needy

[Joel S. Berson]

At 9/19/2012 09:26 AM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>Cf. the recent disdainful sense of "needy," i.e., "needing or demanding
>attention from another person."

How recent is the disdainful" needy?  Or by "recent" do you mean
"lately becoming more frequent"?  The OED has (2.b, "In need of a thing"):

1993   J. Green It: Sex since Sixties 420   Men are as needy of touch
as women, if not more so, because they don't get as much as women do.

Close, if not a cigar?

And I have a feeling of its having entered my archives (neurons)
earlier -- 1950s?  1960s?

Joel


>JL
>
>On Wed, Sep 19, 2012 at 8:22 AM, Jonathan Lighter
><wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> > Subject:      victim = 'feckless irresponsible individual'
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Remember how "hero" is expanding to include a kind of victim?
> >
> > For the past 24 hours I've heard and read numerous comments to the effect
> > that Mitt Romney "considers 47% of voters to be victims."
> >
> > But he doesn't. He said they think of *themselves* as victims. Because Mitt
> > Romney still seems to know what "victim" means  .
> >
> > Of course, most people want to help victims, but that's not the point. The
> > point is that Romney didn't say that putative people who believe the
> > government owes them "medical care, food, housing, you name it" are, in
> > *his* opinion, "victims."
> >
> > But that's how the press, pundits, and public are telling it, even when
> > they go on to clarify the details.  GOP as well as Dem pundits.  At some
> > level of their consciousness a "victim" is a kind of "loser."
> >
> > Nowadays it shows weak character to be a "victim."
> >
> > Instead of a "survivor."
> >
> > JL
> >
> > --
> > "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
>
>
>
>--
>"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org