How did this get by unnoticed?

So when this was finally brought to the attention of someone in charge, do you suppose he slammed his fist on the desk and yelled, 'Spearchucker?? Makes no sense! It should be plural! Spearchuckers!! Dammit, can't anyone around here read??'

 

George Allen lost his potential seat in the Senate here in Virginia for using the term "mucaca" during the election trace. I had no/still really do not know what it means. I do know it bit him and was a major part of him losing that seat.

That said, the Sun was way off base. How do you let a word in your paper if you do not know what it means?

 

I thought the same thing, 21.

"If you're determined to be racist, at least be grammatically correct, you moran!

 

Let's not go down a dumb road here OK? You know how apologies go in this business and who makes them. I think you've been around long enough to know what I'm talking about.
The point is this should have NEVER seen the light of day. At any time.

 

There is online evidence that the writer may have, in fact, used the plural, but I am unable to post a link at this time. If you search long enough, you'll find some interesting takes on this, on Hume's comment and on other related uses of the term.

 

Gotta say ... I'm young, but fairly well-read, I'd like to think, and I've never heard the term in that context, either.

And not to pile on, but ... even if you don't know the racial undertones of that term, don't you, as a copy editor/reader, question a word that is so vaguely understood that few are likely to pick up on it? (Obviously, the ones that would in this case are going to pick up on its offensiveness.)

We've got a columnist that uses archaic phrases sometimes ... they're common to him, because he's intelligent enough (and old enough ) to know them ... but that's my job, on the desk, to check him on those things and make sure readers can understand it. Not sure why anyone on a desk wouldn't pick up on that, if nothing else.

 

"Macaca[1] is a pejorative epithet used by francophone colonialists in Central Africa's Belgian Congo for the native population.[2] It may be derived from the name of the genus comprising macaque monkeys. The word macaque has also been used as a racial slur. The macaque's genus name, Macaca, is a latinization of the Bantu (Kongo) ma-kako,[3] meaning "monkey"." -Wikipedia

It's not always a trustworthy source for info, but they've got this one right.

 

Hume is a beerchucker

Don't forget that Compton High's mascot is the Tarbabe, though it's not meant as a derogatory term.

 

Another citation from the Fun Facts to Know and Share File:

Since we've been discussing M*A*S*H, and the Spearchucker Jones character, DID YOU KNOW that the original novel was co-written by a doctor from Maine named Richard Hornberger - and legendary sportswriter W.C. Heinz - under the pseudonym Richard Hooker?

FACT.

 

Still starting to feel like the kids standing in a circle at recess and throwing a kickball at the slow kid.

 

Hell, I'm as non-diverse as you can get (since being Jewish doesn't count) ... 35-year-old white guy... and I know better than to use spearchucker in a column.

 

OOP, I'm a 35-year-old Jew, too. (And yes, we don't count )