Watch Your Mouth!

Put away perversity from your mouth; keep corrupt talk far from your lips. (Proverbs 4:24) 

          Yesterday, “Guard Your Heart.” Today, “Watch Your Mouth.” Since what comes out of the mouth is indicative of what is in the heart, they are in the right order. Listen to what our mouths say, both our individual mouths and the mouths of our society. 
          What comes out of your mouth. I grew up in a household where what most people would call bad language wasn’t used.  That doesn’t mean that there was no bad language. My mother was known for balderdash and folderol. My own preferences for expletives changes, but includes blast, blasted, (Oh) bother, and rats. In junior high school, I got in trouble with a girl in my neighborhood because when she kneed me (I never knew why) I called her a name. After weeks of being bullied, my mother finally intervened and brought the matter to the vice principal’s attention. The girl defended herself with the statement that I’d called her a bad name. You should have seen the look on the vice principal’s face when she learned that the bad name was “ignoramus.” Different words, but are they different sentiments? 

          I have friends who use far more traditional bad language when they get irritated, and I’ve told them that I understand the need to be able to express strong emotion when circumstances warrant it. I know other folks who seem to think most nouns, verbs, and adjectives should involve words that used to be censored from television and radio. 

         If you even politely suggest that their choice of words is less than admirable, chances are good that you’ll be gas-lighted, told that those words, and by extension all words, don’t have any meaning except what you give them as the audience. Therefore, if your understanding of them is in any way negative, you are the one with the problem. It amazes me how much time and energy some people put into saying nothing. Why do they say anything at all if their words have no meaning? How can they fault anyone for saying anything, if their words have no meaning?

          Oh, but let someone say something negative about someone of a darker skin tone. “Racism!” Let them say something about people whose sexual preferences are not traditional. “Homophobe!”

          Shall we say, “Shame one you for attributing such a horrible meaning to my meaningless words!”?

          Of course, there is some truth to the idea that the hearer can attribute meanings to words that the speaker did not intend. I have said that I believe X (person or group) is wrong and is behaving in a way that is bad for society. I’ve been denounced as being hateful. The same people who criticize me claim to be loving people, yet they not only say that Y (person or group) is wrong and is behaving in a way that is bad for society, but they go on to say that Y is evil, corrupt, hypocritical, hateful, bigoted…. Don’t dare suggest to them that they are hateful, and don’t suppose that if you do, they’ll decide that “hateful” means “loving, kind, considerate, responsible, compassionate…. No, they’ll mean something very negative by it.

          If all of that doesn’t make it clear to you that we need to be careful about what comes out of our mouths, you’re mistaking my meaning.