Holy Freaking Curse Words in YA

I'm not really a heavy subscriber on the profound language of the curse word. I throw out the occasional bomb when I get angry, but it stays fairly PG13 (perhaps a little less so on the internet). I've always been like this, despite how my mother cursed (and still curses) like a sailor. It's just my personal decision, and I don't condemn anyone for making their own decision.

I'd be out of a girlfriend if I did.

So, in the spirit of banned book week -- someone told me the other day, "Cursing is a sign of lower intelligence and a lack of a command of the English language."

I got puffy. Super puffy.

I said, "I can curse all I want and still be fucking eloquent."

He didn't expect me to say that. Let's just put it that way.

To me, cursing is simply another way of communication, but the words themselves mean little after societal context is taken away. "Kill" is a dangerous word, and it's dangerous by its neutral definition alone. A child can read the definition of "kill" and know it's a bad thing. "Shit" is, well, poop. An angry word for poop. And it's the "angry" part that people generally don't like, even if a child reads the neutral definition and only giggles because poop is funny.

Because of this, there are appropriate times and places for this type of expression. But "appropriate" is sort of subjective, isn't it? Who gets to decide what language is "appropriate" for young adults?

My characters curse. They do. Well, not all of them do as frequently as others. Some of them throw out the occasional bomb as I do: when under excruciatingly uncomfortable situations where "shoot" just simply won't suffice. Other characters get a thousand times more creative.

(Seriously, sometimes I sit and stare out the window, brainstorming some of these curses because, wow, they're crazy.)

But the fact is simple: for me to censor or reduce a character's cursing is painfully out of character for them. It's in their character to curse the way they do, and my responsibility as a writer is to write honestly and truthfully. They curse. Some more than others. Some a lot more than others. But this is them. Good young adult fiction should always be honest to teens and never hold back, just because they're teens.

I've always considered Marionettes to be Upper YA for its edgier themes and language. I know I might have been a bit surprised if I'd picked up a book like this when I was a teen, but to be perfectly honest, the teens of today are not the teens of my day. Seriously. My teen section in Barnes and Noble was an itty-bitty thing. Now, it's growing at a rate that bookstores don't even know what to do with.

Also, teens are tougher now. They're more independent and, holy cow, they're a whole lot more aware of the world than I'd been. And just like with anything else, teens will decide for themselves if the language of the curse word is something they want to practice. Censoring it in fiction doesn't keep it from them -- it just makes them ask, "Why is this character saying 'shoot' instead of 'shit'?"