• Asia_Set [he/him]
    ·
    2 years ago

    That's medieval rhyming slang for ya, which also gave us Dick from Richard via Rick. This is also the root of "penis" as a definition for "dick", with the use of "dick" as a metonym for "man" and subsequently "man" as an implied metonym for "penis", via the placeholder phrase "Tom, Dick, and Harry" meaning "unspecified people".

    I wrote this comment in the spirit of linguistic descriptivism (discussing past use of language) rather than prescriptivisism (commanding the reader to use language in a certain way going forward), in order to not carry water for gender essentialism, transphobia, or sexism, due to the direct association of penises with manhood present in the etymologies that I mentioned.

      • eduardog3000 [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        Slang: Turkish
        Meaning: laugh
        Phrase: Turkish bath

        I swear these exist just to fuck with people. "Are you 'avin a Turkish?"