[mrnoodle]

I have no doubt that many people aren't consciously trying to be blasphemous when they use God's name like that. I don't think of the act of copulation when I say "fuck". But there's still a reason why we use the words we do. If nothing else, there's a subconscious knowledge that some words are "worse" than others -- "piss up a rope" doesn't have the same bite as "fuck off and die". We can't say "gosh darn it" without feeling let down a little. It's got to be "goddammit" to carry the proper amount of cuss-osity.

My theory is that we have an inbred knowledge of God that we have to consciously rid ourselves of in childhood. When life doesn't go well and the invisible man upstairs doesn't prevent it, or some asshole does something bad to us and we associate them with religion, we throw the baby out with the bathwater. But there are a few remnants that never go away: 1. the knowledge that there are things that are innately "good" and "bad"; not murder and rape-level bad, but..well..like cussing. 2. Doing "bad" things feels good, often. Christians call it a sinful nature that rebels against God, non-Christians call it freespiritedness or something.

So, maybe goddammit is a more effective blasphemy, and universally regarded as a "bad word" because it invokes the name of someone that everyone but the most hardened atheist still "believes in" on some level. Even if they don't admit it.