Languages change. Moron, idiot and imbecile used to be medical terms. Gay used to simply mean happy and excited. A fag used to be a term for a cigarette.
I really doubt it would have appeared in a mainstream children’s book if it were seen as at all offensive.
Words like “bugger” and “damn” used to be extremely offensive curses. Now they’re often used as very mild expressions of annoyance to avoid using the serious ones.
I had always heard that it originally meant a stick to be used for kindling and was adapted to smoking once the tobacco trade was a thing. Probably complete horseshit because no internet when I was a kid, but I never bothered to look it up.
A faggot originally meant a bundle of sticks or twigs, and they were used to light fires, but I don’t think this has any relation to “fag” as in cigarette. Etymonline says of the latter:
British slang for “cigarette” (originally, especially, the butt of a smoked cigarette), 1888, probably from fag “loose piece, last remnant of cloth” (late 14c., as in fag-end “extreme end, loose piece,” 1610s)
That meaning of faggot, interestingly, comes from the same root as the Roman symbol “fasces” which is a bundle of sticks from which we get the modern word fascism.
Another fun fact: there’s a traditional British dish called faggots which are a kind of meatball made from offal, somewhat similar to haggis but uncased.
Yeah I think they have a huge filter for words they consider problematic.
It doesn’t bother me enough to switch but it can be annoying, especially when I’m reading a comment in French and late gets removed because it’s written the same as the r word
Exactly. I started reading The Fellowship of the Ring again, and it takes some getting used to that “queer” is used in a completely different way than nowadays.
Queer is a strange one for me, growing up it was a straight up offensive slur for gay people but now the LGBTQ community has embraced it hard enough to give it its own letter.
I’ve slowly gotten more used to it because it see it used so much in a non-bigoted way, but I think there will always be a bit of cringe on my part with the term.
Weren’t idiot, moron and imbecile medical terms specifically used by white scientists to describe black people back in the good old eugenics days of the 1920’s America? Language changes sure but it often has very racist roots.
Moron is a term once used in psychology and psychiatry to denote mild intellectual disability.[1] The term was closely tied with the American eugenics movement.[2] Once the term became popularized, it fell out of use by the psychological community, as it was used more commonly as an insult than as a psychological term. It is similar to imbecile and idiot.[3]
Once the term became popularized, it fell out of use by the psychological community, as it was used more commonly as an insult than as a psychological term.
Any term for something that is likely to be a target of scorn or mockery has this problem unless it’s so bloodless, detached and clinical that it is effectively only usable as medical jargon and barely has any meaning outside that context. George Carlin once did a bit on this.
Related is how therapy language seems to increasingly be seeping into literally everything.
All good points. It only stuck with me when I heard it because I personally loved the term moron (it’s fun to say and can be really cutting). But I’m also well aware that loads of the words me and my friends used growing up are now (rightly) frowned upon.
Languages change. Moron, idiot and imbecile used to be medical terms. Gay used to simply mean happy and excited. A fag used to be a term for a cigarette.
I really doubt it would have appeared in a mainstream children’s book if it were seen as at all offensive.
Words like “bugger” and “damn” used to be extremely offensive curses. Now they’re often used as very mild expressions of annoyance to avoid using the serious ones.
Fag still is a term for a cigarette…
Yeah, but only in old-timey countries, like England.
I had always heard that it originally meant a stick to be used for kindling and was adapted to smoking once the tobacco trade was a thing. Probably complete horseshit because no internet when I was a kid, but I never bothered to look it up.
A faggot originally meant a bundle of sticks or twigs, and they were used to light fires, but I don’t think this has any relation to “fag” as in cigarette. Etymonline says of the latter:
That meaning of faggot, interestingly, comes from the same root as the Roman symbol “fasces” which is a bundle of sticks from which we get the modern word fascism.
Another fun fact: there’s a traditional British dish called faggots which are a kind of meatball made from offal, somewhat similar to haggis but uncased.
I always knew fascists were a bunch of fags
[im a gay tranny, relax]
A granny, if you will
Grantifa at your service 🫡
Reign in thunder, Queen 🤘
Weird I only see removed except for your use of fags in plural. The second is removed in your comment too
Huh, that is weird. Might be ml specific. Its not removed for me unless i type out the full removed
Yeah I think they have a huge filter for words they consider problematic.
It doesn’t bother me enough to switch but it can be annoying, especially when I’m reading a comment in French and late gets removed because it’s written the same as the r word
Thats uhhh… kind of fashy, isnt it?
Exactly. I started reading The Fellowship of the Ring again, and it takes some getting used to that “queer” is used in a completely different way than nowadays.
Queer is a strange one for me, growing up it was a straight up offensive slur for gay people but now the LGBTQ community has embraced it hard enough to give it its own letter.
As a Gen Xer, same. I still don’t like using the word due to the negative connotation it used to have.
Yeah, same. It still feels as weird and wrong as the f word or the n word.
I’ve slowly gotten more used to it because it see it used so much in a non-bigoted way, but I think there will always be a bit of cringe on my part with the term.
I must be old, since the original meaning is still what comes to mind first when I hear it in a non-LGBTQ context.
This is from South Africa in the year 2000. It just means unusual in this context.
https://www.songlyrics.com/saron-gas/beer-lyrics/
Weren’t idiot, moron and imbecile medical terms specifically used by white scientists to describe black people back in the good old eugenics days of the 1920’s America? Language changes sure but it often has very racist roots.
I’ve never heard anything about it having a racial component.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moron_(psychology)?wprov=sfla1
Moron is a term once used in psychology and psychiatry to denote mild intellectual disability.[1] The term was closely tied with the American eugenics movement.[2] Once the term became popularized, it fell out of use by the psychological community, as it was used more commonly as an insult than as a psychological term. It is similar to imbecile and idiot.[3]
Eugenics was related to racism, but it wasn’t the same thing as racism.
The intellectual ability / disability axis of eugenics was completely different from its skin colour axis.
Any term for something that is likely to be a target of scorn or mockery has this problem unless it’s so bloodless, detached and clinical that it is effectively only usable as medical jargon and barely has any meaning outside that context. George Carlin once did a bit on this.
Related is how therapy language seems to increasingly be seeping into literally everything.
All good points. It only stuck with me when I heard it because I personally loved the term moron (it’s fun to say and can be really cutting). But I’m also well aware that loads of the words me and my friends used growing up are now (rightly) frowned upon.
Buggery used to be a crime, now it’s a gay way to spend an afternoon
Nice one.
Enid Blyton used it a surprising amount. But she was also considered old-fashioned and racist by critics at the time, so…
“Bah humbug,” was that era’s equivalent of Scrooge wandering around saying, “whatever, bullshit.”