# Unfortunate Changes in Language **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 19, 2009, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986 "2009-05-19T17:46:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Teacake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Teacake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Teacake)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/41 "2009-05-20T18:57:08Z")
Attended and have taught at public schools - I don’t know of any which have their prefects in gowns or mortarboards. Staff, perhaps, though really that only happens on special occasions now (like prize evenings, times when the parents are there, or church services). At my brothers’ school, it was a different tie. At my school, it was a slim sash worn diagonally (like Miss World, but only about an inch wide). (That would be the sash; not the prefect.) ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/42 "2009-05-20T19:41:50Z")
> [@Teacake](#): > > Attended and have taught at public schools. We’re talking the U.K. meaning of public vs. private schools here, yes? Checking 'cause it would be the exact opposite of the meanings we ascribe to them in the U.S. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/43 "2009-05-20T19:53:37Z")
My understanding is that the meaning of “public” is the opposite. “Private” means the same thing, but is not commonly used. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/44 "2009-05-20T19:58:11Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > My understanding is that the meaning of “public” is the opposite. “Private” means the same thing, but is not commonly used. More narrowly, public schools are most commonly defined as those whose headmasters/headmistresses are members of the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference. Strictly speaking, regular (ie., non-public) private schools are now called _independent schools_. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/45 "2009-05-20T20:07:47Z")
There’s also the very end of Poe’s “The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar”: > [@](#): > > As I rapidly made the mesmeric passes, amid **ejaculations** of “dead! dead!” absolutely _bursting_ from the tongue and not from the lips of the sufferer, his whole frame at once — within the space of a single minute, or even less — shrunk — crumbled — absolutely _rotted_ away beneath my hands. Upon the bed, before that whole company, there lay a nearly liquid mass of loathsome — of detestable putrescence. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/46 "2009-05-20T20:20:36Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > I think the expression is “Keep your pecker up.” The Gilbert and Sullivan show Trial by Jury (1870, I believe) has the sung line “Be firm, be firm, my pecker.” When I did that show in '02, we changed it to ticker. I think it could legitimately be used in phrases like “Have a pecker”, “I lost my pecker in the war”, “I’ll lend you my pecker”, and “I really admire his pecker.” ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/47 "2009-05-20T20:27:03Z")
**tdn** , what would be the meaning of “pecker” in this context? The “ticker” substitution would seem to suggest “heart,” but that gets a little fuzzy with some of your examples (e.g., “I’ll lend you my heart”). ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/48 "2009-05-20T20:31:47Z")
I think “pecker” was a slang term for “nose.” ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/49 "2009-05-20T20:35:03Z")
How do you lend someone your nose? ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/50 "2009-05-20T20:49:22Z")
It means courage or pluck. Since the root of courage is cor, meaning heart, ticker is a fair substitution. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/51 "2009-05-20T21:11:46Z")
This is spelling rather than word usage, but I find it unfortunate that “thru” has become so ubiquitous. However, I won’t hesitate to use it, or “donut”, in Scrabble if I need to. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/52 "2009-05-20T21:20:45Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > How do you lend someone your nose? That comes after “pecker” has earned its figurative meaning. ---
**Author:** ![Infovore](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/infovore/32/420_2.png) [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/53 "2009-05-20T21:22:54Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Nowadays I seriously doubt that nuns urge kids to ejaculate 500 times for anyone, and a hero will only ejaculate in an adventure story if the author is looking for a quick laugh. Using such a word UN-ironically would be pulling a real boner. I can’t cite where, but I’m absolutely certain that JK Rowling used “ejaculated” in one of the Harry Potter books. I remember it was Ron doing the ejaculating, and it only happened once. Maybe the word still retains some of its old meaning in British fiction…? Watson ejaculates all the time in the Sherlock Holmes stories. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2009, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/54 "2009-05-20T21:41:31Z")
**winterhawk** : Was it in the context of wands, maybe? I can’t help but think of the bash quote where someone had gone through a bunch of sentences and replaced “wand” with “wang”… **gigi** : Different kind of unfortunate, too. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2009, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/55 "2009-05-21T00:32:21Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > The OED disagrees, saying it comes from “faggot,” which clearly came first. Also, “fag=homosexual” first appeared in the US, where the practices of British public schools did not exist and were pretty much unknown. I question that. First of all, the OED does not _say_ that, though it does imply it. It gives the earliest use of “fag” to mean servant boy in a public school as 1785. The earliest example it has of “fag” used to mean homosexual is 1923, and even its earliest recorded use of “fagot” to mean homosexual is 1914 (although it is true that “faggot” as a contemptuous term for a woman, and also as “a person temporarily hired to supply a deficiency at the muster,” which may be related, goes much further back). It is notable that all the examples of “fagot” meaning homosexual before 1962 spell it with a single **g** , whereas nearly all the examples of the word in other senses (_all_ the examples of it as contemptuous for woman) spell it with two. Americans had well over a century to learn about British public school customs before they started using “fag” to mean homosexual, and this was a century through most of which the products of British public schools ruled the world! I would be surprised if there were not at least a few schools in America during that period that did not try to emulate the British public schools. Even if not, their practices would certainly have been fairly well known. Given American egalitarian instincts, the custom of fagging might well have been particularly despised in America. Combined with a general American contempt for British (especially British upper class) effeteness, it is not at all hard to imagine how “fag” could have come be used to mean homosexual in America. Also, given that slangy language like this is usually current in speech well before it gets into print, and especially given the anomalous spelling of “fagot” meaning homosexual, it seems perfectly possible that “fagot” is actually a back formation from “fag” (perhaps in interaction with other older meanings of “faggot”), even an attempt to make it seem a little less rude and more printable. Sure, I am speculating, but any suggested derivation of a word is speculative. The only facts we have are recorded usages and historical context, and there is no very direct connection between any of the pre-1914 meanings of “faggot” and homosexuality. The connection between the custom of school fagging and homosexuality is very real. (I forgot to mention in my previous post that a major form of punishment in 19th century British public schools was caning on bare buttocks, and I am pretty sure that in many cases it would have been common practice to cane your fag for the slightest infraction.) Writing about this, I am beginning to wonder why the British upper classes didn’t die out long ago. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/malleus_incus_stapes/32/3293_2.png) [@Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malleus_Incus_Stapes)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2009, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/56 "2009-05-21T01:05:46Z")
> [@gigi](#): > > This is spelling rather than word usage, but I find it unfortunate that “thru” has become so ubiquitous. However, I won’t hesitate to use it, or “donut”, in Scrabble if I need to. 😉 What’s wrong with “donut”? How else would you spell it? ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2009, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/57 "2009-05-21T01:07:03Z")
Also, in the OED’s earliest example of “fag” as homosexual, it actually appears to mean boy, gay prostitute. This makes for an even closer analogy with the condition of the English public school fag than merely being homosexual does. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2009, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/58 "2009-05-21T01:08:32Z")
In Britain: doughnut. (Even Americans do not make brad and cakes out of **do** , do they?) ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2009, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/59 "2009-05-21T01:18:44Z")
No, we doughn’t. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2009, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986/60 "2009-05-21T12:55:45Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > In Britain: doughnut. In America, this is still the correct spelling. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unfortunate-changes-in-language/496986.md?page=4)