Twitter Temporarily Bans Users For Saying The Word 'Memphis'

Move over, F***, S*** and B****, there's a new cuss word in town that stands out among the lot, defined by its sheer unadulterated profanity. It is a term so offensive, it makes anyone who dares to utter the abhorrent expletive involuntarily shove a bar of soap inside their vile mouths, in a pithy attempt to cleanse the filthy tongue that had the gall to commit a true act of verbal treachery. What is this gut-wrenching obscenity, you ask? None other than the M-bomb itself -- the Tennesseean city of "Memphis."

Over the weekend, a system bug led Twitter to seriously crack down on those insolent enough to use such foul language,  issuing 12-hour bans to several users who even casually mentioned the apparently defiled southern municipality, Gizmodo reported on Monday. Their rationale? According to Twitter's M-word moderation messages, mentioning the evidently highly-offensive locale was a breach of the site's rules regarding sharing personal information, even though more than 600,000 people live in the city, with "most postal carriers require more specificity to delivery a letter," The Guardian noted. Yet as Gizmodo reporter Alyse Stanley pointed out, Twitter was rather inconsistent with the enforcement of the rule, appearing to only target unverified users, as images featuring the objectionable city's cursed name and individuals with the highly-coveted blue checkmark spewing the scandalous metropolis reportedly evaded the banhammer's unforgiving swing. 

While it is still unclear what, exactly caused the M*mphis mixup, Twitter acknowledged the glitch in a statement. "Earlier today, there was a system issue impacting accounts that tweeted the word 'Memphis'," a statement from the social media platform read. “The issue mistakenly requested that account owners delete those Tweets and temporarily limited their account features. The affected accounts are now reinstated and this issue has been resolved."

As some Twitter users noted the city's new status as a cuss word ... 

... some speculated on what the M*mphis went wrong, including user @SwiftOnSecurity, who guessed the mishap stemmed from an address ban gone awry. "What's possible is a Twitter staffer tried to block a street address, but the postal syntax acted as an escape sequence, or the original was multi-line and they only pasted the city," they wrote, alongside a screenshot of what appears to be Twitter's ban message. 

So folks, remember when you find yourself in a tough situation and certain four-letter-words don't seem to do the trick, The M-bomb is always there for you -- and it's really M*mphis-ing fun to say. 

For more internet nonsense, follow Carly on Instagram at @HuntressThompson_, on Twitch.tv @HuntressThompson_ and on Twitter @TennesAnyone.