go left

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Jump to navigation Jump to search

English

[edit]

Etymology

[edit]

Possibly an alteration of go wrong using an antonym of a different sense of the adjective right.[1]

Verb

[edit]

go left (third-person singular simple present goes left, present participle going left, simple past went left, past participle gone left)

  1. (slang, idiomatic) To take a turn for the worse, to go horribly wrong.
    Synonyms: go downhill, go sideways, go south; see also Thesaurus:worsen
    • 2019 June 6, Ny Magee, “Ja Rule says despite colossal failure, he’d do a Fyre Festival”, in TheGrio[2]:
      Two documentaries have been dedicated to exploring why the Fyre Festival went left, available on Hulu and Netflix — “Fyre: The Greatest Party that Never Happened” and “Fyre Fraud.”
  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see go,‎ left.

References

[edit]
  1. ^ Ben Zimmer (2017 May 5) “The Sinister History of ‘Going Left’”, in The Wall Street Jourrnal[1]:Ja Rule is not the first to use ‘go left’ to mean ‘go wrong,’ playing on the double meaning of ‘right.’