I called my mom a “bitch” once. She spun and dropped as if to shoulder my head against the stove.

“Don’t ever call a woman that,” she warned, her finger in my face. “It means you hate women. Only idiots use that word.”

I panicked and thought Wait, I don’t hate women!

Her signature door-slammer, “idiot,” was always effective too. As in, “If you stick a needle in your arm – you’re an idiot.”

And my mom’s lesson had legs: I soon learned it also applied to the other words boys around me were using to describe women and their parts. 
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