Forum: Author Hangout

No Teabags

awnlee jawking 🚫

After a successful mission, my protagonist celebrates with a co-conspirator with a pot of proper tea. I have them exchanging the salute, "No teabags!" Then it struck me that could be construed as homophobic because, in my youth, 'teabag' was slang for a male homosexual (perhaps because it rhymes with fag?). A quick Google search of slang dictionaries found lots of occurrences of ... well, you can look it up if you want ... but no mention of the homosexual meaning.

Does anyone else remember it? Or has a miniscule piece of English (British?) fallen into disuse?

AJ

Replies: Jason Samson Dominions Son Remus2 joyR Luther Long Buffalo Bangkok

Jason Samson 🚫

@awnlee jawking

I've never heard that term used that way. But if it meant homosexual, I'd be surprised if it was derived from "fag". I've only ever known fag to be slang for cigarette in British English.

Replies: awnlee jawking joyR

awnlee jawking 🚫

@Jason Samson

But if it meant homosexual, I'd be surprised if it was derived from "fag".

That was a wild guess cf tea-leaf = thief.

AJ

joyR 🚫

@Jason Samson

I've only ever known fag to be slang for cigarette in British English.

A fag was very much a slang term for a homosexual, it was also used at Eaton College but with a somewhat different meaning, usually.

Replies: JimWar

JimWar 🚫
Updated:

@joyR

I believe the pejorative term for male homosexual was faggot, which was then shortened to fag. It's original meaning was a bound bundle of sticks which was probably derived from an Italian word "Fasces" that meant 'bundle of wood'. The bundle of wood was usually used to burn heretics at the stake (interesting as homosexuals would also be burned at the stake in Christian Europe although in England the punishment was changed to hanging).

Dominions Son 🚫

@awnlee jawking

I've not heard it as an exclusively homosexual reference.

The only sexual reference I am aware of for teabag is teabagging, which involves a male putting his scrotum in his partner's mouth. Since this applies to female as well as male partners, it is not explicitly homosexual.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teabagging

Pixy 🚫

I'm not quite sure how any sane individual could construe the word 'teabag' in the context of tea making as being homophobic. Unless it was made in a cottage, oh bugger, I mean fuck, shit....arrrggghhh!

Tw0Cr0ws 🚫

Teabagger has also been used as a derogatory political term for members of the Taxed Enough Already party, by a group that thinks taxes should always be higher.

Remus2 🚫
Updated:

@awnlee jawking

In the context you're using it, someone would have had to be looking for a reason to be offended to take offense to that.

Replies: awnlee jawking

awnlee jawking 🚫

@Remus2

You can't keep a good professional victim down. Laurence Fox (an actor) quoted Shakespeare and was accused of being racist.

AJ

Replies: Remus2

Remus2 🚫

@awnlee jawking

Meant to look that up back then and forgot to do so.

https://metro.co.uk/2020/01/30/laurence-fox-backs-alastair-stewart-race-row-want-scare-silence-12152005/

Fox wasn't the one to initiate it, it was Alastair Stewart that did that.

'"But man, proud man, Dress'd in a little brief authority, Most ignorant of what he's most assur'd – His glassy essence – like an angry ape",' the quote read.

From act II scene 2 "Measure for Measure" in which Isabella begs Angelo for her brothers life.

Such a thing is why context is so important. Had the people crying racist thought to consider the context, they would have realized just how far from the mark they were.

Replies: Tw0Cr0ws

Tw0Cr0ws 🚫

@Remus2

Such a thing is why context is so important. Had the people crying racist thought to consider the context, they would have realized just how far from the mark they were.

Very common.
The many people who cry 'Racism!' at the Rudyard Kipling reference to 'lesser breeds without the law' not realizing that he meant Germans, for example.

joyR 🚫

@awnlee jawking

a pot of proper tea.

The teabag thing is incidental, the serious question is the order in which the tea is poured. Only heathens pour the milk first..

:)

Replies: Tw0Cr0ws

Tw0Cr0ws 🚫

@joyR

Only heathens put milk in tea at all.

