Content warning: this article contains strong language.

MF can stand for many things: mutual friends, Millennium Falcon, mezzo forte, mad flow, and medium frequency, to name a few. Its most common online meaning, though, is motherfucker or motherfucking.

MF comes from one of the strongest swears in the English language: motherfucker. Motherfucking is found in the 1880s, and motherfucker, for a “vile, worthless person,” in the 1910s.

In the 1950s, motherfucker, showing the flip from bad to good seen in many swear words, came to mean “badass.” Motherfucking also became a general intensifier (e.g., That’s motherfucking awesome).

In 1970, a Jet article printed M.F. in a report about how Georgia legislator and civil rights leader Julian Bond called Vice President Spiro Agnew a “Maryland Farmer.” This is a euphemism for motherfucker based on its initials, MF.

If anyone wasn’t already aware that MF was a cleaner way to say or print motherfucker, Prince’s 1992 hit “Sexy M.F.” filled them in. 

The internet and social media, ever the environment for shorthands and workarounds, helped spread MF in the 1990s–2000s.

MF can stand in for all your MF needs (e.g., a motherfucker or the modifier motherfucking). MF’er, for motherfucker, is a variant, as is MF‘ing.

In the digital age, you’ll likely see MF online for people either trying to save a little time in their swearing or avoid the outright force of motherfucker. People may also use MF for some self-censorship in speech.

You can’t say motherfucker on broadcast TV in the U.S. and a lot of print outlets won’t publish it, so MF is a commonly used substitute by media sources from Fox News to Mother Jones when reporting.

I’m starting to find myself and I’m realizin I’m a cool mf

— Tamara Powell (@TamaraPowell9) November 27, 2018

Indian film star Priyanka Chopra sparked some controversy in 2017 when she called her ex-boyfriend a MF. 

Hip-hop artist Shotgun Wang inspired a meme with his 2017 track “I Keep That MF Thang On Me.” The MF in the track is a shoutout to its producer, MF Doom, whose MF stands for metal force, metal fingers, and even mad flow. But we’re pretty sure they are both taking advantage of MF‘s other association. The meme featured people carrying unexpected things in their pockets.

This content is not meant to be a formal definition of this term. Rather, it is an informal summary that seeks to provide supplemental information and context important to know or keep in mind about the term’s history, meaning, and usage.