s— about playing the word s— on the radio? (Note: I am not spelling the word out here because I don’t feel like getting a visit from upper management, not because I think there’s anything wrong with it — in the right situation, of course, such as in a Bob Dylan song.)

I almost changed the station, so annoyed was I, but I didn’t because I was curious how the station would handle the other “suspect” words in the song. Turns out, they just let them all go, so I will too:

“You’ll be doing society a favor; that son of a bitch is brave and getting braver. We want to put his ass in stir … .”

“And to the black folks he was just a crazy nigger; no one doubted that he pulled the trigger … .”

“Now all the criminals in their coats and their ties are free to drink martinis and watch the sun rise. While Rubin sits like Buddha in a 10-foot cell, an innocent man in a living hell.”

What do you think? Censors get all of this right or wrong?