For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for May 15, 2018

My father never used such language from his own father and brothers. Makes me wonder now how my grandfather learned such language if HIS father was in an Amish community.

The way I saw this done best was in the old movie A Christmas Story, where the kid admits to the movie audience that he got his bad language from his dad, but blames another kid when his mother hears the kid swear for the first time. In this case, Michael seems to be blaming his father, but longtime readers know that when it comes to the “@%” style of swearing, the Patterson parents and Michael have been doing that for years with no one getting offended or punished.

What’s the difference this time? Elizabeth is doing it.

I never got how parents could swear in front of their kids. Not that there’s anything wrong with it, just that my parents virtually never swore in front of me. I also wasn’t allowed to say “fricken’”, which was one of the sillier rules they had for me.

I still don’t curse much, except for when I’m angry. I’ve never gotten the hang of inserting curse words into every sentence, e.g., “throw the @#!$ ball, man!” or “that’s a #$%*# good doughnut!”

I’m just as amazed at Michael cracking smart-aleck jokes while he’s getting in trouble. That should extend his sentence by another week!

I’m an ex-U.S. Navy petty officer. While in the navy, I’ve seen many a man use “colorful language” in every other sentence. It, the “colorful language” soon became background static noise. I on the other hand, hardly-ever used such words. So when I did use such words, people took notice that P.O. “littlejohn” was more thatn a little P******!

As my mother would say when scolding me for using bad language as a child she would say “watch your damn mouth!”

Time for the Lifebuoy soap.

Lynn’s Notes:

In my mind, I was thinking of the so-called x-rated things kids said in the 80s. Who would have guessed they would be talking the way they do now! I sincerely hope that the NEXT generation will think this is a waste of an education and start using our wonderful, descriptive language again.

When my grandsons were about 4 they let go with a GD word and mom about passed out. she blamed it on me but come to find out it was another child at the “Little Gym” place……..not always from an adult but a little set of ears that thinks it is a cool word.

Michael got off a zinger!

Learned mine from an uncle… BUT he also knew when and where it was not appropriate..Something kids today have not learned.

Try walking down a typical Middle School hallway. I’ve had students call each other some of the most vile names in the book (more accurately, on George Carlin’s fabled “list”). I tried to correct one girl and she told me “it’s OK mister, she’s my friend.”

When I was a freshman in High school I was actually surprised that younger kids used foul language while the rest of my class looked at me like I was crazy b/c they had younger siblings or cousins or just younger kids using poor language all the time. They made it seem like it was just a norm. Even today, alot of them are using poor language and it def doesn’t help when music, movies and really a majority of the media continues to enable them and make it seem like using this language so casually even when your not angry is okay.

When I was on a rollercoaster with my (then) 11 year old niece I cursed a couple of times & thought to myself “She’s going to tell her dad!” So I apologized profusely! She laughed & said “It’s OK…I hear those words a lot in school!” ( She was in middle school then. & I don’t think she told her dad about "Aunt K the sewer mouth! ;-) " )

I’ve heard that Native American languages had no swear words. So, someone asked one what they did if, say, they dropped a rock on their toe. Oh, then we speak white-man language! (When I was in the Army, there were some men that if he letters F and M were removed from the alphabet, would have been unable to communicate!

My Mom lived to be 100 and the strongest language I ever heard her use was damn or hell. Father never cursed much at all. On the other hand, I married into a family where the mother, father, and kids all used the F word, in talking and towards each other, even grandmother towards grandkids. Could never understand them…

Elly’s hair is getting back to it’s lank limp glory.

My dad swore…..a lot. My mother swore…..a lot. I swore when the kids were growing up. BUT when the grandkids came along I had to learn to watch it!

Reminds me the the MAD parody of “The Exorcist” (“The Ecchorcist”), where the mom is asking “Where did she get such a $%#&!! foul mouth?”.

Reminds me of the Seinfeld episode about The Non-Fat Yogurt.

Be a bus aid with teen age kids you will hear the most abused word with four letter it in there vocabulary starts at home

I never had any inclination for such language – I had a large enough vocabulary of perfectly respectable invectives, I didn’t need any. Being a preacher’s kid, there were usually a few parishioners who thought it cute to get me to use them – one to the point my father threatened legal action – but it didn’t take and the attempts stopped.

The irony of this is that Elly gets upset when the kids are playing nicely but cursing, while she seemed to ignore when they were fighting on the street, but not cursing, last summer.