Sipsey Street Irregulars: A moment to clarify what I mean by "moke"

Sunday, September 5, 2010

A moment to clarify what I mean by "moke"

An overloaded moke (who appears to be smarter than his owner).

"Moke" is indeed a disparaging term used by Hawaiians, meaning somebody big and dumb. However, as near as I can tell its usage preceeds that by many centuries in English-speaking countries. It is an archaic British, Australian, and United States slang term meaning donkey. I cannot tell you where I first heard it, but it was long ago in my youth, which was divided between Michigan and Ohio, far away from Hawaii. There are no racial overtones, intended or unintended, to the term as I understand it.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...: That last little box will do it every time!; September 5, 2010 at 9:33 AM
Dennis308 said...: Em a Donkey, A equestrian Animal a little smaller and weaker than a Jack-Ass. Good discription, Good Word.

Dennis
III
Texas; September 5, 2010 at 10:46 AM
catfish said...: Been a long time since I heard the term "Moke". I 1st heard it while stationed in Hawaii. It seemed to be a favorite way to describe "haole" Redneck Marines!lol; September 5, 2010 at 12:00 PM
Anonymous said...: Thanks Mike had no idea what it meant :)
Hope your having a good weekend!; September 5, 2010 at 2:15 PM
Dedicated_Dad said...: Heard the term for many years - describing an idiot - but never hawaii or donkey.

Still, know what you meant...; September 5, 2010 at 8:44 PM
Mike H said...: It's a fave with me and my fictional character in my novel.; September 5, 2010 at 11:11 PM
Skip said...: New Yawkers say jamoke.; September 6, 2010 at 12:19 AM
Ed said...: The Online Etymology Dictionary on "moke":
"“dolt,” 1855, originally (16c.) “donkey;” of unknown origin."

The "Webster's New World College Dictionary, Fourth Edition" describes "moke" as British slang of unknown origin for "donkey" or "a stupid fellow", and as an Australian word for "an inferior horse" or a "nag".; September 6, 2010 at 10:42 AM

"Progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress."

I believe that liberty is the only genuinely valuable thing that men have invented, at least in the field of government, in a thousand years. I believe that it is better to be free than to be not free, even when the former is dangerous and the latter safe. I believe that the finest qualities of man can flourish only in free air – that progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress, and of no permanent value. I believe that any man who takes the liberty of another into his keeping is bound to become a tyrant, and that any man who yields up his liberty, in however slight the measure, is bound to become a slave. -- H.L. Mencken

"The Fate of Unborn Millions. . ."

"The time is now near at hand which must probably determine, whether Americans are to be, Freemen, or Slaves; whether they are to have any property they can call their own; whether their Houses, and Farms, are to be pillaged and destroyed, and they consigned to a State of Wretchedness from which no human efforts will probably deliver them. The fate of unborn Millions will now depend, under God, on the Courage and Conduct of this army-Our cruel and unrelenting Enemy leaves us no choice but a brave resistance, or the most abject submission; that is all we can expect-We have therefore to resolve to conquer or die." -- George Washington to his troops before the Battle of Long Island.

"We will not go gently . . ."

This is no small thing, to restore a republic after it has fallen into corruption. I have studied history for years and I cannot recall it ever happening. It may be that our task is impossible. Yet, if we do not try then how will we know it can't be done? And if we do not try, it most certainly won't be done. The Founders' Republic, and the larger war for western civilization, will be lost.

But I tell you this: We will not go gently into that bloody collectivist good night. Indeed, we will make with our defiance such a sound as ALL history from that day forward will be forced to note, even if they despise us in the writing of it.

And when we are gone, the scattered, free survivors hiding in the ruins of our once-great republic will sing of our deeds in forbidden songs, tending the flickering flame of individual liberty until it bursts forth again, as it must, generations later. We will live forever, like the Spartans at Thermopylae, in sacred memory.

-- Mike Vanderboegh, The Lessons of Mumbai:Death Cults, the "Socialism of Imbeciles" and Refusing to Submit, 1 December 2008

"A common language of resistance . . ."

"Colonial rebellions throughout the modern world have been acts of shared political imagination. Unless unhappy people develop the capacity to trust other unhappy people, protest remains a local affair easily silenced by traditional authority. Usually, however, a moment arrives when large numbers of men and women realize for the first time that they enjoy the support of strangers, ordinary people much like themselves who happen to live in distant places and whom under normal circumstances they would never meet. It is an intoxicating discovery. A common language of resistance suddenly opens to those who are most vulnerable to painful retribution the possibility of creating a new community. As the conviction of solidarity grows, parochial issues and aspirations merge imperceptibly with a compelling national agenda which only a short time before may have been the dream of only a few. For many Americans colonists this moment occurred late in the spring of 1774." -- T.H. Breen, The Marketplace of Revolution: How Consumer Politics Shaped American Independence, Oxford University Press, 2004, p.1.

Sipsey Street Irregulars

Sunday, September 5, 2010

A moment to clarify what I mean by "moke"

8 comments:

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