I am one funny dude. Yes. Complicated as all get-out and twice as queer. Queer being a useful English word that has been wrongly abused, twisted and wasted on the tongues of intolerance. This has happened to Queer in the same way it happened to Gay. Fairy is a close third but that one turned into such an insult that even the offenders blanched a bit.
Over time, Fairy has resumed most of it’s original meaning in part because the ‘other’ meaning was too awful. Time has turned a tiny twist and a person can now almost say Fairy without it’s having a capitalized meaning, an association that catches the eye/ear before any other can settle there.
I am curious now. I just noticed that these words ‘gay’ and ‘queer’ are imported into American English from the Brits. This is, of course true of all English words but somehow, certain words were spit out when the persons who carried English with them hit the sands of the eastern coast and southern United States. They are now British English first and American second, as most that is useful in the English language. My English-born friends readily use all of these sorts of words in common, everyday speech. In Ameri-speak, words of that colour are the exclusive province of the posh folk. Posh is, itself, a word reserved for ‘posh’ folk to use. Posh is posh, as calling your workmates ‘colleagues’ is posh. Even calling your workmates ‘workmates’ instead of ‘buddies’ is posh. Posh is disrespected. Posh is upper-crust, posh is ‘them’. Posh is the enemy.
I think there just might be a serious problem in Americans of the middle-north continent. Is it possible that, in the effort to revolt against Great Britain, certain of the U.S. residents began to eat themselves linquistically? A snake-state that so hated it’s own origins-tail as to begin eating it, word by word? I know that the frequent and easy mispronunciation of French words which appear in English is no accident. The so-self-called Americans despise the French even more than the British. As a result, chaise longue became ‘chase-lounge’ pretty quickly and envoy became ‘n-voy’ in a similar amount of time.
The degradation towards homosexuals, British and French people is equal in America. It can be seen readily in the misuse of language in violent ways. America has a serious problem. The problem is one of terrific intolerance. That problem has been on parade in America since the country’s inception. The puritans who were half-driven out of England for their judgemental interfering have built a whole country on belittling and subjugating others. Those folk used, abused and suppressed black folk, indigenous folk, Irish and Italian and Chinese folk as well. The ‘melting pot’ and individual freedoms of religion and self are the lie of America. Those things were always tongue in cheek.
What is interesting is that the lie of America is now it’s near undoing. The U.S. Constitution speaks of liberty and justice for all but the courts and politicians have always held one hand behind their backs, with fingers crossed, while standing under the wall-mounted plaque that says ‘In God We Trust’. Now, Marjorie Taylor Greene (posh spelling, by the way) and Trump (adulterated from it’s original German) with company are rearing up their ugliness without even a whisper of shame. Those folk and others of their ilk (posh word) would have America be a sort of great that it always and never was. They bring intolerance into the open, and bury the constitution’s false promise. As a result of that burying, the country is in a state of flux. Things could go very badly. Very badly.
Things could go well, also. With luck, the current crop of conservatives might be driven out of the North American continent as well as their forebears were driven out of Europe. Fairy came back to us as a useable word, maybe the American Lie can come true? I don’t know. Ya know what? I am feeling pretty queer this morning, isn’t that odd?
Robert On The Air 