About

Bad Word Bathroom Challenge, also known as the Bathroom Only Swearing Challenge or the Bathroom Cursing Challenge, is an internet challenge and TikTok parenting trend of letting little kids say swears or curse words only when inside the bathroom, often after closing the door and letting the child be in the bathroom alone to say them in front of a camera. The challenge is meant to simulate something similar to the logic of The Purge in that the kids are told to get all of their bad words out before they leave the bathroom, and they're not allowed to say any more of them after they leave. Emerging in January 2024, the trend spread online over the following weeks and went viral in early February 2024.

Origin

One of the earliest TikToks that used a bathroom as part of letting their children have permission to say bad words was posted on January 19th, 2024, by TikToker blonde.brandy.d.^[1] In the TikTok, the mother explains to her daughter that there is a new bathroom rule in which the daughter is required to go to the bathroom if she feels like giving the middle finger or saying bad words. The TikTok gained over 345,000 likes in two weeks while spreading the idea to other parents (shown below).

Spread

The challenge spread over the following weeks and had its rules expanded, with parents adding in that they had to close the door and leave the kid alone before they started to do their obscene gestures or word choices, leaving the children alone with the phone recording.

For example, on February 2nd, 2024, TikToker tasiaalexis^[2] uploaded a TikTok of her daughter going through with the challenge, with the daughter making several faces while saying "bitch." The TikTok quickly went viral, where it gained over 4.1 million views in one week (shown below).

Two days later, on February 4th, the most viral version of the challenge was posted by TikToker pearlinebrown1,^[3] who completed the challenge with her daughter as well. In this video, the daughter begins to repeat the same word said by tasiaalexis's daughter before adding in "motherfucker," earning herself over 52 million views in four days (shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References