Rise of the American Jellyfish

Lickspittle.

Now there’s a world.

While I’ve long known of the word and its definition, I became reacquainted with it recently.

Simply saying it is fun.  Go ahead and try:  Lick Spittle.

Honoring its onomatopoetic roots makes it easy to visualize the attendant sounds:  a lick, and then perhaps a tongue lolling; and spittle, aka drool, a steady stream of saliva slowly dripping from one’s mouth, over the lower lip to the chin and then...

Breathing New Life into an Old Word

It’s an old-timey word, birthed in the 1640s from what was then known as the repulsive act of “licking the spittle.”

For me, lickspittle might just be the center of a universe around which many interesting words orbit.

Toady, or “one who flatters people in the hope of gaining favor.” Lackey and groveler are pretty good, while sycophant lands as contemporary, though a bit supercilious.

And while not a noun, the verb “kowtow,” certainly gets high marks for its sound, parallel construction, and meaning.  Nothing quite like the disgusting spectacle of witnessing a lickspittle kowtowing.

Yes, they’re all wonderful to say, hear, and use.  Yet in their application to current events, they are quite disturbing.

Where Are Our Leaders?

Pray tell (another beautiful phrase from an earlier era) you might ask, what’s with the vocabulary lesson today?

Well, spurred by a podcast utterance of “lickspittle” last week, and fully acknowledging a love for old words and phrases (hello, Godspeed!), it got me thinking that, while dated, lickspittle's revival might be imminent as we are seeing some big-time boot licking these days.

Pick any channel or social media video clip and you can watch a parade of leaders prostrating themselves, in their own ways breathing life back into a word like lickspittle.

Our challenge in this game is to not only to define this act – easy enough with the starter list of words I’ve presented here – but to also try and understand it. 

While everyday people raise their voices at No Kings protests and in congressional town halls, our leaders – political and, surprisingly, corporate CEOs – fall in line to threat and bluster from the highest office in our land, cowed into silence in the face of outrageous acts, or more embarrassingly, gifting 24K gold and glass plaques in the Oval Office or ditching DEI programs that only yesterday they extolled as corporate strengths.

That’s been the shocker for me, that these leaders with so much power and leverage have revealed themselves as a new classification of phylum, Cnidaria, a gelatinous life form I’ll call the “American jellyfish.”

(No disrespect meant to my jellyfish friends swimming around and doing their thing in the deep, blue sea.)

Perhaps I’ve been naïve about it all – the strategy and cunning, the “live to fight another day” ethos, the brown noses covered by matte-finish foundation makeup for the television lights.

It’s all just politics, right?

What’s your take, Dear Reader?  And how’s your vocabulary these days?

Godspeed, friends.

Russ

💬 Think About It

“My actions are my only true belongings.” Thich Naht Hanh

💥 Quick Hits

•            What kind of impact can a music festival have on a community? – When it's a B Corp, turns out it's a lot. Especially when you take the time to document it in an impact report. (Treefort Music Fest)

•            A natural way to boost your attention span – Scientists don't know why, but research proves that being in nature improves your attention span. (New York Times gift article)

•            The world's smartest city: In a small German village, "Smart doesn’t just mean sensors and software. It means solidarity, shared responsibility and thinking big." (reasons to be cheerful)

Find the Most Meaningful Work of Your Career

Our partner One Work has you covered with opportunities that go beyond a paycheck, a cubicle, or a weekly team Zoom call. You'll find purposeful jobs like those below at the One Work job board.

• Saalt - Come work for a world-changing, women's period-care company. Better yet, come work and live in beautiful Boise! Vice President of Finance, Boise, ID.

• Too Good to Go - Your chance to be enterprising and save good food from going to waste. Enterprise Account Executive, New York, NY, or Austin, TX.

• InStride - Educational programs that help companies promote people internally through debt-free education. Sr. Technical Project Manager, REMOTE.

Need help in some way? Have a story idea, question, or request? Perhaps a social entrepreneur we should interview? Let us know – We're here to help. Just reply to this email with whatever you've got. We'll see you next week.