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AIBU?

Beyond the pale

187 replies

Reppin · 15/12/2017 05:11

Can we all stop using this expression now?

OP posts:

Report

Bluntness100 · 15/12/2017 05:49

Op. I honestly can’t work out your logic. A pale was a very common thing, it’s simoly a fence that circled a safe area.

I am actually considering you may be drunk. I’m scottish, I do not think it implies my ancestors were barbaric, that’s nuts.

Reppin · 15/12/2017 05:50

Interesting Twiney. I am very interested in the origin of words and phrases and will look into this.

OP posts:

Bluntness100 · 15/12/2017 05:50

Agree with twiney, I’d ask for this to be shut down if I was you. 😳

Reppin · 15/12/2017 05:51

I don't think this discussion necessarily needs to be shut down though? I have not insulted anyone.

OP posts:

scaryteacher · 15/12/2017 05:53

Pale meant area or jurisdiction, so the Pale of Calais was under English rule after Crecy in 1346. I also thought it delineated the outer bounds of a castle grounds, so a pale was a word for a fence.

Battleax · 15/12/2017 05:59

Don't you generally find that goings on outside of your own jurisdiction are a bit strange and trying OP? Half the reason to have children is to run a nice sensible fiefdom within your front gate.

endofthelinefinally · 15/12/2017 06:00

Also well known in Russian history in the context of the pogroms and the persecution of Jews in the Ukraine.
I cant see why anyone would have a problem with it. We have lots of sayings based on history that are still in common usage.

Columbine1 · 15/12/2017 06:01

I have always understood it to mean excluding Irish people from a particular part of Dublin during British rule so -yes - racist origin and thus never to be used.

Reppin · 15/12/2017 06:01

battleax

OP posts:

echt · 15/12/2017 06:10

This is the point where we need to revive PG Wodehouse's Bertie Wooster's: "It's the frozen limit" to denote extremity.

Booie09 · 15/12/2017 06:18

Just googled and this is what it means.
Beyond the pale.

outside the bounds of acceptable behaviour.

Another step closer to not being able to say anything!!

LittleWitch · 15/12/2017 06:21

There were Pales everywhere. My understanding is that the saying originated in relation to the Pale of Calais, but happy to be corrected. I’ve never heard of it being a racist saying.

endofthelinefinally · 15/12/2017 06:22

Language changes over time. You could probably find all kinds of examples if you took the time to look into it.

Bluntness100 · 15/12/2017 06:23

Of course there was pales everywhere, there wasn’t just one 🤣

BluePlasticBuddha · 15/12/2017 06:24

I always knew it as the Russian exile of the Jews also. So sending someone or something into exile.

CigarsofthePharoahs · 15/12/2017 06:39

Interesting.
I was under the impression that the pale was a reference to the boundary of a cemetery. Within the pale was consecrated ground so those buried there would go to heaven. To be buried beyond the pale meant you had excluded yourself and were not.
Unfortunately this was often applied to babies who had died before being christened.
Nowadays it just means that someone has behaved badly, beyond an acceptable point.

Bluntness100 · 15/12/2017 06:48

Basically a pale was a fence surrounding a safe area. They were used in many contexts in many countries, there was not just one, it was not a English invention, any more than a wall was German and that was the only one and no one should ever say wall and such things should not be in existence to hold up our houses today,

Pengggwn · 15/12/2017 06:55

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

AreThereAnyUsersnamesLeft · 15/12/2017 06:56

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pale

suspect most people using the term have no notion of the origin - and don't need to. As mis-uses of Irish history, it is pretty minor when compared to the rash of tansplaining in the last month or so re the border, GFA / Brexit.

Reppin · 15/12/2017 07:00

True Arethere maybe that is why I feel so disgruntled currently.

OP posts:

Splinterz · 15/12/2017 07:11

Beyond the pale origin
Origin of the name
The word pale derives ultimately from the Latin word pālus, meaning stake, specifically a stake used to support a fence. From this came the figurative meaning of boundary and eventually the phrase beyond the pale, as something outside the boundary.

AreThereAnyUsersnamesLeft · 15/12/2017 07:11

Columbine - really not convinced it racism is the issue though - it is more of a rather exclusive, controlling mindset.
It referred to the hordes outside the Pale who don't comply with English manners and mores - it wasn't their race that was being looked down on, was it, but a failure to comply with English rule and culture?

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borntobequiet · 15/12/2017 07:24

The word pallet comes from the same root. Never thought of it before.

autumnboys · 15/12/2017 07:25

I understood it to mean the same thing as Cigar.

feral · 15/12/2017 07:26

Do you know what? No one cares!

Whatever meaning it once had no longer applies.

I'm more offended by 'rule of thumb' if you want a phrase to ban but even then it no longer means what it once did.

Why is everyone so precious?

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