First of all I would like to point out that those of you in the lake these last couple weeks earn that honorific in the best possible sense. Y'all are badasses! I have withdrawn to the chlorinated waters, submitting myself to the tyranny of the black stripe on the bottom of the pool!
On "Badass:"
I love this word because it doesn't behave like it should. Check it out-
If badass is a good thing, and I think we all agree it is, then when someone calls you a badass, they're sending you props, for sure. So it's good. But "bad" and "ass" are both, typically, negative in their connotations (and denotations). This word doesn't behave: two bads don't usually equal a good.
Further, if we are looking for an opposite of badass, goodass might be a candidate, but it's clearly not. Rather, weakass would be the thing. Not really what you'd expect if the word was behaving, linguistically speaking. By my own account, I would be a weakass.
Look at how that construction plays out with different roots: toughass, weakass, smartass, dumbass. The first two are actually opposites, so they behave. They're also sort of boring, they mostly mean "tough" and "weak." But the second two aren't really opposites, so they don't behave. Also, confusingly, a smartass isn't always very smart, while a dumbass is usually pretty dumb. I think this might be because "smartass" is a variant of "smart aleck," and so it doesn't behave like the others.
I like words that don't behave!
2 comments:
I also like words that don't behave, and even people who don't behave, sometimes.
But surely, there must be another word that is the opposite of ass. That seems to be your cognitive dissonance dilemma.
So, the first words that come to my mind when I think of an opposite of ass are not really appropriate for a refined, erudite blog like this. Guess I'm selective about liking words that don't behave :)
I love this deep dive into the essence of badass.
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