this post was submitted on 18 Mar 2024
616 points (98.1% liked)

Curated Tumblr

5908 readers
15 users here now

For preserving the least toxic and most culturally relevant Tumblr heritage posts.

Here are some OCR tools to assist you in transcribing posts:

Don't be mean. I promise to do my best to judge that fairly.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 
all 48 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] Psaldorn@lemmy.world 124 points 2 years ago (4 children)

UK parlance

"fag" = cigarette "Gay" = happy/good times "Queer" = odd or unusual

πŸ³οΈβ€πŸŒˆβ€οΈ

[–] ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca 38 points 2 years ago (1 children)

My friend's dad is from Scotland. He came to Canada and works as a dealer at a casino. One day, two obviously gay men sat at his table and one of them put down his pack of cigarettes. My friend's dad then unknowingly said "I'm sorry sir, but we don't allow fags at the table". Everyone learned a bit about regional dialects that day!

[–] John_McMurray@lemmy.world 0 points 2 years ago (1 children)

/r/that_happenned is a different site

[–] ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca 10 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Here's another one that never happened for you. My brother got banned from RuneScape for typing "poof".

[–] John_McMurray@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Ok it might have happened but ifnit did, that last line....the Scot absolutely knew.

[–] John_McMurray@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

Which is odd, usually "poofter" is the insult, depending on context.

[–] ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Canada is the same except

Gay/Queer meanings are old fashioned

And fag was a slur for religious people but that appears to be old fashioned now

[–] John_McMurray@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Canada is the same except not at all.

[–] ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 3 points 2 years ago

You can still use gay/queer that way

It’s just fag that didn’t have that meaning

[–] someguy3@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 years ago (3 children)

Really that's how they use queer?

[–] thegiddystitcher@lemm.ee 12 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

It's kind of an old-timey usage. Comes up a lot in Lord of the Rings.

"Gay" in this context is also old-timey.

But a cigarette is still a "fag" to a lot of people. Interestingly uncomfortable for me to even type out even though I grew up with that being a totally normal word!

[–] someguy3@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 years ago (2 children)

I know gay and fag mean happy and cigarette, but didn't know that queer was used to mean unusual (like I know it can be defined as that, but didn't think anyone used it like that.)

[–] John_McMurray@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

There may be a historical ink between the two meanings.

[–] macrocarpa@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

Not frequently said, but certainly written

'as I crossed the misty downs I had the queerest feeling - as if being watched."

There's nowt so queer as folk

[–] Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world 98 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Semantic drift > Continental drift > Tokyo Drift

[–] casmael@lemm.ee 25 points 2 years ago
[–] DavidGarcia@feddit.nl 19 points 2 years ago (1 children)

ding ding ding ding du du du ding

[–] Deceptichum@sh.itjust.works 12 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I wonder if you know
How they live in Tokyo
If you seen it, then you mean it
Then you know you have to go

[–] AppaYipYip@lemmy.world 6 points 2 years ago (1 children)

TOKYOOOOOO drift drift drift

[–] brbposting@sh.itjust.works 3 points 2 years ago

TIL wtf they’re saying

[–] NoSpiritAnimal@lemmy.world 85 points 2 years ago (2 children)

It's a joke from The Nanny specifically about linguistic drift.

This post is like someone watching Austin Powers and being like "I can't believe they almost showed his dick! What a whacky accident!".

[–] ObsidianZed@lemmy.world 11 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Yeah, I know it's black and white but some younger folks seem to way overestimate the quality of older television. This looks like it may have actually been HD, or at least higher SD.

[–] VindictiveJudge@lemmy.world 12 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Anything old enough to have been filmed in black and white was shot on film, which can be scanned in HD just fine so long as you have access to the actual film. The remaster of the original Star Trek is a great example.

[–] ObsidianZed@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] Canadian_Cabinet@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 years ago

Here's an excellent video tangentially related to it

[–] MacAnus@sh.itjust.works 7 points 2 years ago (2 children)

The show is in color, this comes from an episode with a bit in black and white.

[–] ObsidianZed@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Yes I've seen some of The Nanny, I assume it was a flashback or something similar.

[–] MacAnus@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago

Oh my bad, nevermind ^^

[–] FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today 4 points 2 years ago

That's one of the only bits from The Pentaverate that really stuck the landing for me, guy really put his penis (or at least I think it might have been real) out in the open for us. Lots of people hate that netflix allowed a lot of male genitalia around that time, but I think it was a huge step forwards.

[–] AVincentInSpace@pawb.social 35 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I don't know what show this is from, but that's an awfully strange choice of words to use to describe your butler, and I'm just saying this wouldn't be the first time Tumblr has lied to me about what the dialogue in a TV scene was.

[–] jennwiththesea@lemmy.world 84 points 2 years ago (2 children)

This is from The Nanny, but I don't know the episode. Those are the two main characters, though Fran is in a blond wig for some reason. It was made in the 90s and not in black and white, so this must have been a strange episode.

Oh! I found it, or at least this clip: https://youtu.be/82NuUC8WBko?si=30zJLoRGSBjtAnN7

[–] AVincentInSpace@pawb.social 8 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] Quexotic@sh.itjust.works 53 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

It's a play on words assuming that you know both meanings of all 3 words, which the audience clearly did.

Also, it was during a time when people were becoming more aware of queer rights and those words were becoming offensive to more Americans, part of the joke, kinda like "you should never say this in the US, but in the UK it's totally acceptable because all the words have different meanings than in the US"

It's also a play on linguistic drift as mentioned in another post. It's also hanging a lantern on how unacceptable that kind of language had become and in that sense was progressive.

I cannot think of a way that joke flies in the US today unless in a meta context of old jokes, which this meme attempts.

Hopefully this explanation has made the joke completely unfunny at this point.

Hahahahh

[–] blackstampede@sh.itjust.works 9 points 2 years ago (2 children)

I think the term is "lampshades" or something like that, rather than "hanging a lantern".

[–] Quexotic@sh.itjust.works 3 points 2 years ago

Maybe, that's what they called it in the episode 200 (IIRC) of Stargate, so that's what I call it.

They may be opposites.

I don't know. Lol.

[–] wander1236@sh.itjust.works 4 points 2 years ago

I think it's S4E18 but I can't find the episode to check.

[–] xantoxis@lemmy.world 32 points 2 years ago

This is literally from The Nanny. The fact that it sounds like he's talking about gay stuff is the joke, in the show itself.

[–] mindbleach@sh.itjust.works 20 points 2 years ago

I'd tut at people not recognizing when a show fakes an old-timey look for a heavy-handed gag, but on reflection I'm not sure what gives it away. All I know is I can hear the laugh track between these images even without the dialog.

[–] samus12345@lemmy.world 17 points 2 years ago

"So, another Friday is upon us. What will you be doing, Smithers?"

[–] cosmicrookie@lemmy.world 13 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

The funny part is that the actor who played the ~~battler~~ buttler (Daniel Davis) is gay (and fabulous)

[–] Agrivar@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago
[–] GeoGio7@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago
[–] edgemaster72@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago

Ohhh Mr. Sheffield