WARNING: This post may have curse words. Obviously. It's a post about cursing.
If you've met me in a professional/semi-professional setting, you probably know me as loud but genuinely well-meaning. I'm talkative, for sure, but I try to be polite.
However, one I know the "coast is clear" (in a manner of speaking), I have the mouth of a sailor and the humor of a 16-year-old boy. Usually, if I feel my audience is more conservative, I curb my tongue and word choice.
Cursing (or as we in the South more often refer to as "cussing") has always intrigued me. When I was 10 and worked on my dad's turtle pond [I'll explain later], we girls started a "Cuss Club". Seriously--that's what we called it. Basically, it was an agreement that whenever we were to side speaking to ourselves, we could say whatever we wanted word-wise, and no one would go and tell one of the bosses. This was less of a deal for some of the other girls, who were in their mid-teens and so my dad and uncle didn't care. For me and my sister, this meant we could say those words we were prohibited from saying at home, and the others wouldn't tell our dad. Thinking back, it's dumb in a way. But another part of me is kind of proud, giving myself the place to experiment with word usage without fear of retribution and learning how to code switch at an easy age.
I really shouldn't have been too worried though about much judgement. In 1998, my cousin Ethan introduced my sister and I to South Park. I can still remember the first episode I watched--"Mr. Hanky the Christmas Poo". I have a vivid memory of being in my aunt and uncle's driveway on New Year's Eve in the back of someone's truck, singing "Kyle's Mom is a Stupid Bitch". Soon after, we introduced South Park to my dad, the same guy who gave me the sense of humor of a 16 year old boy. We didn't get Comedy Central at the house at home, but my uncle's trailer at the pond did. So on Monday nights when my mom went bowling, my dad would take us three kids to the trailer and do work in the shed, taking a break when SP came on. (We also watched WWF and WCW with my dad. Thinking back, it's strange to think I at one time liked wrestling.) For the most part, it was fine, but I do remember when we realized the repercussions of my little brother, 3 or 4 then, repeated Officer Barbrady after he said in the Barbra Streisand episode, "What a bitch!"
When I got to be in junior high, I definitely continued with code-switching and using curse words. I started to use the word "crap" around my parents,something I wasn't allowed to say before. Cody, ever the goody-two-shoes at that age, would gasp when he heard me and tell me I wasn't supposed to say that. I responded snarkily with, "You get a license to crap at 13." My attitude wasn't overlooked though; people apparently reported to my sister how I was talking. I remember her asking me what I was trying to prove.
That's the question that often comes up when people are arguing against curse words: what are you gaining by using these words? While I feel that there is an appropriate time and place for such language, I see no problem in using it, obviously. It's an expression of self that some have wrongly stigmatized.
Now, let me make this clear--I don't go throwing around God's name with all this. Some curse words are still off limits in my book.
I'm going to end this post with my favorite phrases to use in those professional situations as substitutes for curse words:
If you've met me in a professional/semi-professional setting, you probably know me as loud but genuinely well-meaning. I'm talkative, for sure, but I try to be polite.
However, one I know the "coast is clear" (in a manner of speaking), I have the mouth of a sailor and the humor of a 16-year-old boy. Usually, if I feel my audience is more conservative, I curb my tongue and word choice.
Cursing (or as we in the South more often refer to as "cussing") has always intrigued me. When I was 10 and worked on my dad's turtle pond [I'll explain later], we girls started a "Cuss Club". Seriously--that's what we called it. Basically, it was an agreement that whenever we were to side speaking to ourselves, we could say whatever we wanted word-wise, and no one would go and tell one of the bosses. This was less of a deal for some of the other girls, who were in their mid-teens and so my dad and uncle didn't care. For me and my sister, this meant we could say those words we were prohibited from saying at home, and the others wouldn't tell our dad. Thinking back, it's dumb in a way. But another part of me is kind of proud, giving myself the place to experiment with word usage without fear of retribution and learning how to code switch at an easy age.
I really shouldn't have been too worried though about much judgement. In 1998, my cousin Ethan introduced my sister and I to South Park. I can still remember the first episode I watched--"Mr. Hanky the Christmas Poo". I have a vivid memory of being in my aunt and uncle's driveway on New Year's Eve in the back of someone's truck, singing "Kyle's Mom is a Stupid Bitch". Soon after, we introduced South Park to my dad, the same guy who gave me the sense of humor of a 16 year old boy. We didn't get Comedy Central at the house at home, but my uncle's trailer at the pond did. So on Monday nights when my mom went bowling, my dad would take us three kids to the trailer and do work in the shed, taking a break when SP came on. (We also watched WWF and WCW with my dad. Thinking back, it's strange to think I at one time liked wrestling.) For the most part, it was fine, but I do remember when we realized the repercussions of my little brother, 3 or 4 then, repeated Officer Barbrady after he said in the Barbra Streisand episode, "What a bitch!"
When I got to be in junior high, I definitely continued with code-switching and using curse words. I started to use the word "crap" around my parents,something I wasn't allowed to say before. Cody, ever the goody-two-shoes at that age, would gasp when he heard me and tell me I wasn't supposed to say that. I responded snarkily with, "You get a license to crap at 13." My attitude wasn't overlooked though; people apparently reported to my sister how I was talking. I remember her asking me what I was trying to prove.
That's the question that often comes up when people are arguing against curse words: what are you gaining by using these words? While I feel that there is an appropriate time and place for such language, I see no problem in using it, obviously. It's an expression of self that some have wrongly stigmatized.
Now, let me make this clear--I don't go throwing around God's name with all this. Some curse words are still off limits in my book.
I'm going to end this post with my favorite phrases to use in those professional situations as substitutes for curse words:
- fartknocker
- shootamonkey (said really fast)