All names have been changed to provide anonymity
So this has been ongoing for the past couple of months but really came to a head in the last week.
For a while now my son has been saying “Oh my god!” or “What the fuck!” My wife and I know that he picked these phases up from daycare, so we have the following dialogue:
“Who says that?”
“Zale does.”
“Are you Zale?”
“No, I’m Mark”
“Ok then, Mark doesn’t say those things”
Now is when the FU happens. The next time he says either of the phases I call him Zale. “I’m not Zale, I’m Mark” “Well Mark doesn’t say that, Zale does. So you must be Zale.” This usually gets him to stop saying either phrase, which is the goal, however the FU was realized last weekend when we were at a restaurant, and further during the week with Grandma. One of the people at the table behind us said “Oh my god” and Mark instantly said “Zale” under his breath. My wife and I exchanged Oh great glances. Mark proceeded to do that a couple more times that meal whenever the other group would say it. The same thing happened this past week when he was with Grandma. She would say “Oh my god” without realizing it and Mark would instantly say “Zale”. She would look surprised and claim she didn’t say that. But every time Mark would call her “Zale”
TL;DR any time my son would use a certain phrase he picked up from school we called him the kid who says it. Now he calls other people that kids name.