Talk:asshat

This term may have originated in Vietnam where GI's in helicopters sat on their helmets. The public overhearing the word may have misunderstood its meaning, lacking the original context for it they may have presumed the meaning was close to the modern usage.--107.216.113.28 19:00, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

I have to say myself and my friends began using the term "asshat" in 1992 in Lancaster, CA after I read Oliver Sack's "The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat," and we thought it sounded funny and began using it to insult each other. This is 8 years before the first recorded internet reference, so I think it definitely originated with us. 68.97.173.133 19:29, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Even assuming you're telling the truth (which we can't, without independent verification), we'd still need evidence to show that the wider usage came from yours. Otherwise, it could have come from some unknown other independent coining of the term, while yours remained isolated to your group of friends. We get people all the time claiming that they originated various terms, and most of them have been quickly shown to be either mistaken or lying. Chuck Entz (talk) 22:21, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

As for my best guess: it might have originated as a hypothetical example of something entirely unnecessary and useless. The similar term schmuck was originally Yiddish for a decoration or ornament- in other words, something so useless it had to be there just for show. Chuck Entz (talk) 01:55, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

Does this have anything to do with the threat "you're gonna be wearing your ass for a hat"? Or is it an independent invention?E. abu Filumena 22:47, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I think your etymology is more likely. Please fix? --Connel MacKenzie 22:54, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Rather, I think the idea is that the person in question is primarily characterized by the lower posterior region of their anatomy and that the rest of their body merely serves as a sort of "hat" for that part of them which is definitive.

I remember reading someone on the webs claim that they heard someone refer to the Pope's hat as an asshat, and got the idea from there to use it as an insult. This article needs sources; maybe starting with the earliest use in Google Groups's archives. --68.44.253.17 20:18, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

---

Stuligin says:

I can tell you exactly where the term "asshat" came from:

Everquest PVP servers

when you killed someone, and wanted to provoke him more, you would stand on his dead body, 
take off your armor until you could see your ass, then rapidly sit on the dead guys head. 
The "guild" I was in at the time was the first on our server, and probobly all 
of EQ to start this activity. 

when i went to dark age of camelot servers when the game came out, you would see poeple asshatting everywhere.

as a side note: this  action totally enrqages the person on the recieving end, not only the humiliation 
of dying to another, but enduring the further humiliation of having the guy sit on your head.

I have good reason to believe you are talking about t-bagging when you refer to the technique used to insult your victims on Everquest, as well as other games. The term asshat, or more properly spelled ass-hat, refers to an individuals behavior, i.e being a poor sport, childish and/or dickish behavior. The creation of this term/phrase took place a number of years ago (approximately 2006) amongst a group of students at a school in Central Virginia. I have firsthand knowledge of this event, and the terms propagation. From there it has spread to mainstream usage, notably on the television show "The Big Bang Theory" where it has been used on multiple occasions.

Hell bunny97 (talk) 23:32, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Earliest mention

Attempting to find the earliest mention of "asshat"

• Google Books ngrams: 2005 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=asshat&case_insensitive=on&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=0&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Casshat%3B%2Cc0
• Usenet Archive: 2002-07-14 http://www.theusenetarchive.com/usenet-message-re-i-was-right-12988484.htm
• Google groups: 1998-03-26 https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt.config/Xhf8I0jDo8U/cIbeqSeEd4UJ

--Onco p53 (talk) 08:30, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

Interesting. I've tended to assume that the term is simply a bowdlerisation, or intentional corruption in any case, of asshole (like asshelmet or assclown), possibly one that was created by several speakers independently. The occurrence of these older mentions appears to confirm my hunch, even if the expression only became really popular later, and stopped being a nonce word, an occasional, rare neologism. The part about The Big Bang Theory contributing to the spread of the word sounds believable, but all those "we were the originators" stories need more evidence. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 17:24, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

I believe its frequent usage on fark.com helped popularize the term from c. 2002 onward Wasabe3543 (talk) 04:46, 22 February 2017 (UTC)