Is free speech a thing of the past in England.

[Albert smith]

makapaka's right - your post was daft.

 

Let's take this bit:

Going by that, an unmarried heterosexual man is gay.

 

 

 

It's had many meanings over the years. Here's the OED's definitions:

 

• Of persons, their attributes and actions: Full of or disposed to joy and mirth; manifesting or characterized by joyous mirth; light-hearted, exuberantly cheerful, sportive, merry.
  
• Of a horse: Lively, prancing.
  
• With implied sense of depreciation: Airy, off-hand.
  
• In poetry: Applied to women, as a conventional epithet of praise.
  
• the gay science: a rendering of gai saber, the Provençal name for the art of poetry.
  
• Forward, impertinent, too free in conduct, over-familiar;
  
• Of a dog’s tail: carried high or erect.
  
• Addicted to social pleasures and dissipations. Often euphemistically: Of loose or immoral life. Esp. in gay dog, a man given to revelling or self-indulgence;
  
• of a woman: Leading an immoral life, living by prostitution.
  
• Of a person: homosexual. Of a place: frequented by homosexuals. slang.
  
• Bright or lively-looking, esp. in colour; brilliant, showy.
  
• Finely or showily dressed.
  
• In immaterial sense: Brilliant, attractive, charming. Formerly also of reasonings, etc.: Specious, plausible.
  
• Brilliantly good; excellent, fine.
  
• ironically.
  
• to have a gay mind: ‘to have a good mind’, to be very much inclined.
  
• Of quantity or amount. Pretty good, ‘tolerable’, ‘middling’.
  
• In good health; well, convalescent.
  
• gay cat U.S. slang, a young or inexperienced tramp; a hobo who accepts occasional work;
  
• gay deceiver,
  (a) a deceitful rake
  (b) slang = falsies
  
• Brightly, showily = gaily
  
• In a gay mood, joyously = gaily
  
• Very. Also in weaker sense: Considerably, ‘pretty’. Frequent in dial. a gay few = a good few
  
• A gay lady. Also, rarely of a man, a ‘gallant’.
  
• 2. a. Anything that looks gay or showy; an ornament; esp. one that is used to amuse a child.
  
• A ‘toy’, childish amusement.
  
• A picture in a book. Now dial. (chiefly used by children).
  
• A homosexual, esp. a male homosexual.
  

(My copy of the OED is quite old now - there are others as well.)

 

As you can see, it wasn't "always some one who was a bright and bubbly person ,who dressed flamboyantly and had no association what so ever with the Homosexual folk among us". Language evolves over time for a wide variety of reasons. This is just another example of it.

A gay chap in the fifty's was one who drove an M.G sports car while wearing yellow gloves and a cravat.

[max]

What a daft post.

 

It might be a daft post but at least no-one has stopped him posting it.

[altus]

A gay chap in the fifty's was one who drove an M.G sports car while wearing yellow gloves and a cravat.

And even that was a change from previous meanings.

[andyofborg]

A gay chap in the fifty's was one who drove an M.G sports car while wearing yellow gloves and a cravat.

 

we left the 50's, sixty years ago.

[Albert smith]

It might be a daft post but at least no-one has stopped him posting it.

You have just hit the nail bang on the head:)

[Ontarian1981]

I have noticed in the last few years that we as a Nation are now restricted as to what we can say or write .

This situation is now restricting every day conversation and leads to a Big brother type situation.

 

Do you mean the Bernard Manning form of free speech? lol

[Albert smith]

Do you mean the Bernard Manning form of free speech? lol

I could not stand the bloke .

[Ontarian1981]

A gay chap in the fifty's was one who drove an M.G sports car while wearing yellow gloves and a cravat.

 

I remember singing along to Twisting The Night Away when I was younger, it has a totally different feel to it in today's world, Lol

I also remember a TV newsreader called Gay Byrne and a racehorse trainer called Gay Kindersley, both from the 60s / early 70s, I wonder how they felt when the word changed its meaning.

 

---------- Post added 09-11-2018 at 12:28 ----------

 

I could not stand the bloke .

 

Not a fan myself, I was just making an over the top kind of answer to your question in a sad attempt at humour, sorry if it offended you.

[Albert smith]

I remember singing along to Twisting The Night Away when I was younger, it has a totally different feel to it in today's world, Lol

I also remember a TV newsreader called Gay Byrne and a racehorse trainer called Gay Kindersley, both from the 60s / early 70s, I wonder how they felt when the word changed its meaning.

 

---------- Post added 09-11-2018 at 12:28 ----------

 

 

Not a fan myself, I was just making an over the top kind of answer to your question in a sad attempt at humour, sorry if it offended you.

Now't offends me any more pal.

[Penistone999]

If anything we as a society have become ruder, the past couple of years have seen an increase in reported hate crimes.

 

Thats because more and more nonsense is being classed as Hate Crimes , when in reality most of it is nothing of the sort.