whack 'whacked'

[Jesse Sheidlower]

On Wed, Mar 17, 2004 at 08:48:56AM -0800, Arnold M. Zwicky wrote:
>
> in any case, it *is* true that references to masturbation tend to
> extend their meanings to cover 'inconsequential', 'worthless',
> 'contemptible'.  but the meanings of adjective "w(h)ack" that i'm
> seeing extend out from 'out of kilter, messed up' -- cf. "w(h)acko" --
> to 'wrong, bad', and so just barely overlap with the semantics of the
> masturbatory expressions.  on semantic grounds, "w(h)ack (off)" is not
> a very likely source for adjective "w(h)ack".

Maybe this is too obvious, or someone mentioned it already when I
wasn't paying attention, but what about _wacky_ as a source?

Jesse Sheidlower
OED