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A euphemism is a generally harmless word, name, or phrase that substitutes an offensive or suggestive one.^[1] Some euphemisms intend to amuse, while others intend to give positive appearances to negative events or even mislead entirely. Euphemisms also often take the place of profanity. The opposite of euphemism roughly equates to dysphemism.

Etymology & Usage[link]

The word euphemism comes from the Greek word ευφημία (euphemia), meaning "the use of words of good omen", which in turn is derived from the Greek root-words eu (ευ), "good/well" + pheme (φήμι) "speech/speaking". The eupheme was originally a word or phrase used in place of a religious word or phrase that should not be spoken aloud; etymologically, the eupheme is the opposite of the blaspheme (evil-speaking). Primary examples of taboo words requiring the use of a euphemism are names for deities, such as Persephone, Hecate, or Nemesis. The term euphemism itself was used as a euphemism by the ancient Greeks, meaning "to keep a holy silence" (speaking well by not speaking at all).

Historical linguistics has revealed traces of taboo deformations in many languages. Several are known to have occurred in Indo-European languages, including the presumed original Proto-Indo-European words for bear (*rkso), wolf (*wlk^wo), and deer (originally, hart—although the word hart remained commonplace in parts of England until the 20th century as is witnessed by the widespread use of the pub sign The White Hart). In different Indo-European languages, each of these words has a difficult etymology because of taboo deformations — a euphemism was substituted for the original, which no longer occurs in the language. An example is the Slavic root for bear — *medu-ed-, which means "honey eater". Names in Germanic languages—including English—are derived from the color brown. Another example in English is donkey replacing the old Indo-European-derived word ass. The word dandelion (literally, tooth of lion, referring to the shape of the leaves) is another example, being a substitute for pissenlit, meaning "wet the bed", a possible reference to the fact that dandelion was used as a diuretic. The Talmud describes the blind as having "much light" (Aramaic סגי נהור)^[2] and this phrase—sagee nahor—is the Modern Hebrew for euphemism.

In some languages of the Pacific, using the name of a deceased chief is taboo. Among indigenous Australians, it is forbidden to use the name, image, or audio-visual recording of the deceased; the Australian Broadcasting Corporation now publishes a warning to indigenous Australians when using names, images or audio-visual recordings of people who have died.^[3]

Since people are often named after everyday things, this leads to the swift development of euphemisms. New names are frequently required when an old one becomes taboo. These languages have a very high rate of vocabulary change.^[4]

In a similar manner, in imperial China, writers of classical Chinese texts were expected to avoid using characters contained within the name of the currently ruling emperor as a sign of respect. In these instances, the relevant characters were replaced by synonyms. (This practice may provide a fairly accurate means of dating a document.)

The common names of illicit drugs, and the plants used to obtain them, often undergo a process similar to taboo deformation, because new terms are devised in order to discuss them secretly in the presence of others. This process often occurs in English (e.g. speed or crank for meth) and is really slang formation, as it often is not intended to substitute a softer term. It occurs even more in Spanish, e.g., the deformation of names for cannabis: mota (literally, "something that moves" on the black market), grifa (literally, "something coarse to the touch"), marijuana (a female personal name, María Juana), cáñamo (the original Spanish name for the plant, derived from the Latin genus name Cannabis). All four of these names are still used in various parts of the Hispanophone world, although cáñamo ironically has the least underworld connotation, and is often used to describe industrial hemp, or legitimate medically-prescribed cannabis.

Categorization[link]

Euphemisms can be created phonetically (also called a "Minced Oath"), semantically (using analogy to suggest the meanings), or through slang.

Phonetic euphemisms or minced oaths[link]

Phonetic euphemism is used to replace profanities, giving them the intensity of a mere interjection.

• Shortening or "clipping" the term ("Jeez" for Jesus, "What the-" for "What the hell")
• Using the first letter ("SOB", "What the Eff"). Sometimes, the word "word" is added after it ("F word", "S word", "B word"). Also, the letter can be phonetically respelled, for example, the word "piss" was shortened to "pee" in this way.
• Mispronunciations, such as "What the fudge", "Oh my gosh", "Frickin", "Darn" "Oh, shoot", "Be-yotch", etc.
• Rhymes, such as "What the duck", "Oh, snap!", "Cheese and Rice"

Semantic euphemisms[link]

These are used to describe things relating to religion, excretion, sex, racism, death, drugs, and disability.

• Abstractions (it for excrement, the situation or "a girl in trouble" for pregnancy, going to the other side for death, do it or come together in reference to a sexual act, tired and emotional for drunkenness)
• Ambiguities (for example, the phrases "go to the bathroom" or "sleep together")
• Understatements ("sleep" for die, "hurt" for injured, "candy" for drugs, etc.)
• Metaphors, such as "beat the meat," "choke the chicken," "take a dump", "drain the main vein", etc.
• Comparisons, like "wiener" for "penis", "buns" for "butt", "weed" for marijuana/cannabis.
• Metonymy ("lose a person" for dying, "men's room" for men's restroom, see abstractions.)

Slang[link]

• Using a personal name, such as "Willy" or "Dick" for penis, "Fanny" for "buttocks" (in America) or "vulva" (in UK)
• Using a less harsh term with similar meaning. For instance, "messed up" is a euphemism for "screwed up", which in turn is a euphemism for "fucked up"
• Other slang, such as "pot" for marijuana, "laid" for sexual intercourse

Others[link]

• Using an adjective to refer to an element of a person, rather than using a noun to define them, for example, "...makes her look slutty" instead of "...is a slut"
• Reverse understatements or litotes, such as "not so big" for "short", "not exactly a supermodel" for "ugly", or "not true" for "a lie"
• Using a positive context ("Inspired by" instead of "ripped off of" or "plagiarized", "streamlining the workforce" for "laying off/firing (workers)").
• Using the term "challenged". The most common example of this is using "mentally challenged" to describe mental retards. There are many others, though, from "vertically challlenged" for short people, to "vocally challenged" for those with mediocre singing voices.
• Using the word "bleep" (an onomatopoea for the censored tone), a common word like "sofa", or even the word "profane" or "euphemism", to replace profanity.

There is some disagreement over whether certain terms are or are not euphemisms. For example, sometimes the phrase visually impaired is labeled as a politically correct euphemism for blind. However, visual impairment can be a broader term, including, for example, people who have partial sight in one eye, or even those with uncorrected mild to moderate poor vision, a group that would be excluded by the word blind.

There are three antonyms of euphemism: dysphemism, cacophemism, and power word. The first can be either offensive or merely humorously deprecating with the second one generally used more often in the sense of something deliberately offensive. The last is used mainly in arguments to make a point seem more correct.

Evolution[link]

Euphemisms may be formed in a number of ways. Periphrasis or circumlocution is one of the most common — to "speak around" a given word, implying it without saying it. Over time, circumlocutions become recognized as established euphemisms for particular words or ideas.

To alter the pronunciation or spelling of a taboo word (such as a swear word) to form a euphemism is known as taboo deformation. There is an astonishing number of taboo deformations in English, of which many refer to the infamous four-letter words. In American English, words that are unacceptable on television, such as fuck, may be represented by deformations such as freak — even in children's cartoons. Some examples of rhyming slang may serve the same purpose — to call a person a berk sounds less offensive than to call a person a cunt, though berk is short for Berkeley Hunt, which rhymes with cunt.

