I was stationed at Wright-Patterson Air Force in the 80's where one of the more colorful workers named Marv used to say 'I've been beaten like a red-headed stepchild. Marv came from the northen alabama area and it was a popular saying in his day. I got to saying that every once a while.
Fast forward to today. I was at wargaming tourney at Ft. Knox and getting my glutinues maximus handed to me. I said said "I am being beaten like a red headed stepchild". Everyone looked at me funny. Turns out they never heard of that saying. And this is the south. What ever happened to those good ole collequiallism's?
__________________
Into terror!, Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell
In this case the casual reference to child abuse is the likely culprit.
And, folks have less reference to the sort of prideful arrogance that would lead someone to beat a redheaded stepchild.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''
-- James Nicoll
Maybe, but I can't recall any of the "redheaded stepchild" references I heard specifying beating. Bad treatment, yes, but more in the sense of being the "un-favorite" who gets picked for all the crap details and worked like a slave when doing them. Oh, and spoken of demeaningly, too; one of the sergeants I worked under used to say he'd "talk about you like a stepchild" if the person he was warning fouled up.
Along similar lines, when's the last time anybody heard the expression, "talk about you like a dog," again referring to demeaning speech? This was probably another one with Southern origins, because whenever it passes through my mind's ear, it's pronounced, "dawg."
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Big Brother is watching you. And damn, you are so bloody BORING.
It is a neat phrase -beat you like a or slap you like a - if casual beatings delivered on the undeserving are your thing - and who doesn't like that now again again.
The actual etymology, though uniquely southern takes its origin from Irish immigration to the new World (remember the great Mel Brooks joke from Blazing Saddles - 'We'll take the niggers and the chinks, but we won't take the Irish.' The Irish were socially scaled below pretty much everyone else - which in the early days of America is saying something. Red-headed usually indicated a birth of bastardry and the step child, well what classic tale every starts with fun and joy for anyone's step child.
Not in wide use anymore, but interesting in origin.
Quote:Along similar lines, when's the last time anybody heard the expression,
"talk about you like a dog," again referring to demeaning speech? This
was probably another one with Southern origins, because whenever it
passes through my mind's ear, it's pronounced, "dawg."
"Treated like a dawg", I' ved heard plenty of around here. "Treated like a red headed step-dawg"? Never heard that. either.
BTW, I heard another colloquialism here in 'Ham. It's more like a chant
Roll Who!!
Tide!!
If you follow collegiate football, you can figure it out.
__________________
Into terror!, Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell
Colloquialisms shift with the changes in culture, media, location, and political opinions. "Jerry rig" becomes "jury rig" and the other, Southern US version fades into obscurity because people don't use that word in public anymore (for example). The last time I heard "beat you like a red-headed stepchild" was on an early version of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and it was used by a character who would remember it from when it was normal (Lyle Gorch, of the Gorch Brothers... who themselves are a tip of the hat to one of the great film Westerns and one of the great film directors). We don't "lose" a colloquialism; they simply cease to be relevant, much like any piece of popular culture.
Ebony the Black Dragon
http://ebony14.livejournal.com
"Good night, and may the Good Lord take a Viking to you."
Then what is the definition of a 'Red-headed stepchild'?
(I've seen the definition, but I'm curious about other people's interpretation.)
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DEATH is Certain. The hour, Uncertain...
Something unwanted and/or despised. Red hair in a child, I believe, was thought to be a marker of infidelity in the mother (at least among English-derived peoples, who were usually blond or brunet; this is probably the root of the anti-"ginger" prejudice one sees surfacing every once in a while in the UK). I have some thoughts about the role of the "stepchild" part, but I'm not sure if they're borne out by fact.
-- Bob
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Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
One of my favorites (often applied to myself) is "Being used/worked like a rented mule."
One of my sergeants used to say, when speaking of being in a particularly good situation, that the lucky person would be "shittin' in tall cotton."
Also, I once wrote a parody of an Army recruiting jingle. It included the line: "We felt like redhaired bastard stepkids of the National Guard!"
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Big Brother is watching you. And damn, you are so bloody BORING.
DHBirr Wrote:One of my sergeants used to say, when speaking of being in a particularly good situation, that the lucky person would be "shittin' in tall cotton."
Also, I once wrote a parody of an Army recruiting jingle. It included the line: "We felt like redhaired bastard stepkids of the National Guard!"
Sarge must had come from the cotton belt.
__________________
Into terror!, Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell
When I was a kid people used to say "it's a free country" all the time, but I can't remember hearing it after the 1980s.