Profanity And Children

"I don't want my kids to hear that!"  Profanity is not sinful [1], but that doesn't stop some Christians from objecting to it.  One of the things I hear used against it often is the claim that children shouldn't hear it.  Or that some parent doesn't want his or her kids to hear or use it.  Let's examine this logically, to see if it even is possible for this, of all things, to be a legitimate argument against profanity.  This is a brief post.  It doesn't take long to realize that this is a stupid argument!

If something is not intrinsically wrong in itself, then how can it be wrong for children to be exposed to it or do it?  It can't be!  Example?  If saying the word "drat" is not wrong, then it isn't wrong if a two year old utters it in frustration or anger.  Same with any other word, whether one that starts with an s, a d, or even an f.  I think many people I've known would easily admit the former (about "drat") while struggling to affirm the latter.  But if a word is not wrong, then it simply is not wrong--regardless of who says it.  And, as explained in the posts linked to in the footnote (I have addressed this particular point elsewhere), profanity is not sinful on the Christian worldview.  Even if this were not the case, any line drawn as to why a word like "drat" or "darn" is alright but a word like "damn" isn't is purely arbitrary and cannot be drawn without a multitude of fallacies.

At the very least, telling someone that children shouldn't hear expletives because they are allegedly "sinful" is to tell someone, whether the speaker is aware of it or not, that adults should preserve an illogical cultural tradition of viewing certain words as inherently "bad", and that adults should keep an irrational and extra-Biblical tradition intact, all for the sake of the fragile feelings of legalists.  This isn't really that difficult to understand when one thinks rationally.  Many people, Christians included, simply accept the morality they've been taught and have yet to challenge the inadequacies of it on an epistemological and metaphysical or Biblical level.  But it does not have to be this way!


[1].  See here:
A.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2016/07/profanity-profane-or-permissible.html
B.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/01/the-fallacies-of-anti-profanity.html
C.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/05/the-delusion-of-inverse-morality.html