I'm a barbarian that uses tea bags and that is unacceptable even for me.

Replies: Dominions Son

Dominions Son 🚫

@Tw0Cr0ws

Only heathens put milk in tea at all.

If you want sweet tea, you should put a spoonful of tea in a cup of honey.

Replies: joyR Tw0Cr0ws

joyR 🚫

@Dominions Son

If you want sweet tea, you should put a spoonful of tea in a cup of honey.

Honey has Bee cups.... If you endowed her with T cups the poor girl would break her back...

Tw0Cr0ws 🚫

@Dominions Son

If you want sweet tea, you should put a spoonful of tea in a cup of honey.

Heat the honey and steep the tea in it.
Gotta teach people everything these days.

joyR 🚫

In an attempt to get back on topic...

If you perceive 'teabag' as derogatory, then perhaps you might refrain for using it in the presence of those ladies that stridently support the tea party.

(Not the minor fracas long ago in Boston, the more current one.)

Replies: Dominions Son

Dominions Son 🚫

@joyR

In an attempt to get back on topic...

Heretic!

Replies: joyR

joyR 🚫

@Dominions Son

Heretic!

Put down that firewood...!!! I don't enjoy my steaks burnt.

:)

Replies: Dominions Son

Dominions Son 🚫

@joyR

I don't enjoy my steaks burnt.

Me either.

Here's how I like my steaks. Take 1 cow, threaten it with a lit match, then serve.

Replies: joyR madnige

joyR 🚫

@Dominions Son

Take 1 cow, threaten it with a lit match, then serve.

Why would anyone threaten a cow with a copy posted to a certain story site...??

(One inferior to SoL)

Methinks you are at most a novice bovine terroriser...

:)

Replies: Dominions Son

Dominions Son 🚫

@joyR

Methinks you are at most a novice bovine terroriser

Quality beef doesn't need terrorizing, I mean tenderizing. :)

Replies: joyR

joyR 🚫

@Dominions Son

Quality beef doesn't need terrorizing, I mean tenderizing. :)

Spoken like a man who truly knows how to beat his meat...

I'd probably enjoy watching you sitting there masticating....

:)

Replies: Dominions Son

Dominions Son 🚫

@joyR

LOL :)

madnige 🚫

@Dominions Son

Here's how I like my steaks.

Trim its horns, wipe its arse, and walk it past the grill on its way to the table.

Replies: joyR

joyR 🚫

@madnige

Trim its horns

Why...?

Having them horny makes for enjoyable eating...

:)

Replies: awnlee jawking

awnlee jawking 🚫

@joyR

Having them horny makes for enjoyable eating...

... when those prairie oysters are particularly succulent.

AJ

Wheezer 🚫

I like my steak rare enough that a good Vet (Dr. not former soldier) could get it back on it's feet.

Replies: joyR

joyR 🚫

@Wheezer

I like my steak rare enough that a good Vet (Dr. not former soldier) could get it back on it's feet.

You don't need a vet of either persuasion, just a crane.

karactr 🚫

Really?! Brits trying to teach us how to make tea?

You throw it in the bay and don't drink it.

Replies: joyR

joyR 🚫

@karactr

You throw it in the bay and don't drink it.

And then fill in the environmental impact form... Good luck in your courts, you'll need it.

:)

Luther Long 🚫

@awnlee jawking

I know the popular slang usage these days, but I seem to remember back when I was in school we used "filthy teabag" for someone that dipped his wick in place he really shouldn't (having sex with a "slag" for instance, following on after another person, etc).

My memory does somewhat fits yours, if more generic in usage.

Buffalo Bangkok 🚫

@awnlee jawking

i have lived in the Midlands (UK) for all of my 53 years and never heard the term

Replies: awnlee_jawking

awnlee_jawking 🚫

@Buffalo Bangkok

i have lived in the Midlands (UK) for all of my 53 years and never heard the term

Thanks.

Perhaps the usage was local. Perhaps extremely local. I can remember its use at school (although not by the teachers).

AJ

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Forum: Author Hangout

No Teabags

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