Bureaucracies such as the military and large corporations frequently spawn euphemisms of a more deliberate nature. Organizations coin doublespeak expressions to describe objectionable actions in terms that seem neutral or inoffensive. For example, a term used in the past for contamination by radioactive isotopes was Sunshine units.^[5]

Military organizations kill people, sometimes deliberately and sometimes by mistake; in doublespeak, the first may be called neutralizing the target or Employing Kinetic Effects and the second collateral damage. Violent destruction of non-state enemies may be referred to as pacification. Two common terms when a soldier is accidentally killed (buys the farm) by their own side are friendly fire or blue on blue (BOBbing) — bought the farm has its own interesting history. Its origins might come from the life insurance payout or a death benefit payment that would permit the soldier's family to pay off the mortgage on real property, such as a farm, or from "the farm" being a slang reference to a burial plot. In World War I the slang "become a landowner" meant to "inhabit a cemetery plot".^[6] The "farm" is a euphemism for property, and "buying" it is a euphemism for the Servicemembers' Group Life Insurance benefit payment that should be sufficient to outright pay for the soldier's "farm." In 2010, the United States administration of President Barack Obama approved a "targeted killing" of a man wanted by the Central Intelligence Agency, effectively launching this term as an official alternative to legal assassination.^[7][8]

Execution is an established euphemism referring to the act of putting a person to death, with or without judicial process. It originally referred to the execution, i.e., the carrying out, of a death warrant, which is an authorization to a sheriff, prison warden, or other official to put a named person to death. In legal usage, execution can still refer to the carrying out of other types of orders; for example, in U.S. legal usage, a writ of execution is a direction to enforce a civil money judgment by seizing property. Likewise, lethal injection itself may be considered a euphemism for putting the convict to death by poisoning.

Abortion originally meant premature birth, and came to mean birth before viability. The term "abort" was extended to mean any kind of premature ending, such as aborting the launch of a rocket. Euphemisms have developed around the original meaning. Abortion, by itself, came to mean "induced abortion" or "elective abortion" exclusively. Hence the parallel term spontaneous abortion, an "act of nature", was dropped in favor of the more neutral-sounding miscarriage.

Industrial unpleasantness such as pollution may be toned down to outgassing or runoff — descriptions of physical processes rather than their damaging consequences. Some of this may simply be the application of precise technical terminology in the place of popular usage, but beyond precision, the advantage of technical terminology may be its lack of emotional undertones and the likelihood that the general public (at least initially) will not recognize it for what it really is; the disadvantage being the lack of real-life context. Terms like waste and wastewater are also avoided in favor of terms such as byproduct, recycling, reclaimed water and effluent. In the oil industry, oil-based drilling muds were simply renamed organic phase drilling muds, where organic phase is a euphemism for "oil." However, this kind of "euphemism" is not necessarily malicious in the sense that labeling an individual byproduct stream "waste" can have severe legal consequencies, such as additional taxes or prohibition of transport or export. In medicine, magnetic resonance imaging has replaced nuclear magnetic resonance in order to avoid frightening patients with the word nuclear (even though MRI scanning does not involve the use of harmful ionizing radiation).

Euphemism treadmill[link]

Euphemisms often evolve over time into taboo words themselves, through a process described by W.V.O. Quine,^[9] and more recently dubbed the "euphemism treadmill" by Steven Pinker,^[10] discussed in his The Blank Slate (2003)^[11] and The Stuff of Thought (2007)^[12] This is the well-known linguistic process known as pejoration or semantic change.

Words originally intended as euphemisms may lose their euphemistic value, acquiring the negative connotations of their referents. In some cases, they may be used mockingly and become dysphemisms. Euphemisms related to disabilities have been prone to this (see below).

• In his remarks on the ever-changing London slang, made in Down and Out in Paris and London, George Orwell mentioned both the euphemism treadmill and the dysphemism treadmill. He did not use these now-established terms, but observed and commented on the respective processes as early as in 1933.
• Where the words lavatory or toilet were deemed inappropriate, they were sometimes replaced with bathroom or water closet, which in turn became simply restroom or W.C. These are also examples of geographic concentration: the term restroom is an Americanism rarely used outside the United States,^[13] while washroom is a Canadian euphemism.^[14]
  The term W.C. was previously quite popular in the United Kingdom, but is passing out of favor there, while becoming more popular in France, Germany, the Netherlands and Hungary as the polite term of choice.^{[citation needed]} Ironically, Toilet is itself a euphemism.

Subject matter[link]

Disability and handicap[link]

Connotations easily change over time. Idiot, imbecile, and moron were once neutral terms for a developmentally delayed adult with the mental age comparable to a toddler, preschooler, and primary school child, respectively.^[15] In time negative connotations tend to crowd out neutral ones, so the phrase mentally retarded was pressed into service to replace them.^[16] Mentally retarded, too, has come to be considered inappropriate by some, because the word retarded came to be commonly used as an insult of a person, thing, or idea. As a result, new terms like mentally challenged, with an intellectual disability, learning difficulties and special needs have widely replaced retarded.

A similar progression occurred with the following terms for persons with physical handicaps being adopted by some people:

lame → crippled → spastic → handicapped → disabled → physically challenged → differently abled → People with Disabilities

Euphemisms can also serve to recirculate words that have passed out of use because of negative connotation. The word lame from above, having faded from the vernacular, was revitalized as a slang word generally meaning "not living up to expectations" or "boring." The connotation of a euphemism can also be subject-specific.

In the early 1960s, Major League Baseball franchise owner and promoter Bill Veeck, who was missing part of a leg, argued against the then-favored euphemism handicapped, saying he preferred crippled because it was merely descriptive and did not carry connotations of limiting one's capability the way handicapped (and all of its subsequent euphemisms) seemed to do (Veeck as in Wreck, chapter "I'm Not Handicapped, I'm Crippled"). Later, comedian George Carlin gave a famous monologue of how he thought euphemisms can undermine appropriate attitudes towards serious issues such as the evolving terms describing the medical problem of the cumulative mental trauma of soldiers in high-stress situations:^[17]

shell shock (World War I) → battle fatigue (World War II) → operational exhaustion (Korean War) → posttraumatic stress disorder (Vietnam War)

He contended that, as the name of the condition became more complicated and seemingly arcane, sufferers of this condition have been taken less seriously as people with a serious illness, and were given poorer treatment as a result. He also contended that Vietnam veterans would have received the proper care and attention they needed were the condition still called shell shock. In the same routine, he echoed Bill Veeck's opinion that crippled was a perfectly valid term (and noted that early English translations of the Bible seemed to have no qualms about saying that Jesus "healed the cripples").

Similarly, spastic was once a neutral descriptor of a sufferer of muscular hypertonicity in British English, but playground use of spastic (and variants such as spaz and spacker) as an insult led to the term being regarded by some as offensive. While the term was developing into an insult in British English, it was evolving in a radically different fashion in American English. In the U.S., spastic or spaz became a synonym for clumsiness, whether physical or mental, and nerdiness, and is very often used in a self-deprecating manner.

