celebumom, skeezy

[Douglas G. Wilson]

>>>"Skeezy" fills in the space between its near-synonyms "scuzzy",
>>>"sleazy",
>>>and "skeevy", I guess.
>>>
>>>-- Doug Wilson
>
>'skeezy' is the adj. of slang 'skeeze/skeeza/skeezer', a slut, esp. the
>the context of trading sex for material objects, often drugs. There is
>also a v. skeeze, thus:
>
>1987 King Tee & Mixmaster Spade ‘Ya Better Bring a Gun’ [lyrics] A skeezer
>comes your way, you say, ‘Let’s take a ride.’
>
>1986 Beastie Boys ‘No Sleep Till Brooklyn’ [lyrics] MCA’s in the
>back ’cos
>he’s skeezin’ with a ho.
>
>Whether her 'easiness' is a direct descendant of early 20C 'skeeze', n.
>'something easily achieved', I do not know. An example reads:
>
>1903 ‘Hugh McHugh’ _Out for the Coin_ 11: ‘It does look like a
>skeeze!’ I
>answered, swelling up fore and aft, as I gave Bunch the easy-money gaze.

I don't think the adjective "skeezy" applied to Britney Spears here has the
sense "whorish" or "ready to trade sex for drugs", although I don't doubt
that this whore-related adjective also exists. Judging from the context I
think here "skeezy" means "scuzzy"/"sleazy" or roughly "grubby" or
"untidy". The two senses would be analogous to the old dual sense of
"slut", and there is of course room for some overlap.

Google Groups search shows hundreds of Usenet instances of "skeezy"
beginning in about 1992, the word apparently generally equivalent to
"sleazy", referring to skeezy [dirty] houses, skeezy clothes [including
men's clothes], skeezy neighborhoods, skeezy lawyers/doctors, etc., etc. It
seems that very few of the instances would permit interpretation as "whorish".

I speculate that "skeezy" was available as a synonym for "scuzzy"/"sleazy"
much earlier, well before the advent of the specifically whore-related
sense (ca. 1980?), but even if it wasn't I think the usual current meaning
is "scuzzy"/"sleazy".

I wonder whence "skeeze" = "whore" [verb].

The old "skeeze" from 1903 is a new one on me.

-- Doug Wilson