[Ads-l] Shoulda seen it coming....

[Ben Zimmer]

That plumbing explanation is the rather implausible spin that some
Republicans have been putting on Trump's comment:

https://twitter.com/scottwongDC/status/953305502183763969
Scott Wong of The Hill: "Why are some Trump allies arguing that POTUS said
'shithouse' rather than 'shithole'? Some Rs say 'shithouse countries'
refers to poor countries w/no plumbing -- places where u have to walk out
to the shithouse -- and therefore the phrase is NOT racist."

But as I wrote for the Atlantic, "shithouse" has long been used to demean
people and places, with a general meaning of "disgusting, contemptible," so
it's in no way better than "shithole."

https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2018/01/a-linguistic-guide-to-donald-trumps-scatological-insults/550589/


On Thu, Jan 18, 2018 at 9:38 AM, Stanton McCandlish <smccandlish at gmail.com>
wrote:

> I'm no apologist for Trump, but *if* he really did say "shithouse
> countries", the intended implication could be "poor places where most
> people don't have indoor plumbing and have to go to an outhouse", while
> "shithole counties" might more directly imply countries that are shitholes.
>
>
> On Thu, Jan 18, 2018 at 6:14 AM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > None, except that believing that the word was "-house," at least two GOP
> > senators can angrily insist that 45 "did not use that word" (i.e.,
> "-hole,"
> > the version quoted by Durbin and Graham).
> >
> > But if "-house" was really uttered, nobody has so attested in public. So
> > it's all pretty magical.
> >
> > BTW, DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, under senate questioning by Durbin,
> > Graham, and others, claimed under oath that while everyone in the room
> was
> > using "tough language," she certainly didn't hear either "-hole" or
> > anything like it. Could she name even a single offensive word of the
> "very
> > tough language" that she did hear?
> >
> > Nope. Just couldn't remember. Nor was Nielsen entirely sure if Norway
> was a
> > "majority white" country.
> >
> > JL
> >
> > JL
> >
> > On Wed, Jan 17, 2018 at 11:16 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > > he referred to Haiti and the African states not as “shithole
> countries”
> > > but as “shithouse countries”.
> > >
> > > Say what, now? I understand the architectural distinction between a
> > > "shithole," which is found under a "shithouse," but what is the
> semantic
> > > distinction between the two as insults?
> > >
> > > On Wed, Jan 17, 2018 at 8:03 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu
> >
> > > wrote:
> > >
> > > > It was “Shitholegate” on either Daily Show or Colbert, I forget
> which.
> > > > But now the Republican senators are claiming the it was all a
> > fabrication
> > > > on Durbin’s part and that Trump’s language was entirely different
> from
> > > what
> > > > Durbin claimed—he referred to Haiti and the African states not as
> > > “shithole
> > > > countries” but as “shithouse countries”.  I guess that means it has
> to
> > be
> > > > “Shitho_(_)egate”, not too catchy.
> > > >
> > > > LH
> > > >
> > > > > On Jan 17, 2018, at 7:50 PM, Jonathan Lighter <
> > wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> > > > wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > MSNBC:
> > > > >
> > > > > "Ess Hole Gate."
> > > > >
> > > > >
>

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