anti-vaxxer

[Jonathan Lighter]

Maybe "anti-vaxer" would look like they opposed vacuuming or something.

Also, "XX" looks twice as dangerous.

And most people spell "vacuum" with two c's anyway, or did when I was
teaching.


JL


On Mon, Apr 14, 2014 at 2:27 PM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: anti-vaxxer
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Note, too, that "doxing" = 'document tracing'
> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doxing) is very often spelled "doxxing".
>
> I suspect the influence of leetspeak
> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leet), which includes such terms as
> "suxxor" and "roxxor", inspired by "hax(x)or".
>
>
> On Mon, Apr 14, 2014 at 1:59 PM, victor steinbok wrote:
> >
> > The term appears to have started as "anti-vaccer", but eventually got
> > converted to "anti-vaxxer". The c was changed to x, presumably because
> > people didn't know how to pronounce original coinage, but reduplication
> > remained.
> >
> > That's my guess, in any case.
> >
> > On Apr 13, 2014 10:10 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> >
> > > The Daily Beast:
> > >
> > > "LYMErix, a promising vaccine for Lyme disease introduced in the '90s,
> was
> > > taken off the market due to pushback from anti-vaxxers (among other
> > > groups)."
> > >
> > > Why two exes?
> > >
> > > Maybe because it makes the word look cool, like "Exxon."
> > >
> > > Note too the subdued pun on "limericks."
>
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