In one episode of America's Supernanny, I saw a young child of perhaps 5 or 6 cuss. As in the F word, people. By golly that was quite horrifying. One of the things I really dislike is cussing esp. in public. Profanity is cathartic, but I feel like it is something you should say in your head or in private by yourself. I don't cuss out loud and only once in a while in my head or in private when I get angry. I find it embarrassing to do so in public. I guess you can compare it to peeing in the streets where everyone can see you. That's what a potty mouth is to me. It's just foul and should be done in private.
Anyways beyond that rant. In my house, since as I mentioned my parents aren't really around and I am the substitute parent. Growing up I instilled in my younger siblings then the same rules of not cussing. What I consider cursing: Obviously the F word, the S word, the D word, the H*ll word, the A word (another word for donkey or tushie) and mean spirited and politically incorrect things like misusing the word gay or retarded. One of my pet peeves is when people say "that is so gay" or "you are retarded." 1. That is highly offensive to people who are mentally retarded and people who are gay. You are turning something into a negative thing. You are associating a negative connotation with that word. You are equating the word gay= stupid and that isn't true at all. If you think something is stupid than just say that. 2. I hate that this is so commonly entrenched into society, this way of thinking. I wanted at least my younger siblings to not do this. I'm scared that since I'm in college I can't stop them from picking these things up from their schoolmates and their friends esp. at this malleable age of middle school and the beginnings of high school.
Story time: We (my siblings and I) were watching H*ll's Kitchen. And in our family we can't even say the name of the show. My younger sister came up with a nickname, "Bell's Chicken"." So as you may or may not know, Gordan Ramsey cusses like a maniac. They usually beep out the F word, but other words are very much there. And after sitting there you get a little brainwashed. And afterwards we were setting up to eat dinner and my younger siblings were dragging their feet to help and I got very angry and I just yelled, "Get off your lazy a**es" And it was like an earth shattering moment. I mean if was the most horrible feeling I had every had (well not really, but it felt horrible). And they were teasing me and saying oh you said a bad word and they hold it over my head even to today. I'm so ashamed. This may sound very bizarre as it may be quite commonplace in other families. But I take the no cursing thing pretty seriously.
It may be bad but I sort of taught this to my siblings my shaming them. I associate saying a bad word with a feeling of shame (as I felt when I cursed) to get them not to curse. I mean I find it pretty effective until they can understand for themselves that it is a bad thing. I was never taught this by my parents, I came to this understanding that one shouldn't curse. It is a graceless action. My parents don't often curse and even if they did they aren't really around. See how easily swayed I was to curse because I heard it for a while. Imagine a family that just all cursed at each other of course a child would think this is normal and ok to do. And copy it. That is exactly why you must teach by example.
And I'm not sure if this comes off like we are some overly Christian family or something like that. Not at all, we are pretty much agnostic. I don't think you have to be religious at all to have good morals and ethics. Not that there is anything wrong with being religious, but it's just not my cup of tea. I esp. dislike when people try to convert you or force their beliefs on you. Some lady randomly stopped me (just me, weird and she was already talking to other people, so why did she stop me??) and asked me "Can I ask you something?" And i thought she wanted directions or something, but she was like, "Do you study the Bible?" and i shook my head no and she said "do you know about the Heavenly Mother" and I kept shaking my head and she went on a little bit and said something about reaching eternal life or something like that. And me being polite was shaking head no because again I mention I hate people trying to convert me. I kind of just wanted to spew out I'm agnostic/atheist. But I feel like she would just try harder to convert me and I really wanted to leave. One thing I don't understand is, why the need to achieve eternal life? My thing is just try to live this life to the best and you don't have to live forever and ever.I'm sorry for my rant. >.<
I mean I've learned a lot and I definitely want to learn from my parents what they did right and learn from their parenting mistakes. I know I have a temper sometimes and just scream at people to do things, but I'm trying to improve that. Self improvement people! lol Ok I have to study blah. Also SPRING BREAK! ... But since I procrastinated so much I have a boatload of work to do. Including a research paper and presentation,studying, reading, glarg. Why my procrastinator self, why???? Need to work on this ASAP!
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