This meme has been circulating twitter and Facebook:
“The term swag was invented in the early 60’s by a group of gay men in Hollywood. It stands for ‘secretly we are gay’ and was most frequently used as code on posters announcing gay orgies.”
I’m no etymologist, but my skeptic organ is pinging hard. I understand the word “swag” pre-dates the 60’s by a wide margin. The claim that it was invented in the 60’s is obviously wrong, but still, it is possible the usage was as mentioned. Is there any evidence from the 60’s? Actual posters? Written accounts?
I had thought, from the times I’d actually heard it used, that swag was loot/prizes/gifts/freebies.
Example 1: a friend of mine from Dallas was heavily involved in gamer and sci-fi cons back in the late 90’s/early 00’s (he still may be, we lost touch ~ '03), and he’d mentioned more than once that the “swag bags” (goodie bags for con organizers and sponsors) were great.
Example 2: not necessarily the best cite, but Hector Barbossa in Pirates of the Carribean mentions that his holds are bursting with swag. Considering that his ghost ship of undead pirates were all-male, I don’t suppose that “Secretly We Are Gay” can be entirely ruled out as a meaning, but in the context of the scene, he was most assuredly referring to loot/treasure.
Neither regular online dictionaries or urban dictionaries support this meaning.
Is there ANY evidence of this terminology being used in the 60’s? It is entirely possible that a subculture of gay men did use the term to mean “secretly we are gay.” However, I am loath to trust a Facebook meme. Does any documentation of this usage exist? For example, one of the mentioned gay orgy posters?
People are always coming up with these asinine false acronym explanation for words. Those who fall for it usually are the same people who can’t figure out how to open a dictionary.
The usage obviously exists in modern times. I suspect this is a pushback from over-use, but cannot say for sure. The origin of the acronym in the 60’s is suspect.
Camel Cigarettes use the term ‘swag’ on their website to mean the odds and ends users have earned or been given by the company. Camels seem to be brand of choice for gays, liberals, youth, moderns and generally anyone that would be gay friendly or more open. Of course that is an open argument, just as Marlboros are more likely to be consumed by republicans, farmers, homophobes, and just the opposite of the Camel Smokers. Swag may not have any roots in homosexuality, but may have subliminally crept into the advertising campaign Camel is aiming for. There are arguments out there that attempt to peg who the average Marlboro vs. Camel smoker is, and I’m not necessarily interested in promoting one side or the other, but it does make sense to me that the two camps have picked their choice of tobacco, as I’ve seen it in my own life. In college, Camel was the brand, and we were all liberal and open minded smokers. Out in the working world, I notice the working class, rural, closed-minded, head-of-household, father of 2.5 children reaches for his Marlboro Reds, while the 20 year old college student working the summer job still reaches for the Camels.
After reading the Urban Dictionary entry, I have a theory that “swag” in the meaning you’re talking about is a fairly recent fake etymology, not going back anywhere nearly as far as the early 1960’s. The meaning of “swag” as “treasure” or “free giveaways” and the meaning of the word “swagger” clearly go back a long way. I suspect that sometime fairly recently (perhaps in the 1990’s or 2000’s), the word “swag” began being used by a youth culture in the U.S. as a general term of approval. Where they took this term from I can’t say. Perhaps it comes from the way a cool person swaggers as they walk or perhaps it means that an item is to be treasured. I’ve never heard this meaning before, so whatever culture uses it is clearly much younger than me (and maybe in some region I don’t visit).
It appears that this term became so common among this youth culture that some members of this culture became sick of it and made up a joke etymology for it. They claimed (as part of the joke) that it was actually invented in gay culture thirty or forty years before and was derived from the phrase “Secretly we are gay.” In this way whenever another member of this culture used the term, they could say, “Well, we know that you must be homosexual to use the term.” I can’t swear to any of this theory of course, since I haven’t done any real research on the topic. Does anyone here personally know of the word “swag” being used in any of these senses in contemporary youth culture?
“Schwag” is the word I’ve always heard to mean “free branded stuff you get from parties, work and companies at conferences and stuff.” Never heard “swag” until now.
My dad, born in Ireland in 1941, used both the terms swag and swag bag. Similar to the first meaning you gave, he used them in reference to sweets/toys/other goodies.
