# wearing green on thursdays **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 2, 2002, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060 "2002-12-02T22:48:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Cliffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/59ef9b/32.png) [@Cliffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cliffy)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/21 "2002-12-03T15:39:46Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by B.Pants \* > \*\*I heard the horny, rather than gay, version of it. There was a period of time that I **made sure** that I wore green on thursdays. \*\* Yes and yes. –Cliffy ---
**Author:** ![Morgainelf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Morgainelf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgainelf)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/22 "2002-12-03T15:52:07Z")
[hijack] I started a thread to discuss synesthesia here: [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=147763](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=147763) [/hijack] ---
**Author:** ![Futile\_Gesture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f05b48/32.png) [@Futile\_Gesture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Futile_Gesture)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/23 "2002-12-03T16:48:08Z")
Huh, why stop at green on Thursdays? When I was at school wearing/doing/saying/not wearing/not doing/not saying **anything** could be produced as rock solid evidence of being gay. The accuser just had to sound convincing enough or be tough enough to beat anyone who disagreed to a pulp. ---
**Author:** ![Ivar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/51bf81/32.png) [@Ivar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ivar)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/24 "2002-12-03T17:16:31Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by easy e \* > \*\*I was told it meant you were horny. \*\* Fellow midwesterner here, I also was told it meant horny. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/25 "2002-12-03T17:25:46Z")
Gay version here. Hmmm…it looks like the coasts read it as gay, the heartland as horny. Any significance to this? ---
**Author:** ![eunoia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eunoia/32/97_2.png) [@eunoia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eunoia)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/26 "2002-12-03T17:42:57Z")
Tuesdays are cornflower blue. ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/27 "2002-12-03T19:18:42Z")
Hmmm… To me, Mondays are red or pink, Tuesdays are yellow, Wednesdays are orange or brown, Thursdays are blue, Fridays are light green, Saturdays are silver or multicolored, and Sundays are white. ---
**Author:** ![CheezyFryes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@CheezyFryes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CheezyFryes)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/28 "2002-12-03T20:17:57Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Ivar \* > \*\*Fellow midwesterner here, I also was told it meant horny. \*\* Same here… ---
**Author:** ![malaka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecc23a/32.png) [@malaka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/malaka)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/29 "2002-12-03T20:19:45Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Skogcat \* > \*\*Is it actually a “custom” or is it just some piece of idiocy invented and perpetuated by school kids (like the earing thing)? \*\* Its truly amazing what kind of idiotic things schoolkids come up with. In my elementary school, when using the drinking fountain, if you pushed the knob away from you while drinking, it was fine. If you pulled the knob towards you, you were gay. I have no idea who/where that one came from. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9fc348/32.png) [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/30 "2002-12-03T20:41:15Z")
Well, in reviewing the reponses, Ive learned (I think) 1. Most Americans are aware of an associatian to the wearing green on thursdays, as part of schoolground culture. 2. Americans are evenly split on whether the association is gay or horny. 3.In reviewing published locations, I find no geographical correlation other than the “custom” appears exclusive to North America. 1. > [@](#): > > _Otto_ > I heard “gay.” > > Judy Grahn in her book “Another Mother Tongue” puts forth a theory as to an association between wearing green and Irish pagan rituals being led by gay priests. It’s been a while since I read the book; I’ll look it up when I get home. This is an interesting lead as to perhaps the origin for this “custom” (I wish there was a better word). I look forward to hearing more on this as I tried Google but learned nothing. Perhaps Irish immigrants brought the custom to North America. Yet I note that **jjimm** is from Ireland and has not acknowledged the custom there. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/31 "2002-12-03T21:09:28Z")
How about instead of “custom” we say “peccadillo”? Peccadillo is a perfectly good word that doesn’t get used anywhere near often enough. FWIW, I was born and bred in the midwest and I always heard wearing green on Thursday = gay and eating green M&Ms any time = horny. So I don’t know how “coastal vs heartland” it is. ---
**Author:** ![Esprix](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/esprix/32/7899_2.png) [@Esprix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Esprix)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/32 "2002-12-03T21:42:15Z")
I am recalling a story of Oscar Wilde wearing green carnations. I do not know the story’s veracity. Esprix ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/33 "2002-12-03T21:51:11Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by eunoia \* > \*\*Tuesdays are cornflower blue. \*\* Can I get the icon in cornflower blue? Grew up in central Ohio and was always told that green meant horny. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2002, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/34 "2002-12-03T23:41:16Z")
Oscar Wilde and his admirers did indeed wear green flowers (not necessarily carnations). Noel Coward wrote and prformed a song about it called, not coincidentally, “Green Carnation” in which the wearers of the green carnation are described sarcastically as “womankind’s gift to the bulldog nation.” Funny little song. As for Judy Grahn, she cites in her book _Another Mother Tongue: Gay Words, Gay Worlds_ the work of anthropologist Margaret Murray who traces the association back to the Faeries, supposed tribes which inhabited the British Isles in the centuries prior to Caeser’s conquest. Green was their signature colour, supposedly because as hunting folk it helped them blend into their surroundings. Grahn cites some sources which if anyon’es desperate to know I can post. Grahn also discusses some regional variations on the “green on Thursdays” trope. One Kansas town: green and pink together, especially on Thursday; another Kansas town: green and yellow; a Boston school: orange and yellow on Thursday; Idaho (with people of Welsh descent): yellow; Midland Texas: knots in shoelaces regardless of day. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2002, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/35 "2002-12-04T00:02:36Z")
Sunday: orange 🆒 Monday: blue ☹ Tuesday: red :mad: Wednesday: yellow 😉 Thursday: purple 😕 Friday: green 😛 Saturday: indigo ;j My color choices for the days have been influenced by the planetary colors according to the Golden Dawn. (Half this thread is already IMHO fodder.) ---
**Author:** ![fish\_in\_the\_sky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7ba0ec/32.png) [@fish\_in\_the\_sky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fish_in_the_sky)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2002, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/36 "2002-12-04T03:45:24Z")
I saw the title of the OP and immeadiatly thought, “Oh, that means you’re gay.” I grew up in rural Wisconsin, by the way. Although the green-on-Thursdays rule was often switched to green-on Tuesdays or red-on-Mondays or any other color on any other day, just so that a certain person could be called gay. Also, if your shirt had a little loop sewn into the back (not sure how to decribed it; it’s usually on button-up shirts) that also meant you were gay. The loop was specifically called a “fag tag.” And god forbid you wear a green shirt with a fag tag… ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2002, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/37 "2002-12-04T03:58:22Z")
I grew up in Arkansas and never heard about wearing green on Thursdays. (I did get sniggered at a lot, though. Maybe I was just the one kid no one ever heard.) Furthermore, green M&M’s, as I recall **did** mean you were gay! (Only heard this once or twice, though.) ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2002, 11:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/38 "2002-12-04T11:03:57Z")
I never heard of any of this rot before. Where I went to school, kids called each other fags _ad libitum_, without bothering to pin it on any specific marker. Sort of a Hobbesian war-of-words of all against all. ---
**Author:** ![Arirang](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Arirang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arirang)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2016, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/39 "2016-03-06T03:30:08Z")
I don’t know about the coasts, but wearing green on Thursdays in Southern Illinois in the 50’s and 60’s was definitely called gay. I never heard “horny” at all. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2016, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060/40 "2016-03-06T04:21:16Z")
Chicago, 80s, never heard of any of this. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wearing-green-on-thursdays/140060.md?page=3)