Quite gay
October 4, 2017 12:56 AM   Subscribe

New Zealand's Rainbow Youth have a new video ad targeting homophobic slurs and it's quite good.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen (20 comments total) 25 users marked this as a favorite
 
This is fabulous, yet not gay.
posted by tula at 1:01 AM on October 4, 2017 [1 favorite]


Interesting, New Zealand. Not sure I've ever heard gay used in quite this pejorative fashion...
posted by jim in austin at 1:14 AM on October 4, 2017


Jim, it's a very common usage in Australia and New Zealand vernacular. Gay = uncool/bad/disappointing etc.
posted by UnoDosTresEsto at 1:24 AM on October 4, 2017 [13 favorites]


Quite a treat indeed. Moreso than the lost pie. And i have heard gay used as a pejorative against random happenstance and non-human items in the US more than once.
posted by Samizdata at 1:31 AM on October 4, 2017 [3 favorites]


It was definitely a common usage on at least one Maine playground in the early 80s. Then seemed to have a resurgence when I was in college or afterward in the southern US.
posted by Hal Mumkin at 2:58 AM on October 4, 2017 [2 favorites]


Mrs Kandinski, who's started teaching in a new school here in Melbourne, has reported a couple of times how pleased she is that her students there don't seem to use "gay" as a derogatory. The students at the schools where she did her placement as a student teacher apparently used it a lot. Either it's on the wane, or these kids are more enligthened.
posted by kandinski at 3:14 AM on October 4, 2017


Well, that was goddamn charming as heck.
posted by BaffledWaffle at 4:14 AM on October 4, 2017 [1 favorite]


Interesting, New Zealand. Not sure I've ever heard gay used in quite this pejorative fashion...

(Um, what? The use of "gay" as "bad/uncool/lame" has been and still is common across the English-speaking world, and has been known and pushed back against as a shitty thing for.. decades?)
posted by Drexen at 4:41 AM on October 4, 2017 [15 favorites]


NZ is killing it with the anti-discrimination ads at the moment. Racism.
posted by drnick at 5:08 AM on October 4, 2017 [3 favorites]


(Um, what? The use of "gay" as "bad/uncool/lame" has been and still is common across the English-speaking world, and has been known and pushed back against as a shitty thing for.. decades?)

I suspect that jim in austin means that it's unusual to hear "gay" used as a general curse in the same way you'd yell "shit!" or "dammit!" when you drop a tasty pie.

Certainly, it was plenty common to use it as an insult in other ways -- "that's so gay", "you're so gay", etc. I was called "Ben Gay" more than once in elementary school by kids who thought they were being clever.

More to the point, this ad is delightful and I have watched it three times and laughed each time.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 6:35 AM on October 4, 2017 [5 favorites]


This is delightful. Stay awesome, Kiwis.
posted by rmd1023 at 6:39 AM on October 4, 2017 [1 favorite]


This is so charming. Thank you for posting it.
posted by bile and syntax at 6:57 AM on October 4, 2017


I'm tucking this into my time machine and taking it back about 5 or 10 years when I was CONSTANTLY fussing at my young friends about using "gay" to mean anything they didn't like or that they disapproved of. The near universal refrain was "gay doesn't mean homosexual in this context" to which I could only respond "don't act brand new."

Thanks for this. It warms my craggy sullen heart.
posted by janey47 at 7:03 AM on October 4, 2017 [7 favorites]


Simon Amstell from Nevermind the Buzzcocks, on the subject of Katie Perry's You're So Gay
posted by AndrewStephens at 7:09 AM on October 4, 2017 [1 favorite]


That's so Takei.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 7:12 AM on October 4, 2017 [2 favorites]


I need a New Zealander husband.
posted by roger ackroyd at 7:33 AM on October 4, 2017 [3 favorites]



I need a New Zealander husband.

I've been saying this for quite some time. I'll let you know when/if it ever works.
posted by thivaia at 8:08 AM on October 4, 2017 [2 favorites]


Kiwis have been destroying short-form edutainment film production for a while. (Among many other things) airnz is famously and spectacularly good at this; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-5gjkh4r3g&sns=em
posted by hatchetjack at 8:46 AM on October 4, 2017 [2 favorites]


This country <3
posted by New England Cultist at 12:17 PM on October 4, 2017


Ghost chip?
posted by litleozy at 1:25 PM on October 5, 2017 [2 favorites]


« Older Fat Possum's Blues Treasure Trove   |   It’s not so very strange to me. Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments