Re: Ear Wax? (was: More on WPTR)

[Richard Chonak <rac@gabriel.cambridge.ma.us>]

Chuck wrote:

> i guess age has mellowed 
> me somewhat in that i no longer get the thrill in hearing if something 
> "really sucks" or even worse on the radio.  (did i laugh when the SNL skit 
> featured the song "...the movie makes a million bucks, even if it really 
> sucks." ?? yep.)  however, and i am by no way a prude when it comes to 
> offering up expletives, i prefer and choose not use those words most of us 
> consider vuglar and crude in front of my kids. 


I don't know if Chuck meant to suggest that "sucks" is a very vulgar
expression, comparable to the expletives, but it really didn't start
out that way.   

A data point: in New Hampshire in the '70s, high-schoolers would say
that something unpleasant "sucks eggs".  The idea was that weasels
suck eggs: thus "it sucks eggs" was a roundabout way to call something
base.

If people think "sucks" has obscene connotations, the cause is more
in the public's mind than in the original sense of the expression!
Really this bit of slang is merely tasteless and silly, not
borderline-obscene.  

--RC


PS: ObMedia: A morose character in Shakespeare echoes the premise: "I
can suck melancholy out of a song, as a weasel sucks eggs." 
http://www.engl.uvic.ca/Faculty/MBHomePage/ISShakespeare/AYL/AYLI2.5.html














--RC