"I must, I must, I must increase my bust" (1970)

[Wilson Gray]

On Jan 11, 2005, at 4:01 PM, Mullins, Bill wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Mullins, Bill" <Bill.Mullins at US.ARMY.MIL>
> Subject:      Re: "I must, I must, I must increase my bust" (1970)
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>>
>> This is all very interesting, and it's great to have the
>> material for comparative textual analysis.  But what I'm
>> wondering is what we
>> *boys* were singing in *our* locker room at the same time.  For the
>> life of me, I can't recall.   Much less whether it worked.
>>
>> larry
>>
>
> In _my_ eighth-grade locker room, no self-respecting boy would admit
> to _needing_ to increase the size of his parts.  Despite any
> evidence in the shower to the contrary ("The water was too cold --
> shrinkage!").  It would be much more likely to have heard something
> like "Well, you may walk up and stick it in, but I stick it in and then
> walk up".
>

Well, I've waited over half a century to get this bit of sociology out
to the reading public and this may well be my chance.

Strange as it may seem, back in the bad old days, the concept of
"hung-ness" did not exist among the colored. And it wasn't because we
were all so well-hung as to render the concept moot. As is the case
with all humanity, with adolescence comes acne. However, this was not
generally known among black male youths of my day. In those days, acne
was known to us colored boys as "fist-bumps."

Why "fist-bumps"? Well, the only term we had for masturbation was
"fist-fucking." And we all "knew" that acne was one of the two
side-effects of masturbation. The other side-effect - are you ready for
this? - was abnormal penile growth! Therefore, if a boy was found to be
unusually well-endowed, it was prima-facie evidence that said boy was
addicted to masturbation, whether said enlargement was accompanied by a
bad case of acne or not.  And what would cause a guy to become addicted
to masturbation? Well, it was obviously the result of not getting any
trim (the term of choice at the Texas grade school that I attended).
When he's not getting the real thing, well, a boy's gotta do what a
boy's gotta do and damn the consequences.

This attitude endured well into the 'Fifties. When I was in college in
St. Louis in those days, a black prof of phys ed was well-known for the
unusually-large size of his dork. We guys felt sorry for him, since we
knew that he couldn't be getting much. It was said that women screamed
and bolted for the door as soon as they saw the size of that thing.

I was amused by the irony. I knew from reading porn that fictional
black guys were reputed to possess extremely large genitalia, whereas,
among actual black guys, a larger-than-normal dork was a source of
laughter or sympathy.

-Wilson Gray