It’s penultimate November and the day after Black Friday, and the leftovers from Thanksgiving — my leftovers, being quirkily Korean, are surely not much like yours, but I have them and they are wonderful — will live again in other meals for several more days. And familiar old tv shows will be re-run as a background of pleasant memories.
Today’s re-runs are from the early days of the American police-procedural tv series NCIS. This morning, in the S4 E1 program “Shalom” (from 9/19/06), came a moment described in the episode summary as:
Tony remarks that Sacks is a self-centered, egotistical jackhole
You don’t need to know who Tony and Sacks are, because my interest in the summary is entirely in its notable final word, boldfaced above. A way of calling someone a jackass and an asshole without using a dirty word. The ass is silent. Twice. Only the respectable remnants of the insults are left over.
Now, jackhole isn’t a fresh discovery, even on this blog — though 2006 is 10 years earlier than the cite that set off an earlier posting of mine, “jockhole”, from 9/28/16 (which makes today’s posting “jockhole 2”). Return with me now to that posting.
From the 2016 jockhole posting.
Television report. From The Mysteries of Laura, S1 E20 (5/7/15), “The Mystery of the Crooked Clubber”:
So, he’s not our killer, he’s not on the getaway squad, he’s just some jackhole throwing himself off skyscrapers in midtown.
The item jackhole was new to me, but instantly recognizable as derogatory slang, doubtless a portmanteau involving derogatory (and strongly taboo) asshole and either derogatory (and mildly taboo) jackoff or [more likely] merely derogatory jackass. Neither jackhole nor the alternative avoidance term jerkhole is in either of the compendious slang dictionaries (Lighter and Green), but in this case, Urban Dictionary provides real gold for jackhole:
(by ke6isf 11/26/03) Portmanteau of “Jackass” and “Asshole”. Originated as a name by radio personalities Kevin and Bean (from KROQ-FM in Los Angeles) as a way of calling somebody a nasty name without actually breaking FCC edicts against foul language.
How to call someone an asshole without uttering the word.
Although it would be possible for jackhole to have been coined more than once, it seems that all the actual cites do go back to the characters “Kevin and Bean” on KROQ. At least that’s the story the OED told when it got onto the case.
From the OED in 2018. By 2018, the OED had an entry:
noun jackhole: coarse slang (originally and chiefly U.S.) A stupid, irritating, or contemptible person; a person who behaves despicably. [1st cite 1996 You guys are all a bunch of Jackholes [Usenet quotation from KROQ]; then 2005 and 2016] Origin: Apparently coined by U.S. comedians and broadcasters J. C. Kimmel and A. Carolla. Apparently < jack– (in jackass) + ‑hole (in asshole).
J. C. Kimmel is the Jimmy Kimmel of current late-nght tv fame. Kimmel and Adam Carolla did their KROQ shtick for some years in the 1990s; I haven’t been able to find the exact dates. But it seems clear that Kimmel and Carolla are the progenitors of jockhole.
Bonus. I offer Progenitors of Jockhole as the name of a rock band. It has a heavy-metal smell to me, but feel free to take it in any direction that suits you.
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