Xander ,'Dirty Girls'
Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.
Oh good LORD. I take it all back!!! No one click that link!!
Too late. I'm trying to figure out how to collect my brain matter. I was unfamiliar with that website so I skimmed the bio/faq and a couple of links. It was too much for my skull to contain.
Also, the various "Dutch" phrases, like Dutch treat and going Dutch, are based on a stereotype of the Dutch along the same lines as "Indian summer".
eta: I somehow missed 25 posts....
There are a lot of theories, not many of them offensive.
Huh. Well, what do I know. I myself associated it with "Indian giver" -- that probably would have made a better analogy. I think it's the one I meant to use, honestly. So, er, I don't know about Indian summer. Feel free to Google.
Wikipedia has no offensive etymologies for it. So let's just pretend I said "Indian giver," okay?
I would pick the one ethnic reference that actually isn't offensive.
it's because you have a pure heart, emily
My folks use "mighty white of you" ironically, but I've never heard it used in a sincere manner.
The gold medal for thoughtless offensive speech has to go to my uncle who cracked some tasteless joke and then apologetically introduced himself to my cousin's new husband as "the black sheep of the family." The new husband being, of course, the first African-American to marry into our family. I felt like crawling under a rock after that one, and I was only a bystander.
re: Pope's Nose
She was mortified about using the phrase
and I got scared for a second that I was saying something I didn't know I was saying.I think I just got that mortified feeling. Dude, that part of my family is Catholic even... There should really be a scorecard.
What does "pope's nose" = "chicken butt" mean in a derogatory sense? I can't suss it out.I always heard of it as the little nugget of mostly skin that gets super crispy when you roast a chicken. Some lemon, some garlic, some sage and crispy skin is delicious. It might be in the butt region but frankly I am already shoving lemons there, so it seems like a nummy place not something gross.
Maybe it has something to do with the fact that Catholics were working class or poor and chicken was the cheapest meat?
it's because you have a pure heart, emily
Shyeah.
Also, some people speculate that it originated with the use of "Indian" as an adjective to mean something false, like Indian corn or Indian tea. To be honest, I've never heard of Indian tea, but there you have it. And of course, I can't think of how to Google "Indian tea" without getting tons of sites about, say, Assam tea.
In Houston (in the friggin 90s) I heard someone use the word "N-rigged) only no hyphen. Completely without irony, completely without understanding how anyone could take offense.