recent francophobic slur

[Jonathan Lighter]

There was a time - admittedly long ago - when the French defense of Paris in 1914 was common knowledge in the English-speaking world.  Without enough trucks, the French army commandeered Parisian taxis - and their drivers - to rush reserves into battle against the Germans. The First Battle of the Marne was probably the most costly battle in human history up to that time.

Less well known is the fact that French forces, already on the brink of collapse, fought on in 1940 to protect the rear of the British Army that was being evacuated at Dunkirk.  Some of them managed to be evacuated as well.

The fall of Dieb Bien Phu resulted less from French incompetence than from the logistic brilliance of General Giap and the extraordinary performance of the Viet Minh.  It happened after nearly a decade of warfare in which the French military doggedly fought to retain Indochina and halt Communism in Asia. By 1954, the U.S. was footing 80% of the bill, with no American troops at risk in combat.

One may argue that that was then, this is now.  But accusations of mass French cowardice are indeed idiotic.  Another favorite jape on Fox News Channel has been, "Wanna buy a second-hand French army rifle? Never used, dropped once."

JL

Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at RCI.RUTGERS.EDU> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Benjamin Zimmer
Subject: Re: recent francophobic slur
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

>> The earliest ex. appears to be from Jan. 14, 2000, but the phrase was
>> introduced on a _Simpsons_ episode - and, IIRC, was used only once -
>> slightly earlier.
>>
>
>This Simpson's site http://www.snpp.com/episodes/2F32.html
>indicates it was in an episode aired on 30 April, 1995.

Jonah Goldberg of the National Review was responsible for popularizing the
expression in early 2003.
For an opposing view on the matter, see this Molly Ivins column
("Cheese-eating surrender monkeys, eh?"):

http://www.dfw.com/mld/startelegram/news/columnists/molly_ivins/5222243.htm


--Ben Zimmer

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com