# What's a sorta rude word for a Swiss guy? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 5, 2004, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379 "2004-08-05T00:17:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/21 "2004-08-05T23:55:31Z")
It has been used both to insult and praise them, but the Swiss are sometimes referred to as “a nation of watchmakers.” ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2004, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/22 "2004-08-06T01:03:27Z")
How about “filthy stinking Swiss bastards?” Too strident? ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2004, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/23 "2004-08-06T11:56:23Z")
Gruyère-eating not-even-getting-involved-so-they-can’t-even-surrender monkeys. ---
**Author:** ![nonnative](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/2acd7d/32.png) [@nonnative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nonnative)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2004, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/24 "2004-08-06T12:35:04Z")
Swede. People confuse them with the swedish often and that annoys them. I have a swiss friend who never failed to get angry when i called him a ‘filthy swede’. All in good humor, of course. ---
**Author:** ![Mops](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mops/32/16494_2.png) [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2004, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/25 "2004-08-06T13:11:17Z")
I for one cannot think of a rude term for the Swiss - and I live less than 100 miles from Switzerland. They have been extremely inoffensive these last few centuries. If your friend were an actuall Swiss (as opposed to someone of distant Swiss ancestry) there would be a viable insult: calling him a German, Frenchman or Italian (depending on what linguistic region he is from) 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2004, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/26 "2004-08-06T14:00:09Z")
I second calling him a Swede. Or a Big, Dumb Swede. ---
**Author:** ![My\_Darn\_Snake\_Legs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f14d63/32.png) [@My\_Darn\_Snake\_Legs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/My_Darn_Snake_Legs)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2004, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/27 "2004-08-06T16:31:38Z")
Yep. Swede ought to get him. I have a friend from Ecuador and I always refer to him as El Salvadorian. Always a good laugh on that one 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2004, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/28 "2004-08-06T16:31:57Z")
Frankly, I cannot think of anything worse than ‘Swiss.’ ---
**Author:** ![WotNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e19b73/32.png) [@WotNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WotNot)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 7:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/29 "2004-08-07T07:52:07Z")
According to Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, the nickname of a Swiss is… [COLIN TAMPON?](http://www.bartleby.com/81/3852.html) If that doesn’t get his (mountain) goat, I don’t know what will. ---
**Author:** ![betenoir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@betenoir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/betenoir)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/30 "2004-08-07T14:00:32Z")
> [@Paul in Saudi](#): > > Frankly, I cannot think of anything worse than ‘Swiss.’ I was going to say that. Although I was going to mention I got it from Monty Python 😃 . I dunno, if you want to be offence maybe you could work in something about them helping the Nazis hide the stuff they stole from the Jews. Why shouldn’t Godwin’s law work in real life? ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/31 "2004-08-07T14:28:53Z")
From Monty Python? Really? My apologizes. I checked the Racial Slur Database (motto; 'Making the World a Better Place) and found no entries for Swiss. I urge you all to go to the RSDB and make contributions. ---
**Author:** ![betenoir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@betenoir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/betenoir)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/32 "2004-08-07T15:20:17Z")
> [@Paul in Saudi](#): > > From Monty Python? Really? My apologizes. Oh, well, no, I was just remembering as show where they (on a show within the show of course) were looking for an offensive thing to call Belgians and one of the entries was “Belgian”. But if you came up with the idea independently, no apology necessary of course. But we’re getting off track, let’s get back to hating the Swiss… ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/33 "2004-08-07T18:46:57Z")
Many thanks to everyone, especially to **Paul In Saudi** for the link to P.J. O’Rourke. I’m going to print up this whole thread and some of the O’Rourke pages (don’t tell P.J…) I talked to my pal yesterday, and I read him some of this thread. He doesn’t have a computer. :rolleyes: He likes “cheese knees” and “Cheesehole” a lot. By the way, his sister’s research turned up a black slave great-grandmother and a grandfather who had changed a Z to an S, which created the Swiss-to-Bohunk confusion in the first place. Now he’s trying to sand the corners off his new self-description; something like, “Cheesehole/Mick/Injun/Cottonpicker.” ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/34 "2004-08-07T21:28:07Z")
Your friend must admit, however, that “cuckoo clock fucker” has a certain zest, ja? ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/35 "2004-08-07T22:04:23Z")
I’d heard that the worst thing that you can call a European is “Belgian”. ---
**Author:** ![11811](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/1/9d8465/32.png) [@11811](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/11811)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/36 "2004-08-07T22:18:43Z")
> [@Boyo Jim](#): > > I’d heard that the worst thing that you can call a European is “Belgian”. I believe the phrase they settled on was “blackballing Belgian bastards.” Not that I would call anybody such a name. ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/37 "2004-08-07T22:49:52Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > I like yeti=) > Amish doesnt work, they are from the paltz region of germany…[mom’s maternal side of the family=)] “The Amish, called “The Plain People” or Old Order Amish, originated in Switzerland about l525. They came from a division of the Mennonites or Anabaptists (Re-baptizers).” ---
**Author:** ![DanielBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/958977/32.png) [@DanielBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanielBG)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2010, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/38 "2010-12-18T02:05:49Z")
A schnitzer ---
**Author:** ![cuauhtemoc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecb155/32.png) [@cuauhtemoc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cuauhtemoc)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2010, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/39 "2010-12-18T03:02:59Z")
Winkelried. ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2010, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379/40 "2010-12-18T04:38:51Z")
I guess these days _banker_ could be considered an insult in and of itself. Not to get off topic, but I think Switzerland would do pretty well during a zombie plague. Lot’s of firearms, all the men have been in the army, civil defence, and cold weather. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-sorta-rude-word-for-a-swiss-guy/258379.md?page=3)