the importance of meaning

The crux of effective communication, relationships, and sociology is shared meaning. Shared meaning being that a "symbol" (verbal, written, non-verbal or other wise) that means the same thing to a group of people.
Take for instance the communication sub-straight of written language. Written language is based on (and could not exist without) shared meaning. A word is only a symbol, a word is only a drawing/picture, a word is in essence only a squiggle. The only reason a word has any meaning is because a person or group of people gave it that meaning. Example: the only reason the word "cat" means cat is because people said it did. We assigned that combination of three symbols (C-A-T) to correlate with the physical description and mental prototype of the feline we all know and love. A dictionary is simply a volume of symbols that have been given meaning agreed upon a large portion of society.
As time goes on the meaning of the ubiquitous symbols we call words has changed; to the extent that we have the evolution of local dialects and completely new languages. To the same end a squiggle can have (within a single language) a social meaning, a dictionary meaning, a relationship meaning, and a personal meaning. Words that have one social meaning can have totally different relationship meaning. The squiggle combo "hello tard" has a negative social meaning; but at the same time a positive relationship meaning. This is concurrently true for symbols that have been given the social and or dictionary meaning of "bad word". Yet! As we have previously discussed squiggles have no inherent meaning, the only meaning we have is the one we give it. So given that fact how can a squiggle be considered inherently bad? If words that originally had innocuous meanings such as "fag" (simply meant a bundle of sticks) can become "bad", would not it also be possible for a word that either started bad or became bad to become "good"? An excellent example of this is the word Christian, it was originally used as a slur against followers of Jesus yet now it is the common self identifier used in a positive sense to refer to them selves.
So because words have no inherent meaning or ill will, two things determine the meaning of the word during its genesis as well as when its meaning evolves. These two factors are intent and context. For example if two biblical scholars were studying numbers 22 (the story of Balaam's donkey) and one of them reads the King James word choice for donkey, no harm is done, why? Because the context the word was used in (study of the bible, among friends, as part of a larger context), and the intent of the word had no ill will or malice it was simply to denote a beast of burden, the meaning of that word was completely innocuous. Though if in rage in the context of a slur or intended as slander, that same word for that particular ungulate would indeed have a hateful meaning.