On Swearing

[If you're offended by swearing, perhaps you shouldn't read this article by Ben Rogers. Same goes if you don't appreciate good satire.]

Let’s be honest with ourselves. We all get angry. Anger is a natural part of our daily lives. For most people, anger may be felt once or twice a day. For those more serious about their religion, it may be felt a greater number of times. Like 4,000. One of the ways we express our angry feelings is with words. Bad words.

I get so offended when people swear in front of me. It hurts my ears, and it makes me feel bad for them. The Bible tells us to feel bad for people who aren’t Christians.

However, being a Christian myself, I refuse to swear. That is heathen talk. Profanity. The word profane means “of the common people.” Do you really want to be associated with common folk? Of course not. No good Christian in his right mind would. I mean as Christians we are supposed to be elevated above the common folk. That is also why I am a Republican, amen.

But I had a problem. How was I to express all this anger? I couldn’t say those bad words, so I had to figure out something else.

I thought about using euphemisms, like calling the toll booth operator a female dog, or the guy at Burger King a fatherless child, or an anus, or a bowel movement-head. But that would simply reduce my intended word-blitz from volatile verbiage to little more than an aborted word-eunuch.

Then it hit me: letters. Yes! Instead of actually saying the profane words that dribble so abundantly over the drunken, slutty, cold sore-encrusted lips of the un-churched, I could simply designate a letter to represent each hateful member of Satan’s lexicon.

Now I can say what I mean, without really saying what I mean. You know what I mean? This also helps when singing along to the Tupac album my mom doesn’t know I have.

If I get angry with someone, I just say, “F you,” and they know that not only am I a follower of Christ, but that I also mean business and will not hesitate to take them out.

Frickin’ sweet, huh? (Frick is OK to say too.)

Sometimes when I get angry, I say to myself, “D it.” If I am extra mad I might say, “This is F-ing BS.” One time, and I thought this was rather creative, I told my mom she was a SFCWOS. My letter tirade was so potent that she was struck dumb, probably by the Spirit, and stood in the kitchen with a puzzled look on her face, probably wondering how I’d managed to so completely berate her while maintaining such a glorious level of piety. Though she still won’t admit it, she knows I’m bad-A.

And this is great because it is somehow within acceptable bounds. Plus I don’t have to be associated with the heathens who utter such nasty words like on my CDs, and in the movies, and on TV, and on the subway, and when I talk to people that don’t go to my church.

Letter cussing is just like Jesus in a way. It frees us from the bondage of verbal sin that has previously enslaved so many. No longer are we bound to the archaic, traditional four-letter words that still sprinkle the language of our linguistically Paleolithic peers. No longer must we actually articulate the demon-words.

We are evolving (socially, of course. Don’t be silly).

By thinking of the dirty word we want to convey, then saying the corresponding letter, everyone else thinks the dirty word too. That way, we are all on the same page as far as just what the speaker means without compromising our salvation. It’s almost like a code.

And, in case you are worried, think-swearing is not a sin. Everyone knows that it’s only bad to swear out loud because it decays the very fibers of our ears, then our minds, and ultimately our souls. When we think swear, the filth is contained in our minds, so it doesn’t have a chance to gain the necessary momentum that allows audible swearing to travel down our ear canal, through our aural nerves, into our brain, then through our brain, and finally into our soul, leaving a nasty brown stain for all eternity. And no amount of Oxy-clean or Shout can bleach out these embarrassing stains. Believe me. I’ve heard of people who have tried. Letter swearing prevents all this by trapping the staining filth in the safe, tightly closed dungeons of our minds.

I know Jesus said that when we lust in our minds it is the same as actually committing adultery, but this is a totally F-ing different deal.

Plus, how could it be a sin to say a letter. A letter is just a part of our language. But words, however, are totally different from letters, even though they are made of letters and also a part of language. Swear words are even more different. They are on a whole other level. Swear words are level ten, regular words are level five, and letters are level three. I have outlined the different levels of language below to help you understand what I am talking about.

Level 10
Swear Words
Books
Film
Theater
Written Speeches
Poetry
Song lyrics

Level 9
Television
Newspapers
Magazines

Level 8
Pamphlets, fliers, billboards, etc.
Paragraphs

Level 7
Sentences
Foreign words and phrases:“Que sera, sera” “Chalupa”

Level 6
Popular catch phrases and slogans

Level 5
Regular Words

Level 4
Abbreviations and shorthand

Level 3
Letters

Level 2
Punctuation
“Goosebumps” books

Level 1
Spaces in between words and sentences

The levels are divided based on the criteria of complexity and vulgarity quotient (Potential to offend). The higher the level, the higher the VQ. The higher the VQ, the more powerfully offensive the language could be if handled irresponsibly. I actually thought about creating a level 11 just for swear words since they offend 100% of the time, but I felt compelled to maintain the integrity of the table.

Logically, as we move down the table, the potential damage inflicted by offensive language in each level decreases until we reach level 4, which is the last level to have a VQ. All the elements of language in levels three to one are incapable of offending, excepting only the “Goosebumps” books.

So you can see, logically, why letters are never offensive, regardless of what their intended meaning is.

Abbreviations, surprisingly are still capable of offending. If they weren’t I suppose we would be abbreviation cussing, rather than letter cussing. Believe me, if I didn’t feel such a moral repugnance for abbreviation cussing, I would be doing it constantly. Alas, we can see all too clearly that abbreviations can indeed be used for evil.

On a side note, if you are reading this, and are really struggling with saying bad words, try limiting yourself to using only levels three and below for at least six months. After that, you should be totally rehabilitated. Prayer during this time would be useless, however, because God ignores all level six prayers and lower.

There is one bad word that Christians are allowed to say, and it too serves as a suitable substitute for all those nasty words: crap. We can even say this one in front of preachers!

There are a multitude of variations for this Swiss army knife of Christian cussing enthusiasts:
“This is crappy.”
“I feel like crap.”
“I’m sick of eating the same fricking crap for lunch.” (Don’t forget that frick is OK too.)
My all-time favorite: “What the crap?”

Some people have asked me while I was doing all this research why these substitutes are acceptable, since they mean the same things as the more objectionable words they replace. When someone asks you a stupid question like this, just do like I do, and tell them to stop being such an F-ing smart A.

It’s not even worthwhile to debate whether or not swearing is as grievous a sin as we make it out to be. Of course it is. I mean, there are words that can be said in substitute (Instead of F, copulate; S is poop, and H is Sheol). This is perfectly acceptable.

What we need to remember about bad language and letter-cussing is that it’s not what we mean that is a sin. Nor is it the spirit of anger towards our brothers and sisters with which the words are uttered. But rather it is the particular combination of letters that God finds objectionable.

And if you disagree, then go F yourself.