Obscene means something offensive, something repulsive or disgusting. It originates from Latin, and it originally meant ill or filth. http://sorabji.com/d/dictionary/obscene/

1593, "offensive to the senses, or to taste and refinement," from M.Fr. obscène, from L. obscenus "offensive," especially to modesty, originally "boding ill, inauspicious," perhaps from ob "onto" + cænum "filth." Meaning "offensive to modesty or decency" is attested from 1598. Legally, in U.S., it hinged on "whether to the average person, applying contemporary community standards, the dominant theme of the material taken as a whole appeals to a prurient interest." [Justice William Brennan, "Roth v. United States," June 24, 1957]; refined in 1973 by "Miller v. California": The basic guidelines for the trier of fact must be: (a) whether 'the average person, applying contemporary community standards' would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest, (b) whether the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law; and (c) whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=obscene Late 16th century. Via French< Latin obscenus "ill-omened" http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/features/dictionary/DictionaryResults.aspx?refid=1861684316 Latin obscaenus ‘ill-omened, abominable’ http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/obscene?view=uk L. obscenus, obscaenus, obscoenus, ill looking, filthy, obscene: cf. F. obscéne. http://machaut.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/WEBSTER.sh?WORD=obscene

Hmm! Might look for a thesaurus, they're handy if you open them!