MBA2180 Q&A Wednesday: Should I curse on my YouTube channel?
2 Feb 2026 · 10 min
This is a podcast episode of The $100 MBA (Q&A Wednesday) in which host Omar Zenhom answers Frank's question about whether he should curse on his YouTube channel. Frank is a two-year YouTuber with ~20,000 subscribers and says he normally swears in private (he's Australian) but has kept his channel clean. Omar advises there is no universally right answer: prioritize authenticity and audience fit. He argues that being authentic (whether that includes cursing or not) helps attract a stronger, more aligned audience and gives the example of creators like Gary Vaynerchuk and Van Neistat. Omar also shares a business anecdote about Webinar Ninja's 'Green Friday' (planting 20 trees per signup) to illustrate choosing values over mass appeal. The episode includes multiple ad reads and closing subscription prompts.
Chapters
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2025 so in today's Q&A Wednesday's question, Frank asked you to curse on his YouTube channel. Here's the truth. If you don't curse on your YouTube channel or any content that you publish, you won't alienate anybody for cursing. Now you might alienate people for other reasons. Your views, your ideas, maybe your style, your humor, whatever. And I the point that some people make like why alienate anybody for this reason? Well, here's the argument for considering cursing if that's part of who you are. Authenticity is really the magic key of online content. What do I mean by that? Well, if you are somebody who uses colorful language every single day, it's who you are. Showing who you are, including the cursing, is part of your authenticity. Now if you don't curse in your normal life, that is being authentic and sticking to it, is part of the values that you hold and you share with others and people respect it. It's not the actual cursing that matters here, it's the actual authenticity. Because when you're holding back the way you express yourself normally, there's something inside of you telling you not to be who you really are or to present something other than your real self. This is what I found in my own experience. You kind of get into this head space where you're trying to be this like, buttoned up, professional person, this alter ego, this other Persona. And whether you recognize it or not, people can feel that at some level. Just look at the people that you like. You follow, you watch on YouTube. Personally, when I look at the people that I watch and subscribe to and watch every episode is people that are unapologetically themselves. A good example of this is like Van Neistat. Van Neistat is actually Casey Neistat, the big time YouTuber's brother. Van is totally different than Casey. His videos are so original because he is himself. He's a little bit quirky, he's a little bit nerdy. He's a fixer upper guy, doesn't have a fancy wardrobe, he doesn't have a fancy anything. He's not a fancy guy. He's not over the top. He's not boisterous. He's kind of mundane in some way, but that's who he is and it shines through. And I enjoy it so much because I feel like I know him and it's unique because he's being himself. Does he curse? I think sometimes. And my guess is he curses when he would normally curse when he wasn't in front of a camera. So in this case with Frank, I would say just be yourself. If you feel comfortable using colorful language and that brings out your real personality, then go for it. Hey, I got a lot of Australian friends and cursing for them is like drinking water. It's totally normal. It's not even seen as low brow. It's just seen as being down to earth. Now, will people unsubscribe or not watch your videos anymore because you curse? Well, people that don't resonate with that might do that. But I think in the long run, this is my personal opinion, in the long run, you'll attract your kind of people, the people that like you for who you are, and that connection will be stronger and you'll have a stronger subscribed audience, which means you'll have a higher quality audience than people that don't really resonate with you strongly. I'm not here to argue if using foul language or cursing or whatever you want to call it is a bad thing or a good thing. I'm a no judgments guy. I actually think that if this is part of who you are, be who you are. And by the way, who we are sometimes changes. I used to curse a lot in interviews and on videos when I was younger. As I've gotten older, I just don't do it as Often, and it's not even intentional. I think my temperament and my attitude towards things changed over time. And it's not a good thing or bad thing. It's just a thing. Right? And it could be the other way around. Somebody could not curse and all of a sudd start cursing because it feels more natural to them. So here's the moral of the story. If you change anything you're doing in anything in your business, the messaging, the way you do it, in this case, cursing, you're going to alienate some people. People