The difference between the British and American connotations of spastic was starkly shown in 2006 when golfer Tiger Woods used spaz to describe his putting in that year's Masters. The remark went completely unnoticed in America, but caused a major uproar in the UK.^[18]

Profanity[link]

Profane words and expressions in the English language are commonly taken from three areas: religion, excretion, and sex. Racism and sexism are a growing influence on profanities. While profanities themselves have been around for centuries, their limited use in public and by the media has only slowly become socially acceptable, and there are still many expressions that are out of place in polite conversation. One influence on the current tolerance of such language may be the frequency of its use on prime-time television. The word damn (and most other religious profanity in the English language) has long lost its shock value, and as a consequence, bowdlerizations of it (e.g., dang, darn-it) have taken on a very stodgy feeling. Euphemisms for male masturbation such as "spanking the monkey" or "choke the chicken" are used often among some people to avoid embarrassment in public.^{[citation needed]} Excretory profanity such as piss and shit in some cases may be acceptable among informal^{[citation needed]} friends (while they are almost never acceptable in formal relationships or public use); euphemisms such as Number One and Number Two may be preferred for use with children.^{[citation needed]} Most sexual terms and expressions, even technical ones, either remain unacceptable for general use or have undergone radical rehabilitation.^{[citation needed]}

Religion[link]

Euphemisms for deities as well as for religious practices and artifacts have been recorded since the earliest writings. Protection of sacred names, rituals, and concepts from the uninitiated has always given rise to euphemisms, whether it be for exclusion of outsiders or the retention of power among the select. Examples from the Egyptians and every other Western religion abound.

Euphemisms for God and Jesus, such as gosh and gee, are used by Christians to avoid taking the name of God in a vain oath, which would violate one of the Ten Commandments. (Exodus 20)

Jews consider the tetragrammaton—YHWH, the four-letter name of God as written in the Torah—to be of such great holiness that it was never to be pronounced as spelled, except in the Temple by the High Priest on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the year. [Aryeh Kaplan, Meditation and Kabballa p. 134] (The pronunciation used in the Temple has been forgotten.) At all other times, when praying or reading from scripture, Jews say the word Adonai ("my Lords") in place of the letters. However, outside of prayer and scriptural contexts, traditional Jews will not pronounce the name Adonai, but replace it, typically with the word HaShem, which literally means, "The Name". The other name of God frequently used in the bible, Elohim (אלוהים)—"Powers"—is also not pronounced as written except in formal, religious use; in other contexts, devout Jews typically change one of its letters to Elokim (אלוקים). Other names of God used in Jewish speech and writing, such as HaMakom (המקום)—"The Place"—or 'HaKadosh Baruch Hu' (הקדוש ברוך הוא) "The Holy One, Blessed is he" can be pronounced in any context. Whether they originated as euphemisms is not clear, but they are used as such, although they are also used in formal prayer. The respect Jews show for the name of God has created, and continues to create, written euphemisms in English. That is, Orthodox Jews usually will not write out the word "God", but instead spell it "G-d." Recently, some have begun making a similar change to the spelling of the euphemism haShem (discussed above). It is written "haSh-m."

Euphemisms for hell, damnation, and the devil, on the other hand, are often used to avoid invoking the power or drawing the attention of the adversary. The most famous in the latter category is the expression what the dickens and its variants, which does not refer to the famed British writer but instead was a popular euphemism for Satan in its time. In questions, "what the hell" may be replaced by "what the heck", and in directive speech "get the hell out" is sometimes replaced by "get the heck out".

In times past, profanity relating to Jesus' body were sometimes used, such as "God's Wounds!" By the time of Chaucer, this was reduced to "'swounds"—as spoken by characters such as the Miller—and since then has worked its way into common language as "zounds," a term now considered too stodgy to be any kind of curse. Yet the same Medieval notions may continue intact in other languages, for example rany boskie (literally "God's wounds"), an extremely common mild curse in modern Polish.

Excretion[link]

The abbreviation BS, or the word bull, often replaces the word bullshit in polite society. (The term bullshit itself generally means lies or nonsense, and not the literal "shit of a bull", making it a dysphemism.)

What is currently known as a toilet, has been known by a number of previous euphemisms "..The Honest Jakes or Privy has graduated via Offices to the final horror of Toilet..."^[19] There are any number of lengthier periphrases for excretion used to excuse oneself from company, such as to powder one's nose, to see a man about a dog (or horse), etc. In the Bible, to cover one's feet referred to excretion.^{[citation needed]}

Sex[link]

The Latin term pudendum and the Greek term αιδοίον (aidoion) for the genitals literally mean "shameful thing". Groin, crotch, and loins refer to a larger region of the body, but are euphemistic when used to refer to the genitals. The word masturbate is derived from Latin, the word manus meaning hand and the word sturbare meaning to defile. In pornographic stories, the words rosebud and starfish are often used as euphemisms for anus, generally in the context of anal sex.

Sexual intercourse was once a euphemism derived from the more general term intercourse by itself, which simply meant "meeting" but now is normally used as a synonym for the longer phrase, thus making the town of Intercourse, Pennsylvania, a subject of jokes in modern usage.

The "baseball metaphors for sex" are perhaps the most famous and widely-used set of polite euphemisms for sex and relationship behavior in the U.S. The metaphors encompass terms like "hitting it off" for a good start to relationship, "Striking out" for being unlucky with a love interest, and "running the bases" for progressing sexually in a relationship. The "bases" themselves, from first to third, stand for various levels of sexual activity from French kissing to "petting", itself a euphemism for manual genital stimulation, all of which is short of "scoring" or "coming home", sexual intercourse. "Hitting a home run" describes sex during the first date, "batting both ways" (also "switch-hitting") or "batting for the other team" describes bisexuality or homosexuality respectively, and "stealing bases" refers to initiating new levels of sexual contact without invitation. Baseball-related euphemisms also abound for the "equipment"; "Bat and balls" are a common reference to the male genitalia, while "glove" or "mitt" can refer to the female anatomy. Among gay men, "pitcher" is sometimes used to mean a "top", while "catcher" means a "bottom".

There are many euphemisms for birth control devices, sometimes even propagated by the manufacturers: Condoms are known as "rubbers", "sheaths", "love gloves", "diving suits", "raincoats", "French letters", "Jimmy Caps", "Johnnies" (in Ireland and to a lesser degree Britain) etc.

Euphemisms are also common in reference to sexual orientations and lifestyles. For example in the movie Closer, the character played by Jude Law uses the euphemism "He valued his privacy" for being gay. Other examples are being a 'lover of musical theatre' or a 'confirmed bachelor'. The term 'confirmed bachelor' originally referred to a man who had "sworn off" traditional relationships for reasons unrelated to sexual orientation; such a person may today be known as a 'serial bachelor' if they remain sexually active, or a 'sexual hermit' if they abstain from romantic or sexual contact entirely.

As an aside, the use of euphemisms for sexual activity has grown under the pressure of recent rulings by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regarding what constitutes "decent" on-air broadcast speech. The FCC included many well known euphemisms in its lists of banned terms but indicated that even new and unknown coinages might be considered indecent once it became clear what they referenced. George Carlin's "Seven Words You Can't Say On TV" evolved into the "Incomplete List of Impolite Words", available in text and audio form, and contains hundreds of euphemisms and dysphemisms to genitalia, the act of having sex, various forms of sex, sexual orientations, etc. that have all become too pejorative for polite conversation, including such notables as "getting your pole varnished" and "eating the tuna taco".

