Talk:Son of a gun

Dictionary

This looks more like a definition of a slang term than an encyclopedia entry, so I think this belongs in Wiktionary. LudwigVan 06:52, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I would suggest moving this to the Wiktionary (how does one do this?) or deleting this. Madman 21:17, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

BS

wow this article is complete bullshit, awesome

• Yeah. Wikipedia loves folk etymologies. --Tysto (talk) 01:29, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Alternate possible origination

An alternative explanation, first heard in Hong Kong from British friends, was that the term derived from pre-modern warships - where sailors had their hammocks strung among the broadside cannons. Children who were the product of these sailors [whether conceived on board in the sailor's living quarters - 'at the guns' - or on land] were bastards and never knew their fathers. Thus it was an expletive commenting on the person's birth and only tangentially on the nature of the person's mother [rather than 'son of a bitch/dog'.]

Then of course you have the old story of a bullet flying through a testicle and into a woman's uterus, impregnating her. Perhaps this is younger?

Anyway we never hear about 'daughters of a gun'.Can anyone explain this?

Son of a gun rhymes. Daughter of a gun doesn't. M0ffx 20:58, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

One unconfirmed fable says the meaning of son of a gun comes from American Civil War times, when a bullet passed through a soldier's scrotum, passing through him into a woman nearby, and lodged into the woman's ovaries, depositing the sperm, thus impregnating her and bestowing on her unborn child the phrase of "son of a gun". This is quite possibly the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard. Where the hell did this 'fable' come from? --81.79.131.141 21:35, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

This is possibly folk etymology, but the explanation I have always been given is that a 'son of a gun' is someone born shortly after a shotgun wedding. ----Johnwaylandbales (talk) 20:17, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

yeah... no

This article is exemplatory of how bad wikipedia is. Never use wikipedia except for rough information.

One unconfirmed fable says the meaning of son of a gun comes from American Civil War times, when a bullet passed through a soldier's scrotum, passing through him into a woman nearby, and lodged into the woman's ovaries, depositing the sperm, thus impregnating her and bestowing on her unborn child the phrase of "son of a gun". The story's origin is a facetious article in an 1874 medical journal[3];

NPOV. First, there are written records proving the existance of said jornal, and other records proving the impossibility of the situation, what is unconfirmed? Also, "unconfirmed fable" is an oxymoron. "Scoopes" is not an acceptable source, it is entirely biased and unscientific anlysis of the situation, just regurgitated from other sources (brings in mind a certain website). —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 131.247.240.122 (talk) 05:14, 1 March 2007 (UTC).

Nothing to do with gun decks

"Son of a gun" is a simple rhyming euphemism for "son of a bitch", the gun deck-hypothesis is a classic, but still wrong.

http://www.wordorigins.org/index.php/site/comments/son_of_a_gun/

Maybe someone would like to rewrite the article. Maikel (talk) 20:02, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

I also think this article needs rewriting - in particular, this paragraph...

"When a Royal Navy vessel entered a port it was common for local prostitutes to visit the ship and elicit custom from the sailors. The sailors and prostitutes then had sexual relations, usually on one of the gun decks beside the many guns carried, one of the few places Able and Ordinary Seaman could obtain some sort of privacy. Should the prostitute subsequently fall pregnant by the sailor, she would then attempt to obtain compensation from the father or the navy for the upkeep of the child. This was usually not forthcoming and the father's name would be withheld. When it was fairly certain that the child had been conceived upon board one of His Majesty's vessels, the infant would be entered into the ship's records as 'child born to gun number X', the X denoting the gun position the sailor responsible for the errant behaviour was allocated-to, his name being omitted to maintain probity. These children born in this manner had no father's name on any official records and the male ones were referred to by knowing sailors as being 'sons of guns', a term denoting illegitimacy and contempt."

...which sounds suspiciously like a folk etymology, especially since there's no citation. Even Admiral Smythe's take on it isn't without its folk-etymology flavor; that might have been his interpretation of the word's origin, but he could have been incorrect. I'll see what I can do for the article. Graymornings (talk) 03:12, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Unreliable claim removed

I've removed the following section as both inadequately sourced, and a logical nonsense. Bringing it here in case thee is disagreement:

Less reliably, it is claimed that the term refers to a child of questionable parentage conceived on the gun deck of a ship, hence 'son of a gun'. The term possibly predates this claimed origin, and Snopes.com lists it as being part of the English lexicon since at least 1708, although British warships, such as the Mary Rose, had carried gun decks since at least the times of Henry VIII in the 16th century. It was also necessary to record in the ship's papers the father of the child. As the parentage was uncertain, the senior non-commissioned officer, "The Gunner's Mate", was ascribed as the parent.

My reasons for removing this are:

• Inadequate sourcing - the only sources in the paragraph are a blog which fails WP:RS, and a second blog rebutting the first blog (which also fails WP:RS). The last two sentences are essential for the overall etymological claim to make any sense, but have no sources at all. By comparison the remaining etymology (about births in spaces between broadside guns) is sourced to an academic text written by Kemp in his role as Head of History at Admiralty, and supported by a primary source in the form of Smyth's wordbook. The Downing claim re feudal knights is also reliably sourced.
• Logical inconsistency - do we seriously imagine that prostitutes, falling pregnant to British sailors in foreign ports, then queued up at Admiralty House to legitimise the birth of their child and have thgem nominally recorded as being the offspring of sailors? Do we think that captains of RN vessels maintained a log of the children of sailors aboard, where those children were born on land in foreign ports? Do we have any evidence that gunners mates were recorded anywhere as being the nominal parent for the bastards of ordinary seamen? Do we think gunner's mates are even "the senior non-commissioned officer" aboard any vessel (and not, say the sailing master or any of the midshipmen who outranked gunners mates everywhere)? Apologies for the slight sarcasm in these questions, but no single element of this claim stacks up.

Happy to discuss if anyone disagrees with this removal. But per the above, and the previous talkpage threads on this page, this second etymology seems to be poorly sourced nonsense. Articles should be comprehensive, but not the point of being simply wrong. On the basis of sourcing alone, I don't believe the above blog-sourced and illogical claim should be placed in the article alongside two alternatives each on reliable secondary sources. -- Euryalus (talk) 06:13, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

References

Plagiarism

This is copied from Urban Dictionary. http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=son%20of%20a%20gun Puppyluv7975 (talk) 21:28, 16 July 2014 (UTC)