[Ads-l] more "X sucks" from 1966-67

Wilson Gray hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Sun Aug 9 20:13:09 UTC 2015


Not earlier than Ben's cites, but it's in the form in which I first heard
this use of "sucks," in the Armed Services Intake building in The Lou, on
August 7th, 1959, a day that would live in infamy, but only from time to
time.

Esquire - Volume 70 - Page 72
https://books.google.com/books?id=IFNXAAAAYAAJ
William S. Burroughs - 1968 - ‎Snippet view - ‎More editions
He gives me the straight answer, no more controversial than his opinion of
the U.F.O.:

"_The Army sucks_."

On Sun, Aug 9, 2015 at 3:01 PM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: more "X sucks" from 1966-67
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Sun, Aug 9, 2015 at 1:37 PM, Ben Zimmer wrote:
> >
> > I also found a few "X sucks" examples from The Berkeley Barb in 1967:
> [snip]
>
> Here are a few more from 1967 in other underground pubs:
>
> ---
> "On Making a Perfect Mess" _The Buffalo Insighter_ (Buffalo, NY),
> Sept. 25, 1967, p. 3, col. 2
> As the network cameras wheel in for classic counter-demonstrator
> footage, the Bomb Peking picket signs will be flipped to say "Does LBJ
> suck?"
> ---
> "Mike Bloomfield: 'Honkies Can't Dig Soul Music" _The Fifth Estate_
> (Detroit, MI), Oct. 1, 1967, p. 6, col. 2
> [Mike Bloomfield:] White people just don't know, they just don't know
> about anything. They suck entirely. Really generally, in everything,
> but in music it is a horrible thing.
> ---
> "Nitty Gritty" _The Screw_ (Lawrence, KS), Dec. 15, 1967, p. 1
> Hippies suck. Because they're safe. Go home to your parents, hippies.
> ---
>
> --bgz
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



-- 
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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