diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index c25599c..491d923 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -13,3 +13,4 @@ __pycache__/
 config.json
 venv/
 *.log
+filter.txt
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/filter.txt.example b/filter.txt.example
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..58f8fdf
--- /dev/null
+++ b/filter.txt.example
@@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
+put
+bad
+words
+in
+filter.txt
diff --git a/functions.py b/functions.py
index dad8b1a..f4daa6b 100755
--- a/functions.py
+++ b/functions.py
@@ -56,6 +56,15 @@ def make_sentence(output, cfg):
 	elif cfg['mention_handling'] == 0:
 		sentence = re.sub(r"\S*@\u200B\S*\s?", "", sentence)
 
+    # optionally remove filtered words
+	if cfg['word_filter'] == 1:
+		try:
+			fp = open('./filter.txt')
+			for word in fp:
+			    if word in sentence:
+				    sentence = sentence.replace(word, "[REDACTED]")
+		finally:
+		    fp.close()
 	output.send(sentence)
 
 
@@ -64,7 +73,7 @@ def make_toot(cfg):
 	pin, pout = multiprocessing.Pipe(False)
 	p = multiprocessing.Process(target=make_sentence, args=[pout, cfg])
 	p.start()
-	p.join(300)  # wait 5 seconds to get something
+	p.join(5)  # wait 5 seconds to get something
 	if p.is_alive():  # if it's still trying to make a toot after 5 seconds
 		p.terminate()
 		p.join()
diff --git a/main.py b/main.py
index 6847e88..f139229 100755
--- a/main.py
+++ b/main.py
@@ -30,7 +30,8 @@ cfg = {
 	"length_lower_limit": 5,
 	"length_upper_limit": 50,
 	"overlap_ratio_enabled": False,
-	"overlap_ratio": 0.7
+	"overlap_ratio": 0.7,
+	"word_filter": 0
 }
 
 try: