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#166731 - 03/12/07 01:30 PM Re: effete [Re: wwh]
klingsor Offline
stranger

Registered: 03/12/07
Posts: 1
In all the msgs here I did not once see the famous remark by Nixon's vice president Spiro Agnew who spoke in one of his diatribes against some political enemies about "effete snobs".

Since this happened a very long time ago, I don't recall if that was all there was to it, or if there was any more. Does anypne else remember this?

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#166784 - 03/13/07 03:55 PM Re: effete [Re: klingsor]
Zed Offline
Pooh-Bah

Registered: 08/27/02
Posts: 2031
Loc: British Columbia, Canada
Hi Klinsor, welcome aboard.
US politics isn't my forte but politics from anywhere remain a great source for insults.

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#186204 - 07/30/09 10:36 PM Re: effete [Re: tsuwm]
Shawn F. Offline
stranger

Registered: 07/30/09
Posts: 1
Loc: LA
I think the word that is being described is 'epicene'

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#186216 - 07/31/09 10:04 AM Re: effete [Re: Shawn F.]
zmjezhd Online content
Pooh-Bah

Registered: 08/13/05
Posts: 2270
Loc: R'lyeh
epicene

Epicene (< Latin epicoenus < Greek epikoinos 'common to many, promiscuous') originally meant 'having the characteristics of both genders (both in the sexual and grammatical sense), and effete, as tsuwm's post showed, meant infertile. In linguistics, epicene nouns are ones in which the male and female terms for animals are the same, not different. They are both roughly synonymous in English in the meaning 'an effeminate (man)'.

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#186240 - 08/01/09 02:28 AM Re: effete [Re: klingsor]
seapea Offline
stranger

Registered: 06/15/09
Posts: 13
Originally Posted By: klingsor
In all the msgs here I did not once see the famous remark by Nixon's vice president Spiro Agnew who spoke in one of his diatribes against some political enemies about "effete snobs".

Since this happened a very long time ago, I don't recall if that was all there was to it, or if there was any more. Does anypne else remember this?


"an effete corps of impudent snobs who characterize themselves as intellectuals." ~ S.T. Agnew (wiki search)

Gee, back then at least one Republican knew how to say what he meant. Today, none would dare use so many polysyllabic words.


Edited by seapea (08/01/09 02:29 AM)
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