I hear you. It's childish and not professional at all, and when whipped out in serious discussions just ... well some validity from the point trying to get made gets lost. However, using altcoins gives too many cryptocurrencies way too much legitimate power, so personally from being repelled by the use of shitcoins - I now use it myself to clearly convey my position haha.

It's part of the jargon and I don't love it. When talking to newcomers or other interested I try to not use the term, and not even altcoin. There's Bitcoin and then there's other copies, and that's what I try to convey. I will always explain that these other cryptos are called shitcoins for a reason though.

Worth to note is that I am not the type of maximalist who dismiss any other use of the tech, because being so close minded will always fail you.