Racism and sexism[link]

Racism and sexism are also common sources of profanity, and one of the few categories producing new profanities. One example is bitch, a slur often used for women, while nigger, a slur for black people, was not considered a profanity at all as recently as the 1950s. Such profanities are often re-appropriated by the group targeted and marginalized, and used as a way of reversing the negative stigma associated with the word. For example, some African-Americans will often call each other nigga.

Profanity itself[link]

In the Spanish language, the word maldición, literally meaning "a curse" or an evil spell, is occasionally used as an interjection of lament or anger, but not necessarily to replace any of several Spanish profanities that would otherwise be used in that same context. The same is true in Italian with the word maledizione and in Portuguese with the word maldição.

In Greek, the word κατάρα "curse" is found, although βρισιά, from ύβρις (hubris) is more commonly used, and in English, an exclamation that is used in a similar style is curses, although it is these days less common. The stereotyped "Perils of Pauline" silent film might have the villain tying his victim to a railroad track. When the hero rescues the heroine, the card might say, "Curses! Foiled again!" in place of whatever cursing the character presumably uttered.

The English language phrase "Pardon my French" is also sometimes used as a euphemism for profanity.

In Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, swear words are replaced by the words "unprintable" and "obscenity", even though the characters are actually speaking Spanish that has been translated into English for the reader (in Spanish, foul language is used freely even when its equivalent is censored in English). These replacements were not performed at the publisher's behest, but instead by Hemingway's choice.

In Wes Anderson's film Fantastic Mr. Fox, the replacement of swear words by the word "cuss" became a humorous motif throughout the film.

Death and murder[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

The English language contains numerous euphemisms related to dying, death, burial, and the people and places that deal with death. The practice of using euphemisms for death is likely to have originated with the magical belief that to speak the word "death" was to invite death; where to "draw Death's attention" is the ultimate bad fortune — a common theory holds that death is a taboo subject in most English-speaking cultures for precisely this reason. It may be said that one is not dying, but fading quickly because the end is near. People who have died are referred to as having passed away or passed or departed. Kick the bucket seems innocuous until one considers an explanation that has been proposed for the idiom: that a suicidal hanging victim must kick the bucket out from under his own feet during his suicide. Deceased is a euphemism for "dead", and sometimes the deceased is said to have gone to a better place, but this is used primarily among the religious with a concept of Heaven. Was taken to Jesus implies salvation specifically for Christians, but met his Maker may imply some judgment, content implied or unknown, by God. In the Bible, especially in the books of Kings and Chronicles, a deceased king is said to have "slept [or rested] with his fathers" if he received a proper burial.

Some Christians often use phrases such as gone to be with the Lord or called to higher service (this latter expression being particularly prevalent in the Salvation Army along with "promoted to glory") or "graduated" to express their belief that physical death is not the end, but the beginning of the fuller realization of redemption.

Orthodox Christians often use the euphemism fallen asleep or fallen asleep in the Lord, which reflects Orthodox beliefs concerning death and resurrection. Greeks in particular are apt to refer to the deceased as "the blessed", "the forgiven", or "the absolved" ones, in the belief that the dead person will be counted among the faithful at the Last Judgement.

The dead body entices many euphemisms, some polite and some profane, as well as dysphemisms such as worm food, dead meat, or simply a stiff. Modern rhyming slang contains the expression brown bread. The corpse was once referred to as the shroud (or house or tenement) of clay, and modern funerary workers use terms such as the loved one (title of a novel about Hollywood undertakers by Evelyn Waugh) or the dear departed. (They themselves have given up the euphemism funeral director for grief therapist, and hold arrangement conferences with relatives.) Among themselves, mortuary technicians often refer to the corpse as the client. A recently dead person may be referred to as "the late John Doe". The term cemetery for "graveyard" is a borrowing from Greek, where it was a euphemism, literally meaning 'sleeping place'. The term undertaker (for the person responsible for the preparation of a body for burial) is so well-established that some people do not recognize it as a euphemism, since giving way to the more scientific-sounding euphemism mortician and yet further euphemisms.

Someone who has died is said to have passed on, checked out, cashed in their chips, bit the big one, kicked the bucket, keeled over, bit the dust, popped their clogs, pegged it, carked it, was snuffed out, turned their toes up, hopped the twig, bought the farm, got zapped, wrote their epitaph, fell off their perch, croaked, gave up the ghost (originally a more respectful term, cf. the death of Jesus as translated in the King James Version of the Bible Mark 15:37), gone south, gone west, gone to California, shuffled off this mortal coil (from William Shakespeare's Hamlet), run down the curtain and joined the Choir Invisible, or assumed room temperature (actually a dysphemism in use among mortuary technicians). When buried, they may be said to be pushing up daisies, sleeping the big sleep, taking a dirt nap, gone into the fertilizing business, checking out the grass from underneath or six feet under. There are hundreds of such expressions in use. (Old Burma-Shave jingle: "If daisies are your favorite flower, keep pushin’ up those miles per hour!") In Edwin Muir's 'The Horses' a euphemism is used to show the elimination of the human race 'The seven days war that put the world to sleep.'

The "Dead Parrot" sketch from Monty Python's Flying Circus contains an extensive list of euphemisms for death, including many cited above, referring to the deceased parrot that the character played by John Cleese had purchased. The popularity of the sketch has itself increased the popularity of some of these euphemisms — indeed, it has introduced another euphemism for death, "pining for the fjords" (since it was a Norwegian parrot) — although in the sketch that phrase was used by the shop owner to assert that the parrot was not dead, but was merely quiet and contemplative.

Euthanasia also attracts euphemisms. One may put one out of one's misery, put one to sleep, or have one put down, the latter two phrases being used primarily with dogs, cats, and horses who are being or have been euthanized by a veterinarian. (These terms are not usually applied to humans, because both medical ethics and law deprecate euthanasia.) In fact, Dr. Bernard Nathanson has pointed out that the word "euthanasia" itself is a euphemism, being Greek for "good death."

Some euphemisms for killing are neither respectful nor playful, but instead clinical and detached, including terminate, wet work, to take care of one, to do them in, to off, or to take them out. To cut loose or open up on someone or something means "to shoot at with every available weapon". Gangland euphemisms for murder include ventilate, whack, rub out, liquidate, cut down, hit, take him for a ride, string him up, cut down to size, or "put him in cement boots," "sleep with the fishes" or "put him in a concrete overcoat," the latter three implying disposal in deep water, if then alive by drowning; the arrangement for a killing may be a simple "contract" with the victim referred to as the "client," which suggests a normal transaction of business.

One of the most infamous euphemisms in history was the German term Endlösung, frequently translated in English as "the Final Solution", a systematic plan for genocide of the Jews. This was, in turn, an extension of the concept of eugenics, a euphemism for the neutering and killing various people who are deformed, social misfits, or members of racial groups deemed undesirable to the Nazi Party.

Some dysphemisms, especially for death are euphemisms or dysphemisms for other unpleasant events and thus are unpleasant in their literal meaning, used to generalize a bad event. "Having your ass handed to you," "left for the rats," "toasted," "roasted," "burned," "pounded", "bent over the barrel," "screwed over," or other terms commonly describe death or the state of imminent death, but also are common in describing defeat of any kind such as a humiliating loss in a sport or video game, being unfairly treated or cast aside in business affairs, being badly beaten in a fight, and similar.

