swearing

I used to think bitch was a type of lizard.

LiZaRd WoMaN!

I used to think that every time you swore, God (Im Catholic, thank you.) Would make a checkmark on a clipboard, and if her ran out of room on his clipboard, you would go to hell for bad language.

Stevensonbak

I used to believe that your "rude finger" meant I hate you. So when we were angry at the teacher, we would all put up our rude finger when she wasn't looking.

Eishi

I used to think screw you was just like saying forget you in a different way. So when my mom where joking together in the car she kinda dissed me and I said screw you boy was I set straight. This happened when I was 11

Eric

I used to think that bastard was another word for beast so one time my friends and my dad were throwing snowballs and he was throwing a lot so I said dad you're a bastard!

sky

When I was about seven, my cousins and I believed it was okay to say curse words as long as you apologized to God directly afterwards. We would tentatively whisper, "Dammit!" and then look up at the sky and shout, "SORRY, GOD!!!!"

A Religious Child

When I was young I met a man who said "BS" in almost every sentence. I asked my dad what BS meant. He told me it meant "Bachelor of Storytelling". It wasn't until several years later that I learned it meant bullshit.

filchyboy

Once when I was about 10 I called my Dad a "stupid dildo" without knowing what the word meant. I don't know where I'd heart it but I thought it was just a variation on "dumbo". A classic middle-class English parent, Dad just said something like, "Be careful of the words you use," without actually saying it was rude or explaining what it meant.

Anon

When you're 2 and a half, you pretty much take at face value anything an adult might happen to utter around you. Your mind is a little sponge, soaking up the new and different, and language is an adventure. Indeed, I was praised for my quick uptake of new words. Hence, I believed I was in for lots of cuddles when I demonstrated my grasp of the vocabulary taught to me by my grandfather when I told my father that the stubborn bolt he was trying to loosen was, in fact, a c*%&sucker. I can still remember the way his mouth opened but nothing came out...

Potty Mouth

When I was about three, my parents and grandparents took me to a restaurant. One of the rules my mother had was that no one was ever allowed to say curse words around me. But you can't stop people from saying things when they're angry or upset.

So, we're in this restaurant, and I spill a big glass of water. Then, in the loudest voice I could manage, I yelled the most vile stream of curses I could think of.

"DADGUMMIT LORDY ME I SWEAR!"

We still laugh about this today. I'm 38.

Gary

my sisters and i invented an imagination game called the alley cat restaurant, some cross between a disney movie and a soap opera. my youngest sister, who always had to be the boy, played thomas o'malley (a la aristocats). there was some pretended romantic triangle and i said, "Tom doesn't love you. he's after one prime pussy." my mom came running in to the room screaming, "what did you say??" and i started yelling "pussy cat! pussy cat!" i didnt really know what i had said, i wa only about 9, but i got the fact that it wasnt something my mom wanted to hear coming out of my mouth.

hels bels

My cousin used to believe that Wells Fargo was a bad word.

Captain Wheeler

When i was 9 i used to believe that shiites was prounounced @#&*ies. So when i asked my mom whats the difference between the @#&*ies and the sunnis was, she sent me to my room without dinner. The next day i asked my bestfriend what she thought i had done to upset my mother. She told me my mother was probably offended that i didn't know what the difference was(she believed thats how you pronounced it too). Until i was about 12 i believed i was either a @#&* or a sunni but i didnt want to offen my mom again by asking.

Anon

Not my belief, but that of a friend's brother:
Try to allow me to take you back to a few years ago, when the (terrible)* band Papa Roach released the video for the (equally terrible) song "Last Resort". For whatever reason, the word "resort" in the chorus was decidedly bleeped out on television, as if it were a cuss word (Still mystified myself, but I choose to file it under Douchebaggery and not think about it too much). Anyway, Friend's Brother, who was maybe 9 or 10 at the time, sincerely thought that the word "resort" was a legitimately offensive one and told on my friend, the older sibling, once or twice for saying it before he was set straight.

*understatement on my part

Coelacanth

When i was about 5 or 6 years old, i just came home from school and someone was talking to my mum. My um said something funny and the person said "f****ing hell" and he was laughing and i thought it meant something was funny so when my sister told me a joke i said "F***ing H*ll" and well, i actually shouted it and my mum heard me...poor me.

Never Swear When a Child Can Hear!

I was a 90's kid and The Violent Femms' "Add It Up" was always on the radio.
When we were really young my brother and I would think nothing of singing "Why can't I get just one screw?!" (Or worse), at the top of our lungs at any time in school.
We didn't really get what a curse word was and thought it was just another word like "cat" or "dog".

Anon

When I was little, I spent a brief period of time for reasons I don't remember under the impression that to "swear" meant to tell lies at school.

Rachel

I thought that "shit" was just a rude way of saying "stuff", rather than specifically meaning fecal matter, due to how people say things like "I don't have time for this shit."

Geirskogul

When I was six or something my best friend had asked her mum what the 'f' word was, saying she'd never tell anyone. Her mum told her it was 'frettle'. My friend told me and for years we went on believing that the 'f' word was frettle!

Anon

Like many a man from northern Ireland, my dad's language can frequently be described as "colourful". My nan, being from the republic, was more genteel, so when she cut herself whilst making dinner she just said "oh dear!"

"No nan," piped up her golden-haired, 5 year-old grandson (me), "you don't say 'oh dear' you say Jesus f'n wept!"

CFC 4 Life