are not going to like it, even small, subtle things, but other people will really love it. It's going to be interesting to them. It's going to resonate with them. They're going to tell others. The volume and the velocity of that interest is much higher than somebody just being okay with you being normal or not offending them. I always say in business, the worst thing is being ignored. And I'm not saying be controversial for controversial sake, but I'm saying if you strike a nerve with somebody and they disagree with you, that's not necessarily a bad thing. It's actually a good thing because it means you have a point of view and you stand for something. I'll give you a totally different example that has nothing to do with cursing. At Webinar Ninja, our software company, last year, we started a new initiative. We stopped doing Black Friday. We just felt like it wasn't aligned with our values as a company, this idea of, like, stampeding crowds and screaming promotions. So we started a new thing called Green Friday. What's Green Friday? Well, during the period of time of that Friday through Monday that we now call Green Friday, not Black Friday or Cyber Monday, we plant 20 trees on behalf of every single customer that signs up. During that time, we teamed up with one tree planted to make it happen. And customers even get a certificate certifying they planted some trees. It's a little bit different. It's a little bit quirky. Some people think thought, oh, this is not great. I want 50% off. And that's okay. We're not going to resonate with everybody. But people that like this initiative think that this is cool, care about the environment, think it's awesome to be planting trees, and it gives them a reason to, you know, buy. During this time, they're going to love it. And by the way, it stands out more than another Black Friday deal. It's a little bit different. So it's okay for you to not be accepted by everybody. That's fine. You don't need to convince the world you're amazing, just the people that are aligned with you, aligned with what you're all about and resonate with your message.
Thy ticket, lady Jennifer of Coolidge. Well, many thanks, good sir. Here is my Discover card.
They accept Discover at Renaissance Fairs?
Yeah, they do here. Discover is accepted at the places I love to shop. Get it with the times.
With the times. You're playing the loot.
Yeah, and it sounds pretty good, right?
Discover is accepted at 99% of places that take credit cards nationwide, based on the February 2025 Nielsen report. To wrap up today's lesson, be yourself. Now, I know there are arguments for having a different Persona in public. I know that there's a very popular book by Todd Herman called the Alter Ego Effect. This is a fantastic book. I know Todd personally. I met him in person, seen him speak. His work is great. And it's a good way for you to get out of your head and be where you need to be. But in my opinion, it's not a permanent state. You don't have to be something you're not always. It could be just a crutch until you get to a certain point of confidence, and then you can slowly start integrating who you really are in your public Persona. At least that's my take. The book is super valuable and I highly recommend you check it out. And by the way, you don't have to agree with everything that is out there. With every book you read, you can take what you like and leave what you don't. Thanks so much for listening to the 100 OMBLA show and thanks, Frank for your question on Q and A Wednesday. If you got a question you want to ask, go ahead and email me over at omar100mba.net or you can go ahead and ask me on Twitter. I'm TheOmarzenholm on Twitter. Thanks again for participating and making our show amazing. Speaking of our show, if you haven't subscribed or followed us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or whatever podcast app you use, go ahead and do that right now. By following us, you can get access to over 2,100 episodes in our archives. It also means that you get our next episode automatically as soon as it gets dropped in our feed. Thanks so much for supporting the show. Before I go, I want to leave you with this. I understand it's not easy to do things, you know, might offend people that might have some backlash. It's not easy to just, like, simply not care what people think. So one technique I do to kind of help me with this is just focus on the people that I do care about or are really my followers or my tribe or the people that I'm really connected to. I gotta give them my best self, my real self. Even if that means other people won't like it. Those other people, I wish them all the best. But I'm not here for you. I'm here for the people that really resonate with my message and what I'm about. Focus on the people that you can resonate and help, not those who you can't help or resonate with. Thanks again and I'll check you in tomorrow's episode. I'll see you then. Take care. Of.
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