Such an execution device as the electric chair has been known as "Old Sparky" or "Yellow Mama," and the device that delivers lethal chemicals to the condemned in a lethal injection is reduced to "the needle."

To terminate with prejudice generally means to end one's employment without possibility of rehire (as opposed to lay off, where the person can expect rehire if business picks up), but the related phrase "terminate with extreme prejudice" now usually means to kill. The adjective extreme may occasionally be omitted. In a famous line from the movie Apocalypse Now, Captain Willard is told to terminate Colonel Kurtz's commission "with extreme prejudice". An acronym, TWEP has been coined from this phrase, which can be used as a verb: "He was TWEPed/TWEPped."

In a passage near the beginning of The Twelve Chairs, Bezenchuk, an undertaker, astonishes Vorobyaninov with his classification of people by the euphemisms used to speak of their deaths.

The game Dungeon Siege contains many euphemisms for death. Likewise the video game Secret of Mana uses the phrase sees the reaper to mean death.

A scene in the film Patch Adams features Patch (Robin Williams) dressed in an angel costume, reading out various synonyms and euphemisms for the phrase "to die" to a man dying of cancer. This evolves into a contest between the two men to see who can come up with more, and better, euphemisms, ending when Patch comes up with "and if we bury you ass up, we'll have a place to park my bike."

Warfare[link]

The last time the United States Congress passed a bill with the title "Declaration of War" was in 1942, when the U.S. declared war on Romania.^{[citation needed]} Since then, various euphemisms have been employed:

The renaming of war department as defence department in the post-World War II era in various countries is itself a euphemism, as pointed out by George Orwell (who portrays a Ministry of Peace or minipax in a state at perpetual war in 1984).

In job titles[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

Euphemisms are common in job titles; some jobs have complicated titles that make them sound more impressive than the common names would imply, such as CPA in place of car parking attendant. Many of these euphemisms may include words such as engineer, although in fact the people who do the job are not accredited in engineering, manager for an employee without subordinates, or even a combination thereof. Extreme cases, such as sanitation engineer for janitor, or 'transparent-wall maintenance officer' for window cleaner, are cited humorously more often than they are used seriously. Less extreme cases, such as custodian for janitor or administrative assistant for secretary, are considered more terms of respect than euphemisms. Where the work itself is seen as distasteful, a euphemism may be used, for example "rodent officer" for a rat-catcher, or "cemetery operative" for a gravedigger. From the inter-force rivalry of the US military comes "High-Velocity Projectile Interceptor" as a description of the mission of an infantry soldier, usually spoken by someone of a non-infantry branch like the Air Force.

Doublespeak[link]

Doublespeak, often incorrectly assumed to originate from George Orwell's novel 1984 (erroneously combining Orwell's "newspeak" and "doublethink"), is language deliberately constructed to disguise or distort its actual meaning, often resulting in a communication bypass. What distinguishes doublespeak from other euphemisms is its deliberate usage. Doublespeak may be in the form of bald euphemisms such as "downsizing" or "rightsizing" for "firing of many employees"; or deliberately ambiguous phrases such as "wet work" for "assassination" and "take out" for "destroy".

Common examples[link]

Other common euphemisms include:

Euphemisms	Meaning
light in the loafers, confirmed bachelor, rides the bus	male homosexuality
abattoir	slaughterhouse
acting like rabbits, making love to, getting it on, screwing, doing it, making the beast with two backs, sleeping with	having sex with
adult entertainment, adult material, gentlemens's special interest literature	pornography
bathroom tissue, t.p., bath tissue	toilet paper (usually used by toilet paper manufacturers)
bias crime	hate crime (used by the New York Times to describe the Rutgers University/Tyler Clementi case.)
big, curvy, fluffy, zaftig, plus-sized, thick-boned, full-figured, heavy-set, Rubenesque	overweight, fat, obese
chemical dependency	drug addiction (though these technically describe distinct conditions)
co-morbidity	simultaneous existence of related mental and physical health issues (when morbidity is used as a medical term for illness), although in the regular medical use of this term it simply means the presence of one or more mental or physical diseases apart from the primary one and as such is not a euphemism.[24]
correctional facility	prison
custodian, caretaker	janitor (Also originally a euphemism — in Latin, it means doorman. In the British Secret Service, it may still carry the ancient meaning. It does in the novels of John le Carré.)
economically depressed neighborhood, culturally-deprived environment, inner city	ghetto, slum
enhanced interrogation	torture[25]
escort, service provider	callgirl, sex worker - often used in a context where 'johns' become "clients" and 'tricks' become "sessions" or "appointments" like those conducted by professionals in various other fields.
euthanasia	killing of healthy animals in animal shelters for a variety of reasons ranging from temperament to shelter overcrowding
feminine protection	tampon
gaming	gambling
gender-based violence	rape or sexual assault
gentlemen's club	go-go bar, strip club
hardware key, hardware token, security device	dongle
holiday tree, winter tree, tree	Christmas tree
in the family way	pregnant
it's snowin' down south	your slip is showing
lost their lives	were killed
mature, senior citizen, golden ager, been around the block	old, elderly
been around the block	having had much sexual experience
"I misspoke," bend the truth, white lie, fudge, colour the truth, be economical with the truth, dissemble, political spin, unreliable	lied, lie
motivation	bribe or coercion
peer homework help, comparing answers, collaborating, harvesting answers	cheating
persuasion or interrogation	torture[26]
a little persuasion	enormous physical force, as with a blow from a sledgehammer
pre-owned, pre-loved	used or second hand goods, such as automobiles
products of pregnancy	fetus (in the context of abortion)
mentally challenged, intellectually challenged, a few sandwiches short of a picnic	stupid, dim, dull, slow; of subnormal intelligence
reputational management	the use by lawyers of a strategic lawsuit against public participation or threats of vexatious litigation to silence public complaints or criticism
ride the short bus	learning disability requiring remedial or special education - see Short bus (disambiguation)
restroom, washroom, powder room (for women)	toilet room
replacement workers	scabs or strikebreakers brought into a labour dispute
sanitary landfill	garbage dump (and a temporary garbage dump is a transfer station), also often called a Civic Amenity in the UK
sanitary napkin	maxipad
sanatorium	lunatic asylum
sanitation worker (or, sarcastically, sanitation officer or sanitation engineer)	bin man, garbage man
"she's in the club"	she's pregnant, chiefly British
State Electrician	executioner in cases where an electric chair is used
take legal action	sue
the big C	cancer (in addition, some people whisper the word when they say it in public, and doctors euphemistically use technical terminology when discussing cancer in front of patients, e.g., "c.a." or "neoplasia"/"neoplastic process", "carcinoma" for "tumor"); euphemisms for cancer are used even more so in the Netherlands, because the Dutch word for cancer can be used as a curse word
the north of Ireland	Northern Ireland (seen by many Irish people as a term imposed by the British and therefore a profanity; however, saying the north of Ireland may be primarily a way of identifying oneself with the Irish Nationalist cause, rather than a euphemism)
the Scottish Play	Shakespeare's Macbeth
to cut excesses (in a budget), rightsize, downsize, let go	Lay off
being paid (off)', dismissal'	fired or sacked
water pollution control plant	sewage treatment facility
wellness	benefits and treatments that tend to only be used in times of sickness
women wearing comfortable shoes	female homosexuality (used on-air by Robin Williams as announcer in Good Morning Vietnam)
comfort station	Brothel, or alternatively, Toilet
a little thin on top	bald
we are looking forward to settlement of the account	you owe us money
exotic dancer	stripper
visit from the stork	give birth

These lists might suggest that most euphemisms are well-known expressions. Often euphemisms can be somewhat situational; what might be used as a euphemism in a conversation between two friends might make no sense to a third person. In this case, the euphemism is being used as a type of innuendo. At other times, the euphemism is common in some circles (such as the medical field) but not others, becoming a type of jargon or, in underworld situations especially, argot. One such example is the line "put him in bed with the captain's daughter" from the popular sea shanty Drunken Sailor, which means to give a whipping with the cat o' nine tails—euphemistically referred to by sailors as the "captain's daughter".

Euphemisms can also be used by governments to rename statutes to use a less offensive expression. For example, in Ontario, Canada, the "Disabled Person Parking Permit" was renamed to the "Accessible Parking Permit" in 2007.^[27]

The word euphemism itself can be used as a euphemism. In the animated short It's Grinch Night (See Dr. Seuss), a child asks to go to the euphemism, where euphemism is being used as a euphemism for outhouse. This euphemistic use of "euphemism" also occurred in the play Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? where a character requests, "Martha, will you show her where we keep the, uh, euphemism?" It is analogous to the 19th-century use of unmentionables for underpants.

Also, lots of euphemisms are used in the improvised television show, Whose Line Is It Anyway?. They are used often in the game 'If You Know What I Mean', where players are given a scene and have to use as many obscure clichés and euphemisms as possible.

See also[link]

For a list of words relating to euphemisms, see the Euphemisms category of words in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Look up euphemism in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article Euphemism.

• Allusion
• Code word (figure of speech)
• Dead Parrot sketch
• Distancing language
• Double entendre
• Dysphemism
• Framing (social sciences)
• Minimisation
• Polite fiction
• Political correctness
• Pun
• Sexual slang
• Slander and libel
• Spin (public relations)
• Thomas Bowdler
• Word play

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Keith Allan., Burridge, Kate. Euphemism & Dysphemism: Language Used As Shield and Weapon, Oxford University Press, 1991. ISBN 0-7351-0288-0.
• Benveniste, Émile, "Euphémismes anciens and modernes", in: Problèmes de linguistique générale, vol. 1, pp. 308–314. [originally published in: Die Sprache, I (1949), pp. 116–122].
• Enright, D.J. (1986). Fair of Speech. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-283060-0. 
• R.W.Holder: How Not to Say What You Mean: A Dictionary of Euphemisms, Oxford University Press, 501 pages, 2003. ISBN 0-19-860762-8.
• Keyes, Ralph (2010). Euphemania: Our Love Affair with Euphemisms. Little, Brown and Company. ISBN 978-0-316-05656-4. 
• Maledicta: The International Journal of Verbal Aggression (ISSN US).
• McGlone, M.S., Beck, G., & Pfiester, R.A. (2006). Contamination and camouflage in euphemisms. Communication Monographs, 73, 261-282.
• Rawson, Hugh (1995). A Dictionary of Euphemism & Other Doublespeak (second ed.). ISBN 0-517-70201-0. 
• Smyth, Herbert Weir (1920). Greek Grammar. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press. p. 678. ISBN 0-674-36250-0. 

v t e Propaganda techniques Ad hominem · Bandwagon effect · Big Lie · Blood libel · Buzzword · Card stacking · Censorship · Code word · Dog-whistle politics · Doublespeak · Euphemism · Framing · Glittering generality · Historical revisionism · Ideograph · Indoctrination · Lawfare · Lesser of two evils principle · Limited hangout · Loaded language · Loosely associated statements · Newspeak · Obscurantism · Plain folks · Public relations · Slogan · Spin · Weasel word

Bill Maher
Maher at a ceremony to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in September 2010
Birth name	William Maher, Jr.
Born	(1956-01-20) January 20, 1956 (age 56) New York, New York, U.S.
Medium	Stand-up, television, film, books
Nationality	American
Years active	1979–present
Genres	Satire, Political satire, News satire, Observational comedy
Subject(s)	American politics, current events, American culture, pop culture, freedom of speech, environmentalism, religion, human sexuality, recreational drug use, libertarianism, American liberalism, American conservatism
Influences	Steve Allen, George Carlin, Johnny Carson, David Frost, Robert Klein, Don Rickles, Gore Vidal, Lenny Bruce
Notable works and roles	Elliot on Charlie Hoover Host of Politically Incorrect Host of Real Time with Bill Maher Religulous
Website	BillMaher.com

William "Bill" Maher, Jr. ( /ˈmɑːr/; born January 20, 1956) is an American stand-up comedian, television host, political commentator, author, and actor. Before his current role as the host of HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher, Maher hosted a similar late-night talk show called Politically Incorrect originally on Comedy Central and later on ABC.

Maher is known for his political satire and sociopolitical commentary, which targets a wide swath of topics including religion, politics, bureaucracies of many kinds, political correctness, the mass media, greed among people and persons in positions of high political and social power, and the lack of intellectual curiosity in the electorate.^[1] He supports the legalization of marijuana and same-sex marriage, and serves on the board of PETA.^[2] He is also a critic of religion and is an advisory board member of Project Reason, a foundation to promote scientific knowledge and secular values within society.^[3] In 2005, Maher ranked at number 38 on Comedy Central's 100 greatest stand-up comedians of all time.^[4] Bill Maher received a Hollywood Walk of Fame star on September 14, 2010.^[5]

Early life and education[link]

Maher was born in New York City, the son of Julie (née Berman), a nurse, and William Maher, Sr., a network news editor and radio announcer.^[6] He was raised in his Irish American father's Catholic religion, remaining unaware that his mother was Jewish until his early teenage years.^{[7][8][9][10]} Due to Maher's father's disagreement with the Catholic Church's position on birth control, he stopped taking Maher and his sister to Catholic church services when Maher was thirteen.^[11]

Maher was raised in River Vale, New Jersey, and graduated from Pascack Hills High School in Montvale in 1974. He received a B.A. in English and history from Cornell University in 1978.^[12]

Early career[link]

Maher began his career as a stand-up comedian and actor. He was host of the New York City comedy club Catch a Rising Star in 1979. Thanks to Steve Allen, he began appearing on Johnny Carson's and David Letterman's shows in 1982. He made limited television appearances including a recurring role in Sara (1985), appeared in Max Headroom (1987), two separate appearances on Murder, She Wrote (1989, 1990), a recurring role in Charlie Hoover (1991) and other productions. He has also appeared in several films, usually in a comic role. His feature film debut was in D.C. Cab (1983), and he also appeared in Ratboy (1986) Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death (1988) and Pizza Man (1991), among others.

