Christopher Moore's Blog

As you know, I subscribe to word of the day at Dictionary.com, which is a worthwhile thing to do, however it does sort of make you feel like you have an irritating friend with a better vocabulary than you, who e-mails you every day. While I won’t always share the wordadaday with you, today’s word seemed particularly useful, and frankly, I didn’t know it had a verb form. So here you go:

abominate uh-BOM-uh-nayt, transitive verb: To hate in the highest degree; to detest intensely; to loathe; to abhor.

I had no wish to study or learn anything, and as for Latin, I abominated it. –Charles Tyng, [1′ target=’_blank’>Before the Wind

“Sir Laurence,” he said, smiling wanly, “I detest literature. I abominate the theatre. I have a horror of culture. I am only interested in magic!” –John Lahr (editor), [2′ target=’_blank’>The Diaries of Kenneth Tynan _________________________________________________________

Abominate comes from Latin abominari, “to deprecate as a bad omen, to hate, to detest,” from ab- + omen, “an omen.”

Synonyms: abhor, detest, hate, loathe. [3′ target=’_blank’>Find more at Thesaurus.com.

ME AGAIN:

Since fundamentalist Christians often refer to homosexual behavior as “an abomination”, and the root of the word abomination, is to deprecate as a bad omen, to hate, to detest,, are they, in fact, refering to gays and lesbians as “The Hated”? How does this reconcile with the Christian doctrine of love and forgiveness?

Discuss.

Since a majority of Americans appear to(along with the President) oppose Gay Marriage, does that make a Constitutional Amendment banning it right?

Discuss

Compare and contrast the proposed “anti-gay marraige amendment with the 1846 Dred Scott decision by the Supreme Court which, by declaring the Missouri Compromise of 1820 unconstitutional, allowed for slavery in all states.

Discuss

The first article of the 14th Amendendment of the Constitution reads: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

When the amendment says, “No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States,” are they talking about “straight” citizens only, or does the phrase “all persons” actually mean “all motherfucking persons, just like it says, you paranoid, biggoted, flock of asshats”? (You know who you are, flocking over there.)

Discuss.

Exercise: Use “abominate” in a sentence.

Drive thru, please.