The problematic history of the word ‘thug’

Rhapture

♊Dogset Emperor and Sociopathic Socialite ♊
Supporter
Joined
Oct 9, 2015
Messages
29,758
Reputation
18,293
Daps
135,564
The problematic history of the word ‘thug’: From rioting Pa. coal miners to Tupac to a Philly courtroom | The Angry Grammarian

XQVTK6LLB5AB7BEIYIBIODWVA4.jpg

AP PHOTO/FILE

Derrick Rollins is a thug.


It says so right in the transcripts from Delaware County Judge John P. Capuzzi Sr.’s courtroom

Last Friday, when Capuzzi sentenced Rollins to life in prison for the murder of 29-year-old Temple and Lower Merion grad John Le, the judge told Rollins that he was “a liar, a manipulator, a thug, a scumbag.”


Crime victims might respond: Well, yeah. But we really need to ask: How is that an okay thing to say?

To be sure, a convicted murder deserves the punishment coming to him. But a duly elected Common Pleas Court judge just called an African-American man in his courtroom the socially acceptable equivalent of the N-word.


Thug has a checkered history from its origins as a 19th-century Hindi word for thief to its present-day status as a racist dog-whistle. But it’s always held a patina of otherness.


An early English mention in an 1863 New York Times article about the “Carbon Thugs” rioting in Pennsylvania coal country referred to “these ruffians” as “ignorant, brutal, and in the majority of instances animal in appearance and instinct.” Fast-forward a century to the 1959 film The Stranglers of Bombay, about the murderous nature of the Indian “Thuggees,” whose provocative poster includes a man in a turban attacking a buxom young woman underneath the words “MURDER CULT TERROR IN EXOTIC ASIA.” George W. Bush used the word to describe Middle Eastern terrorists, while Rush Limbaugh used it to describe Barack Obama. At a 2016 North Carolina campaign rally, a black Trump supporter waved in the air a note that he wanted to get to his favored candidate. Trump, however, assumed the man was a protester and said, “Were you paid $1,500 to be a thug?” He had security escort the man out of the rally.


Labeling a person as a thug is rarely about just their actions; it’s about painting them as savage, animalistic, unable to be tamed — and therefore subject to retributive violence. Violence that can be excused in a court of law or public opinion.

Like the N-word, thug was reappropriated in the late 20th century. Just a few years after the L.A. supergroup N.W.A took the reappropriated N-word mainstream, Tupac Shakur broke out with “THUG LIFE” tattooed across his chest. “White folks see us as thugs,” Shakur said in one notable speech. “I don’t care if you think you’re a lawyer, if you’re a man, if you’re an African-American, if you’re whatever the f--- you think you are. We’re thugs and n-----s to these motherf-----s.”


Following Freddie Gray’s death in 2015, many — including President Barack Obama and Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, both African-American — used the word thug to describe the protesters wreaking havoc across the city. But as Columbia English professor and language deity John McWhorter noted on NPR, thug carries different meanings depending on who says it. Like with the N-word, the respective races of both the speaker and the subject are important.


Derrick Rollins is a convicted murderer and will spend the rest of his life in jail. But just as if the judge had used the N-word to describe Rollins, calling him a thug serves only to cast doubt on the motivations and heart of the court. That undermines the justice that’s been done, which is the ultimate disservice to the victims.


The Angry Grammarian, otherwise known as Jeffrey Barg, looks at how language, grammar, and punctuation shape our world, and appears biweekly. That’s every other week, not twice a week, friends. Send comments, questions and phrasal verbs to jeff@theangrygrammarian.com.




Updated: April 17, 2019 - 9:09 AM
Angry Grammarian
The problematic history of the word ‘thug’: From rioting Pa. coal miners to Tupac to a Philly courtroom | The Angry Grammarian
 

ManfromNYCest.1900s

Banned
Bushed
Joined
Nov 12, 2017
Messages
195
Reputation
-40
Daps
512
Reppin
All Thats Good Within Thee World
Great read! This is something I came to realize the older I got. It is no longer disheartening to me and actually brings relief to not have to be cognizant of my image. No matter how well I dress, talk, or act the perception of other people about will always be THUG. It only becomes problematic when lives are lost like Trayvon Martin, Emmit Till, Mike Brown and countless others (RIP).
 

Rhapture

♊Dogset Emperor and Sociopathic Socialite ♊
Supporter
Joined
Oct 9, 2015
Messages
29,758
Reputation
18,293
Daps
135,564
Great read! This is something I came to realize the older I got. It is no longer disheartening to me and actually brings relief to not have to be cognizant of my image. No matter how well I dress, talk, or act the perception of other people about will always be THUG. It only becomes problematic when lives are lost like Trayvon Martin, Emmit Till, Mike Brown and countless others (RIP).
I got into some trouble when I was 16 that had me in the back of a police car. The whole time I was in there the officer kept trying to get a rise out of me. We were parked in front of the school and some kids were walking back to campus because lunch was almost over. All the kids in the group were black and he gonna say as they were walking past "thugs :beli:". I kept cool because I knew my parents were on the way but it pissed me off because those kids were doing nothing but walking and minding their business.

"No matter how well I dress, talk, or act the perception of other people about me will always be THUG." This part of your post is why misuse of the word is a problem. You shouldn't be labeled or mischaracterized when you've done nothing wrong.
 

ba'al

Vasectomy Gang
Supporter
Joined
Mar 22, 2015
Messages
25,184
Reputation
24,446
Daps
163,150
I ain't read none of that article but I heard the word thug came from Thuggee in hindi from Indian who were robbers.
 

ManfromNYCest.1900s

Banned
Bushed
Joined
Nov 12, 2017
Messages
195
Reputation
-40
Daps
512
Reppin
All Thats Good Within Thee World
I got into some trouble when I was 16 that had me in the back of a police car. The whole time I was in there the officer kept trying to get a rise out of me. We were parked in front of the school and some kids were walking back to campus because lunch was almost over. All the kids in the group were black and he gonna say as they were walking past "thugs :beli:". I kept cool because I knew my parents were on the way but it pissed me off because those kids were doing nothing but walking and minding their business.

"No matter how well I dress, talk, or act the perception of other people about me will always be THUG." This part of your post is why misuse of the word is a problem. You shouldn't be labeled or mischaracterized when you've done nothing wrong.
I feel you but, it's better to know how you're perceived than to not and fall, a victim. When you were in the back of the police car you subconsciously knew if you became enraged that officer would have taken the most extreme measures dealing with you. Plus, most people nowadays have the mentality of taking no chances so they view guys that look like me as a thug because they feel and think it's safer for them. So many ways to interpret being "labeled or mischaracterized when you've done nothing wrong."
 

Rhapture

♊Dogset Emperor and Sociopathic Socialite ♊
Supporter
Joined
Oct 9, 2015
Messages
29,758
Reputation
18,293
Daps
135,564
I feel you but, it's better to know how you're perceived than to not and fall, a victim. When you were in the back of the police car you subconsciously knew if you became enraged that officer would have taken the most extreme measures dealing with you. Plus, most people nowadays have the mentality of taking no chances so they view guys that look like me as a thug because they feel and think it's safer for them. So many ways to interpret being "labeled or mischaracterized when you've done nothing wrong."
That's true. I guess it's better to deal with a devil in plain sight than a snake in the grass.
 
Top