[Ads-l] "to face-plant' -- needs extension to figurative in OED?

Joel Berson berson at ATT.NET
Thu Aug 18 23:10:08 UTC 2016


Under "face, n." OED3 has "face-plant  v. slang (orig. and chiefly N. Amer.) intr. to fall face-first into or on to something (cf. face plant n.)."  Does this need extension to the figurative, e.g. "make a serious misstatement in public; utterly fail to do or explain something"?  Analogous to "fall flat on ones face".

There are many Ghits, the majority applying to someone in the Trump campaign.

I also think I saw or heard "face plant" used in some commentary on the interview of "Trump lawyer" Michael Cohen by CNN's Brianna Keilar.  My recollection is that the context for "face plant" was Cohen's long pause, with an expressionless, motionless face, after Keilar told him Trump was down in "Polls. Most of them. All of them."  Cohen could only eventually muster the idiotic "Says who?"  At the time I thought that "face plant" meant "plant ones face in an immovable state", but probably it means Cohen fell flat on his face in his response to "all [the polls]"

Joel

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