# Why "Breaking" in these titles? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 10, 2014, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998 "2014-02-10T19:18:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![JerrySTL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e274bd/32.png) [@JerrySTL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JerrySTL)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2014, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/21 "2014-02-10T23:49:22Z")
> [@beowulff](#): > > “Breaking” is often used to mean _separating oneself from the pack._ Hence the movie _[Breaking Away](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078902/)_. Beat me to it. In cycling a person or group taking off from the front is called a breakaway. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2014, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/22 "2014-02-10T23:53:10Z")
> [@gnoitall](#): > > Can’t do the research now, but I wonder if there’s any relation to the idea of a “break” being a sudden change in direction. > > … > > \*the latter example may just be the movies talking. Aren’t they supposed to say “starboard?” 😃 ‘Change of direction’ is what I was going to say. As far as ‘right’ vs. ‘starboard’, let me first say that I have never been in the military. (Though I do have a civilian pilots certificate.) ‘Break’ is used to direct a sudden change in direction. A sudden change of direction is useful if you’re being shot at. So I would suspect ‘Break right!’ to be used instead of a direction to break starboard, simply because they’re quicker to say. If you take time to say that extra syllable, your friend may be shot down. But them’s the breaks of Naval warfare. 😉 Where did ‘break’ as ‘change of direction’ come from? Someone mentioned baseball, and someone mentioned golf. I’m only guessing, but I suspect a nautical origin. That is, waves ‘break’ on the shore (hence, ‘breakers’), and they break right or left if they don’t come right in. ---
**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:** [February 10, 2014, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/23 "2014-02-10T23:57:14Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > Where did ‘break’ as ‘change of direction’ come from? Someone mentioned baseball, and someone mentioned golf. I’m only guessing, but I suspect a nautical origin. That is, waves ‘break’ on the shore (hence, ‘breakers’), and they break right or left if they don’t come right in. I don’t think the term originates in baseball, but I suspect it got into the colloquial vernacular that way. And I suspect baseball got it from pool or billiards. ---
**Author:** ![EdwardLost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/bbe5ce/32.png) [@EdwardLost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EdwardLost)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2014, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/24 "2014-02-11T02:46:26Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > So I would suspect ‘Break right!’ to be used instead of a direction to break starboard, simply because they’re quicker to say. If you take time to say that extra syllable, your friend may be shot down. But them’s the breaks of Naval warfare. On a ship a sailor may be facing any direction, so “starboard” avoids the follow up question: “My right, your right, or the ship’s right?” In a fighter jet everyone is always facing forward, so no confusion. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2014, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/25 "2014-02-11T03:03:30Z")
Huh, and here I always assumed that “Breaking Bad” was a pun on the phrase “Breaking Bread.” ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2014, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/26 "2014-02-11T03:06:49Z")
There’s a band that formed in the late '90s called [Breaking Benjamin](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaking_Benjamin) (Benjamin is the lead singer’s name), but I don’t see anything in the band description that says why they picked it. ---
**Author:** ![Cugel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cugel/32/1199_2.png) [@Cugel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cugel)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2014, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/27 "2014-02-11T03:20:51Z")
In cricket, there’s [off breaks](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Off_break) (and leg breaks). Fairly old usage. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2014, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/28 "2014-02-11T04:11:57Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > Huh, and here I always assumed that “Breaking Bad” was a pun on the phrase “Breaking Bread.” In an early episode Jesse Pinkman says something to Walt about how he was surprised that Walt was “breaking bad,” and explains the phrase to him. ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2014, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/29 "2014-02-11T06:52:09Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > Huh, and here I always assumed that “Breaking Bad” was a pun on the phrase “Breaking Bread.” > [@Colibri](#): > > In an early episode Jesse Pinkman says something to Walt about how he was surprised that Walt was “breaking bad,” and explains the phrase to him. Unless, perhaps, you only count the scenes with Walt Jr. in it. ---