Television career[link]

[edit] Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher

Maher assumed the host role Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher, a late-night political talk show that ran on Comedy Central from 1993 to 1997 and on ABC from 1997 to 2002. The show regularly began with a topical monologue by Maher preceding the introduction of four guests, usually a diverse group of individuals from show business, popular culture, political pundits, political consultants, authors, and occasionally news figures. The group would discuss topical issues selected by Maher, who also participated in the discussions.^[13] Jerry Seinfeld, a regular guest on the show, stated that Politically Incorrect reminded him of talk shows from the 1950s and 60s "when guests interacted with each other as much as with the host."^[14]

Politically Incorrect won an array of awards, including an Emmy Award for Outstanding Technical Direction, two CableACE awards for Best Talk Show Series, and a Genesis Award for Best Television Talk Show. Maher earned numerous award nominations for his producing, writing and hosting of Politically Incorrect, including ten Emmy nominations, two TV Guide nominations, and two Writers Guild nominations. ABC decided against renewing Maher's contract for Politically Incorrect in 2002, after he made a controversial on-air remark shortly after the September 11 attacks.^[15] He agreed with his guest, conservative pundit Dinesh D'Souza, that the 9/11 terrorists did not act in a cowardly manner (in rebuttal to President Bush's statement calling 9/11 hijackers cowards). Maher said, "We have been the cowards. Lobbing cruise missiles from two thousand miles away. That's cowardly. Staying in the airplane when it hits the building. Say what you want about it. Not cowardly. You're right." Maher later clarified that his comment was not anti-military in any way whatsoever, referencing his well-documented longstanding support for the American military.^[16][17][18]

In the context of the attacks, some corporate advertisers found the comment too insensitive and controversial. Several companies, including FedEx and Sears Roebuck, pulled their advertisements from the show, costing the show more than it returned.

The show was cancelled on June 16, 2002, and the Sinclair Broadcast Group had dropped the show from its ABC-affiliated stations months prior. On June 22, 2002, just six days after the cancellation of Politically Incorrect, Maher received the Los Angeles Press Club president's award (for "championing free speech"). Maher was on the board of judges one year for the PEN/Newman's Own First Amendment Award.

Maher's remarks after 9/11 were not the first time he had sparked controversy on Politically Incorrect. In the same year, Maher was widely criticized for comparing dogs to retarded children. He apologized for his comments.^[19]

[edit] Real Time with Bill Maher

In 2003, Maher became the host, co-producer and co-writer of Real Time with Bill Maher, a weekly hour-long political comedy talk show on the cable television network HBO. During an interview, Maher told Terry Gross (on NPR's Fresh Air) that he much prefers having serious and well-informed guests on his program, as opposed to the random celebrities that fleshed out his roundtable discussions on Politically Incorrect.^[20]

As with his previous show, Politically Incorrect, Maher begins Real Time with a comic opening monologue based upon current events and other topical issues. He proceeds to a one-on-one interview with a guest, either in-studio or via satellite. Following the interview, Maher sits with three panelists, usually consisting of pundits, authors, activists and journalists, for a discussion of the week's events. In the segment "New Rules" at the end of each show, Maher delivers a humorous editorial on popular culture and American politics.

In late May 2005, Alabama Congressman Spencer Bachus sent a letter to Time Warner's board of directors requesting Real Time be cancelled after remarks Maher made after noting the military had missed its recruiting goals by 42 percent. Bachus said he felt the comments were demeaning to the military and treasonous. Maher stated his highest regard and support for the troops and asked why the congressman criticized him instead of doing something about the recruitment problem.^[21]

Real Time has earned widespread praise. It has been nominated for more than ten Primetime Emmy Awards and six Writer's Guild awards. In 2007, Maher and his co-producers were awarded the Television Producer of the Year Award in Variety Television by the Producers Guild of America.^[22] Maher holds the record for the most Emmy nominations without a win, having been nominated on 22 occasions and not winning once. Eleven of the nominations were for Politically Incorrect, while nine were for Real Time. The other two were nominations for two of his HBO comedy specials: Bill Maher: I'm Swiss and Bill Maher: The Decider.^[23]

HBO announced in July 2011 the show was renewed for a tenth season.^[24]

Christine O'Donnell[link]

On September 17, 2010, Maher aired a clip of Delaware Republican Senatorial candidate Christine O'Donnell from the October 29, 1999 episode of his old show Politically Incorrect on his current show Real Time with Bill Maher,^[25][26] where she discussed that she had "dabbled in witchcraft." This was one of the most notable of numerous controversial statements by O'Donnell that made her the most covered candidate in the 2010 mid-term election cycle.^[27][28]

Political commentator[link]

Maher is a frequent commentator on various cable news networks, namely CNN, MSNBC, and HLN. Maher has regularly appeared on CNN's The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer^[29] and has also been a frequent guest on MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews,^[30] The Rachel Maddow Show^[31] and Countdown with Keith Olbermann.^[32] Maher has also appeared as a guest on HLN's The Joy Behar Show.^[33]

Maher hosted the January 13, 2006 edition of Larry King Live, on which he was a frequent guest. Maher appeared as a special guest on the June 29, 2010 edition of the show, on which CNN anchor Larry King announced his retirement.^[34] Maher co-emceed the final show of Larry King Live on December 16, 2010 with Ryan Seacrest.^[35]

Since May 2005, he has been a contributing blogger at The Huffington Post.

Views and beliefs[link]

Politics[link]

Maher and Ingrid Newkirk, founder of PETA. Maher is on the board of directors of the animal rights group.

Maher eschews political labels, referring to himself as "practical".^[36] In the past, he has described himself as a libertarian and has also referred to himself "as a progressive, as a sane person".^[37][38]

Maher favors a partial privatization of Social Security, ending corporate welfare and federal funding of non-profits, and legalization of gambling, prostitution, and marijuana. Maher is a member of the advisory boards for both the NORML and Marijuana Policy Project, organizations which support regulated legalization of marijuana.^[39][40] He describes himself as an environmentalist, and he has spoken in favor of the Kyoto treaty on global warming on his show Real Time. He often criticizes industry figures involved in environmental pollution.^[41]

Maher is a board member of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Before the 2004 U.S. presidential election, Maher became candid in his stated opposition to the re-election of George W. Bush and in his support for John Kerry.^[42]

Known for protesting against the demonization of the word "liberal", during the campaign Maher criticized Kerry for being ashamed of the word. On his show, the comedian has noted the paradox of people claiming they distrusted "elite" politicians while at the same time wanting elite doctors to treat them and elite lawyers to represent them in court.^[43] Maher supports the death penalty. Since the 9/11 attacks, he has endorsed the use of racial profiling at airports.^[44]

He was originally against the Iraq War, and has summarized his opinion by saying that the United States and the world have had to pay too high a price for the war. He is skeptical of Iraq surviving without civil war.^[45]

In the 2008 U.S. presidential election, Maher announced his support for Barack Obama.^[46] Although Maher welcomed Obama's electoral victory, he has subjected him to criticism once in office for not acting boldly on health care reform and other progressive issues.^[47]

On February 23, 2012, after his 'Crazy Stupid Politics' special streamed on Yahoo! Screen, Maher announced that he was contributing $1 million to Priorities USA, the Obama SuperPAC.^[48][49]

Religion[link]

Maher is highly critical of religion, and views it as not worth the bother. He has referred to himself as an apatheist - a pragmatic atheist - on Scarborough Country on April 24, 2007, and again in July 2011.^[50][51] He has reiterated this stance in subsequent interviews, rejecting both the certitude of the existence, as well as the certitude of nonexistence of deities, concluding, "I'm saying that doubt is the only appropriate response for human beings."^[52] He is an advisory board member of author Sam Harris's Project Reason, a foundation that promotes scientific knowledge and secular values within society.

