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Original poster

To believe we can retire the word "shagging"?

243 replies

ReplacementBusService · 13/10/2025 22:07

I was a teenager in the 90s, and the word for casual, semi casual, or run of the mill sexual congress was "shag", as in "shagging" "have a shag", "quick shag", and "shagged em".

I just think, this word has had its day. It has connotations with vintage rugs, thick carpets, unruly beards, and perhaps panting sheepdogs, that are uncomfortable. Other words exist. I don't want to be the self declared Word Police, and appreciate there will be other points of view on this very important topic, but please can we all consider never using it again?

OP posts:
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5
Moonless · 14/10/2025 02:47

Floatlikeafeather2 · 14/10/2025 02:38

I don't know why people are linking it to the 90s. It was a word bandied about a lot when I was at school, late 60s early 70s. As far as its history goes, it's an ancient word and has been in use for centuries. Not a pretty word but it has staying power.

I think Austin Powers gave it a bit of a resurgence, although it obviously wasn't set in the 90s.

Floatlikeafeather2 · 14/10/2025 02:38

I don't know why people are linking it to the 90s. It was a word bandied about a lot when I was at school, late 60s early 70s. As far as its history goes, it's an ancient word and has been in use for centuries. Not a pretty word but it has staying power.

JacquesHarlow · 14/10/2025 02:29

ErrolTheDragon · 14/10/2025 00:18

So what term would you use?

Show quote history

I don't use any "term" for it, because I'm never referring to it in casual conversation.

That doesn't make me a prude - FAR from it, I have a very healthy approach to the subject and the activity - but since when am I constantly referring to the sexual act?

No. Doesn't happen.

So yeah, good luck to everyone who is constantly chatting about "shagging", sounds great, but I don't really get the conversations you lot have, and why.

PollyBell · 14/10/2025 02:07

What is actually wrong with it? so its dated, and?

BauhausOfEliott · 14/10/2025 01:53

@tartyflette I still have that song from The High Life stuck in my head on a regular basis despite it being decades since I saw it 🤣

Also due to The High Life, if I hear anyone say “Can I be blunt?” I always immediately think “If I can be Philby, and he can be Burgess”

tartyflette · 14/10/2025 01:38

I'm a 'have it off' sort of person as in the old and silly-but-funny sitcom'The High Life' where they suggested the following entry for the Eurovision song contest.
Pif paf pof, my heart goes pif paf pof,
Pif paf pof, I want to have it off,
Pif paf pof, my heart goes pif paf pof
I want to have it off til I cough.

BauhausOfEliott · 14/10/2025 01:20

Depends on the context.

I wouldn’t say ‘shagging’ in any actual bedroom situation. I’d just call it fucking.

Neither would I say it in a serious conversation about the subject of sex. I’d just say ‘having sex’.

In an irreverent / flippant / sarcastic / jokey conversation, I’d probably use the word shagging.

The terms that really, really make me cringe are ‘lovemaking’ and ‘intimacy’ - eg when someone on Mumsnet says something “My DH said something insensitive during intimacy last night” or “I stayed over on Tuesday night but we weren’t intimate”. It sounds so coy and euphemistic and prissy.

Moonless · 14/10/2025 00:53

Sorry, there just isn't an adequate replacement. Shagging has to stay.
Making love is just vomitous, fucking is way harsh, but occasionally very suitable and bumping uglies is comical.
I also like the Britpop sound to shagging, although I have a juvenile snicker at shag pile carpets.

Mistyglade · 14/10/2025 00:46

SprayWhiteDung · 14/10/2025 00:22

'Let Mrs Tiggywinkle consort with Jeremy Fisher' is a mature, simple, factual description.

🤣

Funnywonder · 14/10/2025 00:36

This reply has been deleted

This has been deleted by MNHQ for breaking our Talk Guidelines.

🤣🤣

ErrolTheDragon · 14/10/2025 00:34

SprayWhiteDung · 14/10/2025 00:22

'Let Mrs Tiggywinkle consort with Jeremy Fisher' is a mature, simple, factual description.

