Same here.
In 1990, when my male cousin got married, during the wedding reception, his groomsman attached an actual ball-and-chain to his ankle (which one of them had made from a bowling ball and a length of chain). They saw it as the height of humor; then again, at that point in the evening, 95% of the attendees were drunk.
That was probably one of the last times I’d heard/seen the reference.
No. This term pre-dates the boomer generation by at least one generation, probably two.
I’ve never heard it used to refer to a man.
I was gonna say, it sounds more old-timey to my Gen X ears than boomer humor. Definitely at least 30s generation. I’m thinking, like @Grrr , black-and-white sitcoms like The Honeymooners or screwball comedies. I don’t have any specific examples in mind, but that’s the era that my imagination wants to put it in.
And, like almost everyone else, I’ve heard it only referring to wives.
ETA: OK, close. The first reference to refer to “one’s wife” is attested in 1920, according to etymonline.com. (Also, note their definition as “one’s wife” and not “one’s spouse.”)
ball and chain | Etymology, origin and meaning of phrase ball and chain by etymonline.
It does. I’m a Boomer, albeit toward the tail end, and I remember these references being made throughout my childhood by my parents and their parents.
I’m an earlier Boomer than you, but yeah. My parents and grandparents thought this was the height of wit. I always cringed.
That was two of us, anyway.
Wife.
I certainly took it as misogynistic, as did the doper who flagged the thread that used it. I’ve never heard it used for other than a wife.
Seconding.
And agreeing that it’s primarily pre-Boomer, though extending to some extent to overlap with us. I’m a fairly early Boomer, and it has an old-fashioned sound to me.
I will say that I’ve never seen or heard it used to refer to a husband; only to a wife.
There’s also a lot more tolerance for divorce. If one doesn’t value the partner, one’s now more likely to be expected just to leave than to stay married but keep complaining about them.
I’ve heard both women and men refer to their spouse as a ball and chain. The implication is the less fun one who is preventing them from doing something.
I saw that note and immeaditly went to ATMB thinking there would be a thread about how there was no way it was misogynistic. Didn’t care enough to start the thread myself though.
When I made the comment I meant it as a conservative person in a relationship with l one a bit more wild. I know couples who work both ways, but I see that historically it swung one way. Sorry.
Based on what’s been described in this thread, it sounds like, in more recent usage, the term (which isn’t very common anymore, anyway) is used to describe both husbands and wives, but, historically, it was predominantly used to describe wives only.
I’ve been known to refer to myself as my wife’s old ball-and-chain, in the sense that she can use me to kill people.
If I search on there for “ball and chain marriage”, I get nine results of the woman locking up the man, two results of both man & woman being locked and one result of the woman being locked.
But… that includes a series of three man-only, man/woman, woman-only images where they just moved the clipart around. Eliminate that and it’s eight locked men and one man & woman (the one you showed). I think there’s a pretty strong gender bias towards “the ball and chain” referring to the wife keeping the man at home and not having fun.
Older millennial here. I don’t recall hearing the term used at all by anyone younger than my boomer parents, and even among that cohort I hadn’t heard it in a while. But when I did hear it, it was only men saying it about their wives. It definitely took me aback to see it in that thread. I guess I could imagine a woman my age ironically appropriating the phrase, in the way she might jokingly tell her husband “bitch, make me a sammich!” I.e., not as a way of communicating that her husband is the nag spoiling her fun, or that she would like a sandwich, but as a playful way of mocking sexist tropes.
My husband actually came out on the porch while I was writing this, to ask if he should start dinner, and I posed this question to him. His answer was the same as mine. But I suppose the “ball and chain”-encumbered men would just conclude he’s… what, henpecked? Or that I’m an old battle-axe? Is that the appropriate old-timey phrase? Where’s my onion belt?
I remember an episode of King of the Hill that flashed back on the main characters’ bachelor parties (taking place in the late '70s or early '80s, with the episode being written and airing in the late '90s or early ‘00s), in which they pranked each other by attaching an actual ball and chain to the groom’s ankle while he was distracted. They don’t flash back on the wives’ parties, but they do show a then-present-day bachelorette that doesn’t involve any such humor. It would’ve been jarring if it did.
That’s another term that came to my mind when I saw this thread. Equally outdated, also nearly always used to describe a wife back when it was in common usage, and seemingly even more sexist/derogatory than “ball & chain.”
Aw, that just brought back memories of Norm. God bless his soul:
I’d concur with the usage and sentiments about “old battle axe” directed as a derogatory term for females.
But then I haven’t heard the term “old war horse” applied to women.
I can’t think of any time I’ve heard old battle ax actually used but it is definitely only referring to women.
I picture Fred Flintstone calling his mother-in-law one, but I may be mistaken as to whether he ever did.