"attack" (euphem.)

[Wilson Gray]

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch was also a fan of "attack" back in the day.

OTOH, the Boston Globe of today is SNAFU'ed on this point. On one day,
you'll read, "The victim suffered an assault." Another day, you'll
read, "The victim suffered a sexual assault." Then, on some third
occasion, you'll read, "The victim suffered a sexual assault during
which s/he was forced to perform oral sex upon her/his assailant and
thirty of the latter's closest friends." Weird.

-Wilson



On 10/31/06, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM>
> Subject:      "attack" (euphem.)
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> OED surprisingly fails to notice this very frequent euphemistic sense:
>
>   1932  Howard W. Comstock &  Allen C. Miller _Dr. X_ (film): Was the murdered woman..._attacked_?
>
>
>   JL
>
>
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--
Everybody says, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange
complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is knows how deep
a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our
race. He brought death into the world.

--Sam Clemens

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