2/9: Terrible MSNBC gaffe

[MaggieL]

Originally posted by jeni

maybe he'd rather just use those words how they're meant to be used.

There's a world of difference between "how they're meant to be used" and "how they were formerly used".

"Queer" simply meaning "odd" is so unusual now as to almost constitute an archaic usage in everyday speech. If it hadn't been used as a derogatory term for homosexuals, it might still be in use with it's former meaning. Now it's so loaded with connotations in modern daily speech that the old meaning is no longer available, unless you're clearly speaking an archaic voice: "Zounds, what a queer thing is this!"

"NIce" used to mean foolish, simple, silly, effeminate, trivial, overscrupulous, delicate, refined or dainty. In other usage it meant "apprehending slight differences or delicate distinctions". But if you say it today, it means pleasing, agreeable, satisfying or delightful. If you say somone is "nice", they'll take it as a compliment. If you use the phrase "that's a nice distinction", you're hinting that a former meaning is intended.

What if somone you'd callled "nice" bristled that you'd impugned his masculinity? After all, by your lights above, that's "how the word is meant to be used".