the "pimp" chronicles

[Laurence Horn]

At 1:37 PM -0500 2/12/08, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:
>There's much buzz about MSNBC's suspension of anchor David Shuster for
>suggesting that the Clinton campaign had "pimped out" Chelsea Clinton.
>Among the more informed commentary:
>
>http://www.slate.com/id/2184211/
>("A History of Pimping" by Jesse Sheidlower)
>
>http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Vote2008/story?id=4274500
>(article quoting Jesse, Barry Popik, and Univ of Chicago's Michael
>Silverstein)
>
>--Ben Zimmer
>
Great timing.  I just made up a handout for my language, sex & gender
class on this flap, including excerpts from blogs and online groups
(cf. e.g.
http://news.aol.com/political-machine/2008/02/09/msnbc-imuses-schuster-for-chelsea-gaffe/
for views on why it's just us old fuddy-duds who might be offended by
an innocent term like "pimp (out)").  For my purposes, the strongly
opinionated and not particularly well informed commentary is equally
significant.

LH

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