October 22, 2002

9:42 AM

NJ Guido!A site for guidos, by guidos... hilariously enough! The pics are great (actually, many hotties), but the clincher has got to be the proud testimonials (under "writings"). Can anybody say B&T?
posted by adamms222 (52 comments total)

Those poor guys. Most of them don't appear to own any shirts.

Also, I may be out of it, but just what is "B&T"?
posted by kokogiak at 9:50 AM on October 22, 2002

Bridge & Tunnel, which refers to people who come to party in Manhattan (via the various bridges and tunnels) from NJ, Long Island, Yonkers, Westchester, etc. Depending on whom you talk to, it can also include the outer NYC boroughs.

Great link!
posted by mkultra at 9:57 AM on October 22, 2002

Wow - now I remember why I hate going out to the bars in NJ...
posted by MsVader at 10:11 AM on October 22, 2002

I teach a large number of B+T adolscents at a Manhattan technical college, and what this site confirmed for me is that young men in this region seem completely obsessed with GNC, steroids, and viagra. What is up with that? Is this the new boy-anor-sexia?
posted by DenOfSizer at 10:12 AM on October 22, 2002

** tears of nostalgic mirth streaming down face **

god bless you, adamms222, i am having a Jersey flashback of the Z. Cavarricci pants variety...now i remember why i stayed here in Boston after college, while my sister is dating jabeeps like this after meeting them at the Hunka Bunka Ballroom in Lodi...
posted by serafinapekkala at 10:18 AM on October 22, 2002

jabeeps? This word...what does it mean?
posted by me3dia at 10:27 AM on October 22, 2002

I was using this term a year or two ago until someone pointed out that it was kind of an ethnic slur (the term racist has been intentionally avoided). After that I tried 'mook', but stopped after noticing an asian friend flinch at the word's proximity to a particularly hateful ethnic term for asians (rhymes with mook, starts with a 'g').

Which brings me to 'meathead'.

Meathead is choice. One can choose not to be a meathead. Meathead doesn't seem to rhyme with or sound like anything other than what it is. (I'm also reminded of this which was discussed here)
posted by joemaller at 10:27 AM on October 22, 2002

Hunka Bunka Ballroom is in Sayreville. Soundgarden is in Lodi.

I thought I escaped guidoville when I moved out of the former only to find myself immersed in it once again when I ended up in the latter.
posted by goddam at 10:28 AM on October 22, 2002

so you moved out of sayerville up to lodi to escape the guidos? ha. i live around lodi. this is the center of the guido universe. tinted windows. dubs. very load car stereos. tight black pants for women and no shirts for the guys (if you couldn't already tell by the pictures on the site).

kinda funny. makes me want to start an anti-guido website similar to this.

although i must say i find the hipsters much more annoying. at least the guidos are having fun.
posted by oliver_crunk at 10:52 AM on October 22, 2002

Well, there's an anti-bennie site.

Check out the Boards complete with Bennie Haiku.
posted by goddam at 11:10 AM on October 22, 2002

Ah, New Jersey. The butt of all jokes, cliche'ed, but nevertheless: one is thankful that there exists such a place, a place with enough cheese gravity to keep the "types" from roaming to other states too much.
posted by four panels at 11:17 AM on October 22, 2002

This, I should add before sounding too harsh, is an excellent sinister smile:

posted by four panels at 11:21 AM on October 22, 2002

i got to say it. jersey rules. all the bad jersey jokes. all the flak we get. all the guidos. all the trash and stinky smells. jersey rules. i mean, what's cooler than that picture above? confirming the stereoype and not giving a damn at all.

goddam: that's a great link.
posted by oliver_crunk at 11:31 AM on October 22, 2002

don't forget the plucked eyebrow thing--that's kinda new....
posted by amberglow at 11:37 AM on October 22, 2002

Is New Jersey the only state that has guidos?

That can't be possible. Can it? Someone please tell me that there is evidence of them elsewhere...
posted by MsVader at 11:44 AM on October 22, 2002

Oh my gawd, goddam, thanks for that link! I was born in Toms River, and I remember asking my grandmother what "Go Home Bennies" (usually seen spray-painted on a sheet hanging over an overpass) meant.

I have conflicted emotions over being a Jersey Girl...on the one hand, I have a certain nostalgic fondness for the Garden State. On the other hand, I look at some of those pictures (and wonder what my life would have been like if we hadn't moved when I was 5) and I shudder...
posted by JoanArkham at 11:54 AM on October 22, 2002

Long Island is the true land of guidos...
posted by stifford at 11:55 AM on October 22, 2002

A lot of guidos in LI and Queens
posted by culpable at 12:01 PM on October 22, 2002

and wonder what my life would have been like if we hadn't moved when I was 5

I've lived in two guido hotspots for most of my life and I've managed to not get too fucked up.

