Is homosexual a derogatory term?

[Campanula]

Indeed, I used to have a gay friend who called everything he didn't like gay, it was sort of ironic to him, and he wouldn't be offended at all by you saying 'my Ps3's being gay'. However I've also known gay people who have gotten upset by me using the word 'gay' in that context, it's a hard habit to break but I'm making an effort these days. Obviously though when I'm with people who I know will not be offended I don't hold back. Also, it's pretty lazy to just call everything gay I'd rather try and liven my vocabulary up a bit.

 

Good point. I don't really use the word in that context (well, I might have done once or twice) but my 7 year old son occasionally does. If he were to come out with anything racist he'd picked up at school I would go absolutely ballistic at him and educate him about what's so wrong about that language. But my husband and I have actually debated whether we ought to stop him saying gay in that way like 'that was gay of me' because we don't know whether it's likely to land him in trouble at school or get taken the wrong way and upset someone. Suffice to say my son has no idea what gay means in the homosexual sense. He's from a whole new generation and their use of the word is completely different.

 

EDIT- though of course he will eventully learn the other meaning of the word as he gets older. I wonder if this current use of it will just be a flash in the pan or if it will work it's way into the lanuage permametnly?

[crookesey]

I would consider the word 'gay' to be the most offensive.

It conjours up visions of the old time afficionadoes, before legality, with their outrageous behaviour.

 

Homosexual is a straightforward word, describing in its entireity.

I acannot see anyone seeing it as a derogatory word.

 

Read post 65.

[flamingjimmy]

I have checked this out and you are 100% correct, many thanks for sorting it out.

 

may I inquire as to which source you have used to 'check this out' because it seems pretty unlikely.

[crookesey]

may I inquire as to which source you have used to 'check this out' because it seems pretty unlikely.

 

Just google gay, good as you, and all will be made clear.

 

Google is your friend. (I bloody well despair)

[artisan]

Read post 65.

 

What about it?

It is nothing to do with that at all.

If anything it comes from the proper definition of the word.

 

Also I would say they lack ambition if their only aim is to be as good as me.

 

gay

late 12c., "full of joy or mirth," from O.Fr. gai "gay, merry" (12c.); cf. O.Sp. gayo, Port. gaio, It. gajo. Ultimate origin disputed; perhaps from Frank. *gahi (cf. O.H.G. wahi "pretty"), though not all etymologists accept this. Meaning "brilliant, showy" is from c.1300. OED gives 1951 as earliest date for slang meaning "homosexual" (adj.), but this is certainly too late; gey cat "homosexual boy" is attested in N. Erskine's 1933 dictionary of "Underworld & Prison Slang;" the term gey cat (gey is a Scot. variant of gay) was used as far back as 1893 in Amer.Eng. for "young hobo," one who is new on the road and usually in the company of an older tramp, with catamite connotations. But Josiah Flynt ["Tramping With Tramps," 1905] defines gay cat as, "An amateur tramp who works when his begging courage fails him." Gey cats also were said to be tramps who offered sexual services to women. The "Dictionary of American Slang" reports that gay (adj.) was used by homosexuals, among themselves, in this sense since at least 1920. Rawson ["Wicked Words"] notes a male prostitute using gay in reference to male homosexuals (but also to female prostitutes) in London's notorious Cleveland Street Scandal of 1889. Ayto ["20th Century Words"] calls attention to the ambiguous use of the word in the 1868 song "The Gay Young Clerk in the Dry Goods Store," by U.S. female impersonator Will S. Hays, but the word evidently was not popularly felt in this sense until later (cf. the stage comedy "London Assurance" written 1841 and popular through early 20c., with its character Lady Gay Spanker, famously played by Mrs. Nisbett). The word gay in the 1890s had an overall tinge of promiscuity -- a gay house was a brothel. The suggestion of immorality in the word can be traced back to 1630s. Gay as a noun meaning "a (usually male) homosexual" is attested from 1971

[flamingjimmy]

Just google gay, good as you, and all will be made clear.

 

Google is your friend. (I bloody well despair)

 

I am perfectly capable of using google, and I have done so, and have been able to find 0 evidence that the origins of the modern usage of the word 'gay' is the acronym 'good as you'.

 

I have politely asked if you would tell us where you were able to verify that claim, I am now asking again, please will you? pretty please with sugar on top?

[crookesey]

What about it?

It is nothing to do with that at all.

If anything it comes from the proper definition of the word.

 

Also I would say they lack ambition if their only aim is to be as good as me.

 

There is more than a little Groucho Marx in the latter.

[harvey19]

 

Of course not, as an isolated incident it wouldn't, it would just be confusing.

 

If however your parents had been called "<removed>. Brit <removed>" as well and your brothers and sisters and every day at school people called you a "<removed> Brit <removed>".

 

It's obvious really, I can't believe anyone ever argues this point, it's completely ridiculous.

 

**** is different to Brit, Brit just does not have the historical and social context that **** does, not at all.

 

My point is that the word Brit didn't bother me it was the words before and after that were offensive.

[Harleyman]

Why should homosexual be considered derogatory? Homo comes from the Latin word meaning a member of the male species and sexual basically refers to the human instinct to fornicate

In short putting the two word together a loose meaning is "A member of the male species who practices the sexual act with a member of his own species"

 

 

On the other hand the words queer, fag or bum boy are definitely derogatory terms

[crookesey]

I am perfectly capable of using google, and I have done so, and have been able to find 0 evidence that the origins of the modern usage of the word 'gay' is the acronym 'good as you'.

 

I have politely asked if you would tell us where you were able to verify that claim, I am now asking again, please will you? pretty please with sugar on top?

 

Well it worked for me.