Jared Meyer
Veteran
Terry_Lasater said:
As far as broad generalizations go, these two are just plain silly.
Stats & Origins
- Thread starter Terry_Lasater
- Start date
As far as broad generalizations go, these two are just plain silly.
Jared Meyer
Veteran
Terry_Lasater said:
It is often claimed that the term originally referred to the maximum size of a stick with which it was permissible for a man to beat his wife. This claim has been debunked, for instance by Christina Hoff Sommers in her book Who Stole Feminism? (1994 ISBN 0684801566). In particular Sommers notes that there is no mention of this in the legal commentaries of William Blackstone.
The popular etymology may have received a boost in the following quote from Del Martin of the National Organization for Women:
"In America, early settlers held European attitudes towards women. Our law, based upon the old English common-law doctrines, explicitly permitted wife-beating for correctional purposes. However, certain restrictions did exist and the general trend in the young states was toward declaring wife-beating illegal. For instance, the common-law doctrine had been modified to allow the husband 'the right to whip his wife provided that he used a switch no bigger than his thumb' -- a rule of thumb, so to speak"
—Del Martin, Battered Wives Volcano Press, 1976, page 31.
Regardless of whether Martin's analysis of old English common-law doctrines and possibly even her facts, are accurate, there is no evidence that she suggested this usage was the origin of the expression under consideration. However the legend persists. For example:
"Until the 19th Century, there was a charming little rule of thumb that applied to family life. A man was allowed to beat his wife as long as the stick he used was no wider than a thumb."
—Ellen Goodman, Washington Post, April 19, 1983.
"In state courts across the country, wife beating was legal until 1890. There was a rule of thumb, by which courts had stated a man might beat his wife with a switch no thicker than his thumb."
—Chicago Tribune, March 18, 1990.
Source: Wikipedia
Jared Meyer
Veteran
I don't have time for any more, but MAN it is frightening how much "misinformation" is floating around out there....
Something only needs to be condensed into a "fun fact" put onto a "Things You Didn't Know" List, and BAM!!! The collective IQ of the gullible American people just dropped 20 points.
Something only needs to be condensed into a "fun fact" put onto a "Things You Didn't Know" List, and BAM!!! The collective IQ of the gullible American people just dropped 20 points.
Terry_Lasater
All about the Caption
Heh heh... Nice try, jaustere, but I won't let facts stand in the way of my posting fun. Just call me Ripley... Believe it or Not. :cheesy:
There are over 58 million dogs in the U.S.
Dogs and cats consume over $11 billion worth of pet food a year.
Fingernails grow nearly 4 times faster than toenails.
Humans blink over 10,000,000 times a year.
In the year 2000, Pope John Paul II was named an "Honorary Harlem Globetrotter.".
Every second, Americans collectively eat one hundred pounds of chocolate.
A fetus develops fingerprints at eighteen weeks.
The fear of vegetables is called Lachanophobia.
There are approximately fifty Bibles sold each minute across the world.
Every year, kids in North America spend close to half a billion dollars on chewing gum.
An earthquake on Dec. 16, 1811 caused parts of the Mississippi River to flow backwards.
A person uses approximately fifty-seven sheets of toilet paper each day.
Honolulu is the only place in the United States that has a royal palace.
One gallon of used motor oil can ruin approximately one million gallons of fresh water.
More money is spent on gardening than on any other hobby.
In 32 years. there are about 1 billion seconds.
Rice paper does not have any rice in it.
Baby robins eat 14 feet of earthworms every day.
In England, in the 1880's, "Pants" was considered a dirty word.
Most dust particles in your house are made from dead skin.
The blesbok, a South African antelope, is almost the same color as grapejuice.
The average person laughs 13 times a day.
Dogs can hear sounds that you cant.
Men are 6 times more likely to be struck by lightning than women.
It is estimated that millions of trees in the world are accidentally planted by squirrels who bury nuts and then forget where they hid them.
Ernest Vincent Wright wrote a novel, "Gadsby", which contains over 50,000 words -- none of them with the letter E.
Of all the words in the English language, the word set has the most definitions.
A toothpick is the object most often choked on by Americans.
Every 45 seconds, a house catches on fire in the United States.
The sun is 330,330 times larger than the earth.
The most used letter in the English alphabet is 'E', and 'Q' is the least used.
There are more than 50,000 earthquakes throughout the world every year.
The original name for the butterfly was 'flutterby'.