There are many ways avoid the guidos around here. Like drive to south Jersey and hang with some Pineys.
posted by goddam at 12:02 PM on October 22, 2002

joemaller: i seriously had *no* idea there was a slur overtone to "jabeep." what's the story there? i thought my dad made it up...and i use it as a synonym for doofus. i think it sounds like something a Muppet would say...but i'll def. take it out of circulation if i'm unwittingly offending somebody. which is funny...because "meathead" has a sort of Polack-joke low-level offense quotient for my mom's family (lots of Lithuanian and Slovak ironworkers from good old Elizabeth, NJ)...but i personally don't mind. ;-)

as for the whole Lodi - Sayreville mixup, it's just been too long since i've gone clubbing back home with my sisters. anybody been to the Crab's Claw or Bambu in Seaside (i think)? loaded with these "rock star" types...
posted by serafinapekkala at 12:10 PM on October 22, 2002

Serafina, I think the offending word is "Guido" as it is a standard slur. I think your Jabeep term is quite fantastic and fits right in with benign monnikers such as: knucklehead, jabroni, numbnuts, spaz, and doofus.
posted by Mushkelley at 12:22 PM on October 22, 2002

I tried 'mook', but stopped after noticing an asian friend flinch at the word's proximity to a particularly hateful ethnic term for asians

Oh man. I guess we'd better avoid saying "Bosh!"; it might make a German flinch because of its proximity to a French ethnic slur for Germans. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. We'd better find a site that has every ethnic slur in every language so that we can avoid all words that might remind someone of one of them.

In other words, joemaller, I think perhaps your friend is a tad oversensitive.
posted by languagehat at 12:22 PM on October 22, 2002

MsVader: Is New Jersey the only state that has guidos?

God, I wish.

I used to live in San Francisco. The club scene there suffers from RAMPANT guido infestation.
posted by jaded at 12:23 PM on October 22, 2002

They're probably everywhere, but I know Pennsylvania has them. Guidos, I mean... Plus, sometimes they attend college out of state, and can spread as far as Raleigh! All the one's I've ever known well were fun as hell to hang out with. They love Myrtle Beach, apparently.
posted by techgnollogic at 12:23 PM on October 22, 2002

My favorite slur is Canucklehead.
posted by four panels at 12:24 PM on October 22, 2002

sera: i think (though i could be wrong) joe was talking about the term 'guido' itself. according to this slang dictionary, a guido is:

An insulting term for an Italian-American male, bringing to mind flashy clothes, gold chains, and plentiful chest hair.

Example: 1) "Hey Tony, why are you wearing a big gold chain? Don't be such a guido!"
posted by oliver_crunk at 12:25 PM on October 22, 2002

Lodi: Land Of Dumb Italians
posted by goddam at 12:27 PM on October 22, 2002

sheesh, i'd better lay off these chocolate Twizzlers, I'm getting a little mushbrained...yup, guido as a slur i can see (just like the preferred 1985 fifth grade Jersey girl term for a tank top, since abandoned obviously: "guinea tee"! second only to "wifebeater"!), but jabeep, no way, i'm sticking with jabeep.

on a related note, did you know the term "gook" is actually a corruption of the word "American"? american GI's in VietNam heard the local people trying to pronounce "american" as "me-guk" and that got thrown back at them as "gooks." can't find the cite but i think it's in Stanley Karnow's big VietNam book. /spazzafina
posted by serafinapekkala at 12:35 PM on October 22, 2002

serafina: The term "gook" (for 'Asian') is first recorded in 1935 according to the 1999 printing of the 10th edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate (life is so complicated now that they change the dictionary every year), so it has nothing to do with Vietnam. If it were from "me-guk," that would be a dialect/variant form of Mandarin Chinese Meiguo 'America' (guo 'country' has a final -k in many forms of Chinese), but the dictionary says "origin unknown," so... the origin is unknown.
posted by languagehat at 12:45 PM on October 22, 2002

I have so much to say on this subject , having lived in nj.
So I will just testify that Bloomfield, NJ is the motherland of all guidos.
That south florida is the place all Guidos wish to go when they die.
And you don't have to be Italian to be a guido, you can fake it with out much effort.
posted by Lungsbreth at 12:47 PM on October 22, 2002

We Jersey girls get a bad rap. I've been in Jersey all my life, and I'm certainly no guidette. Then again, I don't frequent places like the Hunka Bunka Ballroom or Bahama Mama's...
posted by MsVader at 1:01 PM on October 22, 2002

... and it was like jabeepbeepbeepbeepbeep...
posted by blogRot at 1:03 PM on October 22, 2002

thanks for the clarification, languagehat.

