SBS warns that the following post contains coarse language and juvenile themes

Whether we like it or not, religion has influenced and continues to influence almost all aspects of our lives. Our government and judicial system has an English-Christian base; our major holidays celebrate the actions of a fictional holy figure; our suburbs are littered with beautifully designed churches, many, for some reason, covered with imagery of a man being tortured to death.

For those of us who do not believe in an imaginary friend in the sky, the problem is that we continually find ourselves referencing religious themes and icons. No more so than in that most beloved pastime of Australians, swearing.

Jesus Christ, Fucking Hell, For Christ’s sake, and my personal favourite, Jesus Titty Fucking.

Almost all the best ones out there have a religious base. I realise that swearing relies heavily on shock value, and at certain times in history the act of blasphemy was about as shocking as it got without taking your pants off, but still, is it possible to drop the religion in our swears?

The easy answer is just to replace Jesus Christ, God and Hell with fuck, shit and another word that rhymes with Rex Hunt. That works of course, but I think it’s a cheap solution. I think we can be more creative here.

I’ve heard a few sad ones from the militant evolutionists out there along the lines of ‘For the Love of Darwin’ and ‘For Dawkins’s Sake’. But these seem forced, and to me have little chance of catching on.

Another option is to drop the JC bias and invite all the other religions to the table of blue. Try and drown out the Christian influence.

For Allah’s sake? By the many arms of Vishnu? Voodoo Fuck?

Meh. Maybe we should be stick with the shock value base and create our dirty words from the taboos of the day.

Paedophile Pete! Fucking Kiddie Fiddler! Nice ring to those. I think we’re on to something.

But as much as it pains me to say it, I don’t have all the answers here, so I’d like to open the floor. Got any contenders for the secular curse words of the future?