Everyone in our mission used the usual Mormonism euphemisms--fetch, flip, shoot, heck, darn, dang, etc--but some friends and I thought that deceptive, even dishonest. If one is going to curse, why not do it openly and notoriously? Why not take responsibility for your emotions and expressions rather than trying to hide behind weasel words? So we cursed like sailors and offended all sorts of missionaries.
I was baptized at age 8. The first day on the playground, I dropped the f bomb and knew this wasn't going to work.
Having held it together for the majority of the mission, with only a few swears, I went to my last area and my comp met me at the train station. On the way back to the apartment, he ripped off a good "fuck" and it was game on. Oh, what times we had.
For us it was a small act of rebellion. We were so sick of the dishonesty--the pressure for numbers, the assertion of love and concern for people who were really just targets, the constant false positivity and happiness, the bizarrely immoral leadership--and saw linguistic fidelity as one of the few gestures we could make towards the truth.
It's Orwellian in a sense: words as a weapon against a tyranny that uses words to suppress individuals and individuality.
So my companion came out of the bathroom following a dinner appointment at a member's home and exclaimed, "You won't believe this Elder Goop, but I just stepped in my own shit."
My jaw dropped. I was dumbfounded.
The member had her ten year old granddaughter accompanying her and she was quickly amused. In fact, she was laughing so hard she couldn't breathe.
The member initially didn't say anything because she didn't comprehend English very well. She just looked toward her granddaughter for a visual clue as to what was happening.
My companion, who I didn't get along with, wasted no time telling the member that he not only had shitted in his pants, but got it all over his shoes. He was extremely upset.
He left in a hurry and all you could see was a nasty brown stain on his trousers as he pedaled (standing up) back to the apartment.
My father didn't swear much at all but had been taught that it was only really bad if you used the Lord's name. As he aged he said #amn fairly often and unexpectedly it stayed in my brain. When I slammed my finger in my closet door at BYU a great big giant loud #AMN! came out of my mouth. I made a great impression on the first day of school and surprised myself as well.
My father doesn't curse. Once he said, "shit," and my brothers and I got an amazing case of adult giggles. You know how you stop laughing, you look at the person who was laughing with you, and you start laughing again? That was us. As adults. Dad said shit.
My mom curses so much that the words are meaningless. ::ahem::
My cousin, Mabel, used to say, "Sugar, honey, iced tea."
My great grandmother's version of cursing" "May you live so long you become as a whetstone, and we'll sharpen our knives on your bones." <- that's some heinous shit right there.