Lungsbreth: Bloomfield is good, but what about Union? home of Ray Liotta...
posted by serafinapekkala at 1:06 PM on October 22, 2002

Where I grew up (Reading, PA, about an hour outside Philly), we had our fair share of Guido culture. Interestingly, a lot of it was co-opted by the local Latino community. Melting Pot at its worst.

What's a jabeep?
posted by mkultra at 1:19 PM on October 22, 2002

dubs. very load car stereos.

Just curious, since I keep seeing it around: what are "dubs"? They seem to be frequently mentioned in connection with something called "bling bling". I have tried to guess what these things are from context, but have not come up with anything. Is it an east coast thing, perhaps?
posted by Mars Saxman at 1:27 PM on October 22, 2002

mars: dubs are rims on a car.
posted by oliver_crunk at 1:33 PM on October 22, 2002

Mars: specifically 20" (or 22"?) inch rims, usually accompanied by low profile tires. these appear most often on Large SUV's.
posted by jbelshaw at 1:36 PM on October 22, 2002

bling bling = money

Sorry, but I couldn't help laughing when I read that comment. I pictured some old white-bread marketing exec saying "Yes, we must get in on this 'bling bling' thing the kids seem to be into these days..."
posted by mkultra at 1:37 PM on October 22, 2002

Whilst a grad student in American Studies/Cultural Studies in the early-mid 90s, I came across this somewhat painful academic analysis of Guido. Theoretically, I don't think it's particularly rigorous or insightful; it doesn't appear to even acknowledge the use of "Guido" as a potential ethnic slur. (It does, however, say that the term "guido" is used interchangeably with "cugine," which the author says is vernacular Italian for "cousin.")

I am glad not to be in grad school anymore.
posted by scody at 2:14 PM on October 22, 2002

bling bling = money

Specifically, the glimmer of diamond jewelry.

Here's an article from today's SJ Merc that seems apropos.
posted by hilker at 2:23 PM on October 22, 2002

Like most "slurs" it's all in who's saying it and how ya say it. A large chunk of my college buddies were from Bensonhurst over in Brooklyn and Lodi in Jersey(centers of guido culture) and I live in a city with a fairly large cugine contingent, and they're not so bad. NTM, you don't have to be Italian to be a guido. And as someone half italian myself, I can tell ya there's a little guido in all of us.

Capiche, paisan?
posted by jonmc at 3:48 PM on October 22, 2002

I'm looking at the hot chicks, but all I'm hearing are their accents.
posted by gelatinouscitizen at 4:00 PM on October 22, 2002

Jesus, what does a Guidette do if she doesn't have a C or D cup and killer abs? Can she go out at night?

Now I know where Christine Aguilera goes to find out about fashion....
posted by aacheson at 4:14 PM on October 22, 2002

Jesus, what does a Guidette do if she doesn't have a C or D cup and killer abs? Can she go out at night?

No. She (the Guidette) must pursue painting, or perhaps marine biology, and find a different set of friends.
posted by four panels at 6:03 PM on October 22, 2002

posted by goethean at 6:13 PM on October 22, 2002

Jersey. It's funny how people think nothing of NJ but what they see on the NJ Turnpike. It's actually not that bad of a state, decent beaches (Ocean City) and you get it all (urban, suburban, woods, mountains, beaches, pine barrens, etc.)

And guidos. Being a transplanted Detroiter, I still find it funny (8 years later) when I hear people saying "yous" to me. Ah, well.
posted by adampsyche at 6:21 PM on October 22, 2002

Jesus, what does a Guidette do if she doesn't have a C or D cup and killer abs? Can she go out at night?

No. She (the Guidette) must pursue painting, or perhaps marine biology, and find a different set of friends.
posted by four panels at 6:03 PM PST on October 22

wouldn't a female version be guida or guidina?
posted by facapulco at 7:14 PM on October 22, 2002

so this is how the other half lives. also,


so is GNC...GRUNT!..thattaway?
posted by mcsweetie at 9:10 PM on October 22, 2002

That photo above?

If his Momma saw him going out the door like that she'd whup his ass!
posted by alicesshoe at 9:55 PM on October 22, 2002

mcsweetie - oh, god that is too funny. thanks for a good laugh :)

and languagehat said: We'd better find a site that has every ethnic slur in every language so that we can avoid all words that might remind someone of one of them.

such a beast exists. i've seen it, and was amazed at the amount of vertical scroll this single web page contained. I'll try to dig it up..
posted by shadow45 at 10:25 PM on October 22, 2002

No thread on guidos is complete without a shoutout to South Philly! (And its Summer annex, Wildwood, NJ.) YO!
posted by whuppy at 10:18 AM on October 23, 2002

I love Jersey Girls--mall hair and loud annoying voices. See "Clerks". They're kind of like that young mobster's girlfriend on The Sopranos. Buy the girls need not be Italian.
posted by 4midori at 1:45 PM on October 23, 2002