Maher and director Larry Charles teamed up to make the feature film Religulous (2008), described by trade publication Variety as a documentary "that spoofs religious extremism across the world." It was released on October 3, 2008.^[53][54]

While Maher is critical towards Christianity, he is an outspoken critic of religion as a whole, including Islam. On October 29, 2010, during a Real Time segment, Maher commented on a news story saying that the name Mohammed had become the most popular baby name in the United Kingdom. He asked, "Am I a racist to feel alarmed by that? Because I am. And it’s not because of the race, it’s because of the religion. I don’t have to apologize, do I, for not wanting the Western world to be taken over by Islam in 300 years? Sharia law is being institutionalized in England? Well, then I am right, I should be alarmed."^[55] He later defended his comments on CNN, saying, "And when I say Westerner, I mean someone who believes in the values that Western people believe in that a lot of the Muslim world does not. Like separation of church and state. Like equality of the sexes. Like respect for minorities, free elections, free speech, freedom to gather. These things are not just different from cultures that don’t have them. ... It’s better. ... I would like to keep those values here." ^[56]

Maher received the Richard Dawkins Award for 2009 from Atheist Alliance International "for his efforts to further the values science and reason in the world."^[57]

Maher was ranked first by MormonVoices, a group associated with Foundation for Apologetic Information & Research, on its Top Ten Anti-Mormon Statements of 2011 list for saying "By any standard, Mormonism is more ridiculous than any other religion".^[58]

Health care[link]

Maher has stated that the AMA is a powerful lobbying group and one of the primary reasons why the United States had failed to enact health care reform.^{[59][dead link][60]}

On August 24, 2009, Maher was a guest on The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien. On the topic of getting health care reform legislation passed, Maher stated that Obama should forget about trying to get 60 votes for it, "he only needs 51." "Forget getting the sixty votes or sixty percent — sixty percent of people don't believe in evolution in this country — he just needs to drag them to it, like I said, they're stupid; get health care done, with or without them."^[61]

Maher has expressed the view that most illness is generally the result of poor diet and lack of exercise, and that medicine is often not the best way of addressing illness. In an episode of his show about the 2008 presidential candidates' health plans, Maher stated that poor nutrition is a primary cause of illness, and that "the answer isn't another pill."^[62] He also has said:" If you believe you need to take all the pills the pharmaceutical industry says you do, then you're already on drugs!"^[63]

He has expressed his distaste for the pharmaceutical and health care industries in general, on the grounds that they make their money out of curing people who are made sick by consuming unhealthy food that corporations urge upon the public. He maintains that mass consumption of high-fructose corn syrup is a contributor to the rise in frequency of obesity in the United States.^[64]

In a discussion with Michael Moore about the film Sicko, Maher said, "The human body is pretty amazing; it doesn't get sick, usually, for no reason. I mean, there's some genetic stuff that can get to you, but, basically, people are sick in this country because they're poisoned. The environment is a poisoning factor, but also, we gotta say, they poison themselves. They eat shit. People eat shit, and that's, to my way of thinking, about 90 percent of why people are sick, is because they eat shit. Would you agree?"^[65]

On October 9, 2009, on his HBO show, Maher debated the effectiveness of flu vaccinations with Bill Frist and stated, "Why would you let them be the ones to stick a disease into your arm? I would never get a swine flu vaccine or any vaccine. I don’t trust the government, especially with my health." Maher also expressed skepticism about the seriousness of the swine flu and whether completely healthy people could die from it. His comments have generated criticism, and his remarks have been called unscientific and even harmful.^[66]

Maher responded to the criticism, noting, "What I've read about what they think I'm saying is not what I've said. I'm not a germ theory denier. I believe vaccinations can work. Polio is a good example. Do I think in certain situations that inoculating Third World children against malaria or diphtheria, or whatever, is right? Of course. In a situation like that, the benefits outweigh costs. But to me living in Los Angeles? To get a flu shot? No."^[67]

He supports the current abortion laws and giving the terminally ill the right to assisted suicide.

Criticism of 9/11 conspiracy theories[link]

Maher has been a critic of 9/11 conspiracy theories. On October 19, 2007, Maher confronted several 9/11 truthers and had them ejected from his show audience after they interrupted the live show numerous times by calling out from the audience. The incident drew significant media attention and praise from Fox News talk show host and frequent critic John Gibson.^[68]

Personal life[link]

Maher has never married. In 2003, he began dating former Playboy Cyber Girl Coco Johnsen. In November 2004, at the end of their 17-month relationship, she sued him for USD $9 million for "pain and suffering" for alleged "insulting, humiliating and degrading racial comments." Her suit^[69] stated that Maher promised to marry her and father her children, support her financially, and purchase a Beverly Hills home. Her suit also alleged that she quit her job as a flight attendant and occasional model to be with him. Maher's lawyers in their response filed on November 23, 2004, in Los Angeles Superior Court said Maher is a "confirmed bachelor, and a very public one at that" who "never promised to marry [Johnsen] or to have children with her."^[70]

Maher's filing stated that, after the relationship had ended, Johnsen "launched a campaign to embarrass, humiliate, and extort ridiculous sums of money from Bill Maher." Johnsen accused another former boyfriend of rape and kidnapping in 1997, and the charges were later dismissed for lack of evidence.^[71] Her lawsuit against Maher was dismissed on May 2, 2005.

Maher next to his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in September 2010

Maher enjoys his bachelor status and states that he does not want to get married. On his website, he is quoted as saying, "I'm the last of my guy friends to have never gotten married, and their wives — they don't want them playing with me. I'm like the escaped slave — I bring news of freedom."^[72]

In 2005, he began dating Karrine Steffans, best-selling author and former hip hop model.^[73][74][75] When commentators suggested there was a pattern to his dating because both his girlfriend and former girlfriend were black, Maher said, "People say I'm into black women. Robert De Niro is into black women. I'm just into women who are real, and they happen to be black."^[74]

From 2009 to 2011, Maher dated the neuroscientist and science educator Cara Santa Maria.^[76]

Credits[link]

Bibliography[link]

• True Story : A Novel, 1994 (ISBN 0-7432-4251-3)
• Does Anybody Have a Problem With That? Politically Incorrect's Greatest Hits, 1996 (ISBN 0-679-45627-9)
• Does Anybody Have a Problem with That? The Best of Politically Incorrect, 1997 (ISBN 0-345-41281-8)
• When You Ride Alone You Ride With Bin Laden: What the Government Should Be Telling Us to Help Fight the War on Terrorism, 2003 (ISBN 1-893224-90-2)
• Keep the Statue of Liberty Closed: The New Rules, 2004 (ISBN 1-932407-47-2)
• New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer, 2005 (ISBN 1-59486-295-8)
• The New New Rules: A Funny Look at How Everybody but Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass, 2011 (ISBN 0-39915-841-3)

Filmography[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Bill Maher

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Bill Maher

• Official website
• Bill Maher on Twitter
• Bill Maher on Myspace
• Bill Maher at the Internet Movie Database
• Works by or about Bill Maher in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• Bill Maher on National Public Radio in 2004
• Appearances on C-SPAN
• Bill Maher on Charlie Rose
• HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" site
• 2006 Maher Interview with The A.V. Club
• 2009 Maher Interview with writers at the Religulous DVD release
• Bill Maher collected news and commentary at The New York Times