**Author:** ![SpyOne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/82dd89/32.png) [@SpyOne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpyOne)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/30 "2014-02-12T12:21:35Z")
Well, for a long time I misunderstood the meaning of “Breaking Bad”, and if I had understood it properly I would have been more interested in the show. I had assumed it had to do with ending relationships, essentially. Not romantic ones, but business ones. Like if you decide to quit, but you do so in a way that leaves your boss mad at you and seeking revenge, that would be “Breaking bad”. As opposed to “breaking good”, where everybody is happy. Instead they mean it like breaking a suit in a card game. In Bridge, one suit will be defined as “trump”, and you cannot lead with a card from the trump suit unless you have no other suit in your hand, or someone has already played a trump card. Playing a trump card for the first time in the game is called “Breaking trump”. Breaking Trump is often followed by a flurry of trump cards, as everybody wants to be rid of them, but nobody wanted to be the first, knowing it would unleash the dumping from the others. As I understand it, the title “Breaking Bad” (I have never seen the show) refers to a good man who, due to desperate circumstances, is forced to do bad things, and once he has accepted that he can’t always do good things, it opens the floodgates. Once “Bad” has been broken, there is nothing to keep his behavior in check and he out-bads the other bad-guys. Which sounds much more like a show I want to see. ---
**Author:** ![Cyros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a698b9/32.png) [@Cyros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cyros)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/31 "2014-02-12T12:32:30Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > That’s a really good question, actually. Tom Cruise definitely says “break right” in Top Gun, but the court martial’s findings refer to the starboard engine. At least in the Canadian military they use “break right” and “break left”. My dad was a fighter pilot and flew with the Snowbirds and I sat in a few debriefings after a show. Also there are probably audio clips available that demonstrate this as there were at least a few times that the pilot radio communication was piped to the crowd during the show. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/32 "2014-02-12T15:07:45Z")
While aircraft (ships of the air) have tended to use maritime terminology for the craft, itself, (starboard, port, forward, aft, bulkheads in place of walls, etc.), I suspect that using left and right is shorter and is not that susceptible to confusion when spoken. Similarly, other directions have not tended to follow maritime terminology, using, instead, a clock face as seen from above the plane: 12 o’clock is directly ahead, 3 o’clock is off to the right, etc. I’ve never encountered a pilot talking about “off the starboard bow” (1 o’clock or 2 o’clock) or “on my port beam,” (9 o’clock). ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/33 "2014-02-12T15:25:18Z")
There’ salvo “breaking wind,” which I first thought to post as a joke, but seems like it might have an interesting archaic usage of “break.” Any help? ETA: in kayaking, right and left is always downriver. Eta “there’s also,” interpreted by autocorrect above ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2014, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/34 "2014-02-16T00:06:31Z")
> [@Chastain86](#): > > The title of Breaking Bad came from a Southern colloquialism. You can actually learn about it more [here](http://entertainment.time.com/2013/09/23/breaking-bad-what-does-that-phrase-actually-mean/), via an interview with creator Vince Gilligan I didn’t really understand the show’s title until an episode in either the first or second series, when Jessie Pinkman asks Walter White why a mild-mannered high school teacher has decided to “break bad” and become a drug dealer, at which point I want “Oh, I get it now! :smack:” ---
**Author:** ![Ximenean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/aca169/32.png) [@Ximenean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ximenean)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2014, 10:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998/35 "2014-02-16T10:32:29Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#): > > I didn’t really understand the show’s title until an episode in either the first or second series, when Jessie Pinkman asks Walter White why a mild-mannered high school teacher has decided to “break bad” and become a drug dealer, at which point I want “Oh, I get it now! :smack:” ISTR that that’s actually in the very first episode. I didn’t realise it was a regionalism - I’ve never been anywhere near Virginia, but it made sense to me - you’re travelling along the straight and narrow, and then you break to the bad side. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-breaking-in-these-titles/680998.md?page=1)