Dogs and cats, like humans, are either right or left handed... or is that paws?
The opposite sides of a dice cube always add up to seven.
Nose prints are used to identify dogs, just like humans use fingerprints.
Bulls are colorblind, therefore will usually charge at a matador's waving cape no matter what color it is -- be it red or neon yellow.
Apples are more efficient than caffeine in keeping people awake in the mornings.
Smelling bananas and/or green apples (smelling, not eating) can help you lose weight.
A hard working adult sweats up to 4 gallons per day. Most of the sweat evaporates before a person realizes it's there, though.
The average ice berg weighs 20,000,000 tons.
The poison-arrow frog has enough poison to kill about 2,200 people.
A lump of pure gold the size of a matchbox can be flattened into a sheet the size of a tennis court.
After eating, a housefly regurgitates its food and then eats it again.
There are over 58 million dogs in the U.S.
Dogs and cats consume over $11 billion worth of pet food a year.
Fingernails grow nearly 4 times faster than toenails.
Humans blink over 10,000,000 times a year.
In the year 2000, Pope John Paul II was named an "Honorary Harlem Globetrotter.".
Every second, Americans collectively eat one hundred pounds of chocolate.
A fetus develops fingerprints at eighteen weeks.
The fear of vegetables is called Lachanophobia.
There are approximately fifty Bibles sold each minute across the world.
Every year, kids in North America spend close to half a billion dollars on chewing gum.
An earthquake on Dec. 16, 1811 caused parts of the Mississippi River to flow backwards.
A person uses approximately fifty-seven sheets of toilet paper each day.
Honolulu is the only place in the United States that has a royal palace.
One gallon of used motor oil can ruin approximately one million gallons of fresh water.
More money is spent on gardening than on any other hobby.
In 32 years. there are about 1 billion seconds.
Rice paper does not have any rice in it.
Baby robins eat 14 feet of earthworms every day.
In England, in the 1880's, "Pants" was considered a dirty word.
Most dust particles in your house are made from dead skin.
The blesbok, a South African antelope, is almost the same color as grapejuice.
The average person laughs 13 times a day.
Dogs can hear sounds that you cant.
Men are 6 times more likely to be struck by lightning than women.
It is estimated that millions of trees in the world are accidentally planted by squirrels who bury nuts and then forget where they hid them.
Ernest Vincent Wright wrote a novel, "Gadsby", which contains over 50,000 words -- none of them with the letter E.
Of all the words in the English language, the word set has the most definitions.
A toothpick is the object most often choked on by Americans.
Every 45 seconds, a house catches on fire in the United States.
The sun is 330,330 times larger than the earth.
The most used letter in the English alphabet is 'E', and 'Q' is the least used.
There are more than 50,000 earthquakes throughout the world every year.
The original name for the butterfly was 'flutterby'.
Dogs and cats, like humans, are either right or left handed... or is that paws?
The opposite sides of a dice cube always add up to seven.
Nose prints are used to identify dogs, just like humans use fingerprints.
Bulls are colorblind, therefore will usually charge at a matador's waving cape no matter what color it is -- be it red or neon yellow.
Apples are more efficient than caffeine in keeping people awake in the mornings.
Smelling bananas and/or green apples (smelling, not eating) can help you lose weight.
A hard working adult sweats up to 4 gallons per day. Most of the sweat evaporates before a person realizes it's there, though.
The average ice berg weighs 20,000,000 tons.
The poison-arrow frog has enough poison to kill about 2,200 people.
A lump of pure gold the size of a matchbox can be flattened into a sheet the size of a tennis court.
After eating, a housefly regurgitates its food and then eats it again.
Jared Meyer
Veteran
Ripley is one of those sources I do hold to be reliable, actually.
And Snapple Caps.
Alright, have your fun. But the people have been warned! Every time another one of these snappy little false-trivia pearls is transmitted at a cocktail party and taken to be true, somewhere, unbeknownst to you, a hapless community college transfer student flunks out of bonehead english. Or so I've heard.
And Snapple Caps.
Alright, have your fun. But the people have been warned! Every time another one of these snappy little false-trivia pearls is transmitted at a cocktail party and taken to be true, somewhere, unbeknownst to you, a hapless community college transfer student flunks out of bonehead english. Or so I've heard.
Matt Grunau
Adobe Demigod
Good fun. Thanks guys
rogar-BigGrin(DBG)