That’s never going to work. Poor Mr Fisher!Shock
(how do hedgehogs mate? …. Consensually)

ErrolTheDragon · 14/10/2025 00:31

Contemporaneouslyagog · 13/10/2025 23:27

Shagging around was way before Austen Powers used it

Show quote history

Well yes of course it was. He was the ‘swinging 60s’ spy who found himself unfrozen in the more staid late 90s.

apparently its etymology is older, deriving from Middle English ‘shag’ meaning shake or waggle.😂

https://www.etymonline.com/word/shag

etymonline logo

Shag - Etymology, Origin & Meaning

Originating in the 1590s from Old English sceacga meaning "rough matted hair," shag denotes a velvet-napped cloth; as a verb (1788), it means "to copulate," likel...

https://www.etymonline.com/word/shag

SprayWhiteDung · 14/10/2025 00:22

'Let Mrs Tiggywinkle consort with Jeremy Fisher' is a mature, simple, factual description.

Mistyglade · 14/10/2025 00:21

I’ve never liked the word shagging, I tend to stick with doing it.

SprayWhiteDung · 14/10/2025 00:18

Having a rumble or a tumble? Or does the latter bring unhelpful images of CBeebies to mind and kill the mood?

ErrolTheDragon · 14/10/2025 00:18

JacquesHarlow · 13/10/2025 23:54

The biggest reason why I wholeheartedly agree with the OP @ReplacementBusService can be found in the entirety of this thread, and throughout most of Mumsnet.

There's this weird pervasive thing on Mumsnet that any description of sex HAS to be accompanied with knowing humour. As if no British self-respecting woman (I am British and female btw) could really abandon herself mentally in the act, or be ardent about why sex makes them feel amazing, etc.

Nope. Instead you have to find a way to talk about it in the most bawdry way possible, as if sex is really something silly and to be referred to in the quickest, most dismissive way you can describe. We really are a weird, insecure nation when it comes to sex.

Hence, "shagging" will always win on here. Because as a word and with its 90s connotations, it fits the description and the demographic here, so absolutely perfectly.

So what term would you use?

OSTMusTisNT · 14/10/2025 00:18

Lilington · 13/10/2025 22:16

I’m not giving it up. It’s my term of preference.
Would you rather I said made lurve?

Argh, that would have me running for the hills 😂.

Cringe 🙉

SprayWhiteDung · 14/10/2025 00:17

TooManyNiblings · 13/10/2025 22:27

@BlueJuniper94 pumping = farting!!

Exactly the same with boffing to many of us!

If you boffed or pumped in front of your intended before the act, that could indeed be the deal-breaker that meant it would not transpire at all Grin

OSTMusTisNT · 14/10/2025 00:15

God no, I'm Scottish and there's no way you're removing that from our vocabulary 😂!

We have many words for poop e.g jobby, keech, shite, khaki, turd or 9-coiler etc but nothing is suitably synonymous with shagging.

Belshels · 14/10/2025 00:07

Or a bit of "how's yer father" 😂

TooBigForMyBoots · 14/10/2025 00:03

OnlyOneAdda · 13/10/2025 23:01

lol - fucking love this thread

I love the Irish's use of "riding" (or more accurately "ridin"

Particularly love that is can also be a subject - "he's a right ride"

I'm Irish and came on to propose "ride", as in "Why's Toobig a grumpy fucker? When did she last have a ride? Ah for fucks sake is it any wonder."<<sad faces all round>>

SnugglyJumpersMakeItBetter · 14/10/2025 00:01

A bit off-topic, but do people still use the term 'One-night-stand'? I've not heard that in forever but I don't know what the alternative phrase would be!

PennyPugwash · 13/10/2025 23:58

us Irish say “riding” and I love it 🤣🤣🤣

CrystalSingerFan · 13/10/2025 23:58

OnlyOneAdda · 13/10/2025 23:50

@FenceBooksCycle

Mmmm I see what you mean...

Bone / bang = definitely 😒
Screw prob also

Fuck... 🤔

Shag = positive mutually participating vibes!! 😂

Beat me to it! Ta!

TooBigForMyBoots · 13/10/2025 23:55

Contemporaneouslyagog · 13/10/2025 22:44

I like shagging

So I've heard.😉😂