1947 Archie Comic "butthole." What did it mean?

[Laurence Horn]

On May 3, 2012, at 11:39 AM, Charles C Doyle wrote:

> I sent the following several hours ago, but, as far as I can tell,  it never got posted (that happens to a certain percentage of the items I endeavor to post-- perhaps 5% or 10%).
>
> <<  I must confess:  The (now in print) _Dictionary of Modern Proverbs_ lacks an entry for "Theories are like assholes . . . ."  However, entries for the more common "Excuses are like assholes . . ." and "Opinions are like assholes . . ." do appear (with the silly "armpits" variants).  >>
>
> --Charlie

That *is* a silly variant, since we've all (well, most of us, anyway) got two of those.  Although I suppose in that form the punchline would be "We've all got 'em" or the link.  But the substitution, presumably prompted by the paucity of odiferous concave body parts beginning with a-, is not unprecedented; various places are typically described alternatively as "the asshole/armpit of X", where X is a larger geographical entity.

LH

>
>
> ________________________________________
> From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] on behalf of Jonathan Lighter [wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM]
> Sent: Thursday, May 03, 2012 11:25 AM
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>
> Um, everybody's got one.
>
> JL
>
> On Wed, May 2, 2012 at 10:22 PM, Dan Nussbaum <yekkey at aol.com> wrote:
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Dan Nussbaum <yekkey at AOL.COM>
>> Subject:      Re: 1947 Archie Comic "butthole." What did it mean?
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> And you know what they say about theories.
>>
>> What?
>>
>>
>> Dan Nussbaum=20
>
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