It’s not any kind of sexual. Teabagging is; now we are just trying determine what kind.
Although it is at least true that the name originated within the movement, and that’s worth something. The other well accepted but false story is that juvenile and nasty liberals came up with it to be jerks whereas in reality, as you’ve shown, we merely won’t stop using the embarrassing name they came up with because we’re jerks.
Although the rightwingnuts did indeed use the term for themselves first, they sure don’t know what to do about it any more! Cite.
Nordlinger incorrectly reports that the name usage began on April 15, but as Sage Rat has pointed out, the tea partiers labeled themselves in February. But now what?
Nordlinger points to other names originally given as slurs that in time gained acceptance. But hey! No one insulted or slurred them! They chose their own name! And wore it proudly. Further, I’d bet that the words “Christian” and “Shaker” did not have any prior sexually-oriented original meaning to overcome.
So, are liberals jerks for calling them the name they claimed for their own, but failed to research? No way! The name is priceless and I hope they continue to wear it proudly while I continue to point and laugh.
With zero experience in this area, it would seem logical to me grammatically that the “teabagger” is the active person, the person who opens their mouth? From the “Sex and the City” description, the recipient of the treatment is fairly passive (I would imagine you don’t want to be moving too much in that… um… situation…)
The text of Steal This Book is available online. I skimmed it but wasn’t able to find anything that sounded like the source of this idea.
Very interesting and timely article… thanks for the cite. Here’s an interesting exerpt… not sure what it shows…
"We grant that one can always look at things too literally, or too etymologically. In 1998, a major Clinton foe, Rep. Dan Burton (R., Ind.), called the president a “scumbag.” The same year, Sen. Al D’Amato (R., N.Y.), running for reelection, called his opponent — Rep. Charles Schumer — a “putzhead.” Many in the media were careful to explain to people that Burton had called Clinton a “used condom,” and that D’Amato, borrowing from Yiddish, had called Schumer a “penis head.” (Always with the penis.) But did Burton and D’Amato mean those words in quite those senses? "
Thanks. I guess it must’ve just been a reference to Hoffman’s ideas of weird, attention getting protests rather then anything specific about mailing tea.
And yea, I was vaguely aware that Santorum had some sort of dirty joke associated with his name (though not the actual meaning of the term so…thanks?) which is why I gave the second example quote of conservatives using “tea-bagger” non-ironically. Agree that “Liberty Bell” was probably a liberal troll.
Probably this:
Not very detailed, but the general idea (sending “things” via the mail) is there.
Sex and the City is irrelevant – that’s not teabagging. Teabagging, as the name implies, involves dipping one’s sack into a passive partner’s mouth. When this is done as a prank, the passive partner is unconscious.
Ooooo! Ooooo! I’m old enough to know this one! (And I have the book.) Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin went to the NY Stock Exchange and threw lots of coins (quarters I think) out on the floor during trading. It stopped trading while the traders scrambled to pick up coins. Or so that is the story.
Of course, some conservatives still don’t get it, leading to things like Lou Dobbs calling Rachel Maddow a “tea-bagging queen”.
Gee, I don’t know.
Based on the show, I would say that Samantha from SitC would be more of an expert on it than purported “straight” guys. Anderson Cooper (at the opposite extreme) seemed to find it very funny when he used the term not long after it “came out” in the blogs. All the connotations I got was that teabagging was done by the open-mouthed recipient, and the baggee was the person in a delicate position.
I gathered from the context that it was something initiated by the intaking person. I have trouble imagining someone “doing it” as in being the depositor to an unwilling conscious person. Sounds dangerous. I guess different people’s versions of “straight” may vary, then?
The closest similar joke I ever heard was from an army guy who mentioned they had a fellow recruit who would sleep with his mouth open. They got a hot dog, stuck it in his mouth while someone dropped his pants directly in front of the guy’s face. What he saw when he woke up was a bit too close for comfort, and the fact that it was only an Oscar Meyer in his mouth did nothing to calm him; apparently the “flasher” guy had to run pretty fast for few minutes.
I happened to be watching when this happened . . . a memorable “WTF” moment. I assume he knew it was something uncomplimentary, but rather ignorant of the details.
The first place I learned of it was from collegehumor.com back 5-6 years ago when they would just post various pictures from college students up and this was one usually there to shame the person who passed out first in a frat party usually. Also included was drawing penises all over their face, posing them in humiliating ways, and also to cover them in flour or other various things.
It usually wasn’t a “good” thing to be teabagged, but the usage has changed alot since I was in college- and now college humor doesn’t seem to show that “R rated content” unless you sign up for it so I don’t know if they still show those sorts of things any more, but you can just google around if you really wanted to for images of passed out people with others placing their testicles on them (though usually when it’s done it’s NOT done in the mouth, because that’s pretty extreme to do to your buddy), but i’ll surely believe that it’s been done.
I’m assuming for Anderson Cooper and his ilk, the expression has different connotations than for drunk college boys without dates. He seemed to be smirking when he got away with using the expression on CNN. Based on SitC usage and viewership, it is probably more understood as a sex play activity now - by anyone not stuck in college-boy mentality or the 1700’s.
You do know, don’t you, that “Samantha on Sex in the City” is a fictional character written by straight guys?
Technically, the book was written by a straight girl.
Not sure the inclination of the script writers, but presumably they are from the New York city area and up on a lot of the trends - let’s say at best they are metrosexual, ha ha. Maybe they adapted the expression for that (alternate?)use; who knows!
However, for the average more liberal-minded HBO-viewer type, I’m guessing teabagging now means something different than to drunk greeks. Or maybe not.
I’m sure the phrase would not have the current nyuck-nyuck value if it was not interpreted as a code for (gay?) sex play by the commentators using it.
Sticking your private parts on another guy’s face is a form of gay sex play, whether the frat boys want to admit it or not.