Sin-eater

Sin-eater (pronounced sin-ee-ter or sin-ee-tah)

(1) An individual (in the historic texts usually a man) who, by the act of eating a piece of bread laid upon the breast of the corpse (although in many depictions the goods are place on the lid of the coffin (casket)) , absorbs the sins of a deceased, enabling them to “enter the kingdom of heaven”.

(2) Figuratively, as a thematic device in literature, a way to represent themes of guilt, atonement, sacrifice, and societal exclusion (used variously to explore the moral complexities inherent in assuming the sins (or guilt) of another, the act of mercy and the implications of personal damnation.

Late 1600s (although the culture practice long pre-dates evidence of the first use of the term):  The construct was sin + eat +-er.  Sin (in the theological sense of “a violation of divine will or religious law; sinfulness, depravity, iniquity; misdeeds”) was from the Middle English sinne, synne, sunne & zen, from the Old English synn (sin), from the Proto-West Germanic sunnju, from the Proto-Germanic sunjō (truth, excuse) and sundī, & sundijō (sin), from the primitive Indo-European hs-ónt-ih, from hsónts (being, true), implying a verdict of “truly guilty” against an accusation or charge), from hes- (to be) (which may be compared with the Old English sōþ (true).  Eat (in the sense of “to ingest; to be ingested”) was from the Middle English eten, from the Old English etan (to eat), from the Proto-West Germanic etan, from the Proto-Germanic etaną (to eat), from the primitive Indo-European hédti, from hed- (to eat).  The –er suffix was from the Middle English –er & -ere, from the Old English -ere, from the Proto-Germanic -ārijaz, thought most likely to have been borrowed from the Latin –ārius where, as a suffix, it was used to form adjectives from nouns or numerals.  In English, the –er suffix, when added to a verb, created an agent noun: the person or thing that doing the action indicated by the root verb.   The use in English was reinforced by the synonymous but unrelated Old French –or & -eor (the Anglo-Norman variant -our), from the Latin -ātor & -tor, from the primitive Indo-European -tōr.  When appended to a noun, it created the noun denoting an occupation or describing the person whose occupation is the noun.  Sin-eater is a noun and sin-eating is a verb; the noun plural is sin eaters.  The term often appears as “sin eater” but (untypically for English), seemingly not as “sineater”.

The first documented evidence of the term “sin-eater” appears in texts dating from the late seventeenth century but cultural anthropologists believe the actual practice to be ancient and variations of the idea are seen in many societies so the ritual predates the term, the roots apparently in European and British folk traditions, particularly rural England and Wales.  The earliest (authenticated) known documented mention of a sin-eater occurs Remaines of Gentilisme and Judaisme (1686) by English antiquary John Aubrey (1626–1697), in which is described the custom of a person eating “bread and drinking ale” placed on the chest of a deceased person in order that their “many sins” could be eaten, thus allowing the untainted soul to pass to the afterlife, cleansed of “earthly wrongdoings”.   Aubrey would write of a "sin-eater living along the Rosse road" who regularly would be hired to perform the service, describing him as a “gaunt, ghastly, lean, miserable, poor rascal”.  He mentioned also there was a popular belief that sin-eating would prevent the ghost of the deceased from walking the earth, a useful benefit at a time when it was understood ghosts of tormented souls, unable to find rest, haunted the living.  Whether this aspect of the tradition was widespread or a localism (a noted phenomenon in folklore) isn't know.  Interestingly, in rural England and Wales the practice survived the Enlightenment and became more common (or at least better documented) in the eighteenth & nineteenth centuries.  In the turbulent, troubled Middle East, a macabre variation of the sin-eater has been documented.  There, it's reported that a prisoner sentenced to death can bribe the jailors and secure their freedom, another executed in their place, the paperwork appropriately altered.   

Paris Hilton (b 1981, left) and Lindsay Lohan (b 1986, right) discussing their “manifold sins and wickedness” while shopping, Los Angeles, 2004.

The ritual was of interest not only to social anthropologists but also to economic historians because while it was clear sin-eaters did receive payment (either in cash or in-kind (typically food)), there’s much to suggest those so employed were society’s “outcasts”, part of the “underclass” sub-set (beggars, vagrants, vagabonds etc) which is the West was a less formalized thing than something like the Dalits in Hinduism.  The Dalits (better known as the “untouchables”) in the West are often regarded as the “lowest rung” in the caste system but in Hindu theology the point was they were so excluded they were “outside” the system (a tiresome technical distinction often either lost on or ignored by the colonial administrators of the Raj) and relegated to the least desirable occupations.  Being a sin-eater sounds not desirable and theologically that’s right because in absolving the dead of their sins, the sin-eater becomes eternally burdened with the wickedness absorbed.  Presumably, a sin-eater could also (eventually) have their sins “eaten” but because they were from the impoverished strata of society, it was probably unlikely many would be connected to those with the economic resources required to secure such a service.  As a literary device, a sin-eater (often not explicitly named as such) is a character who in some way “takes on” the sins of others and they can be used to represent themes of guilt, atonement, sacrifice, and societal exclusion.  In popular culture, the dark concept is quite popular and there, rather than in symbolism, the role usually is explored with the character being explicating depicted as a “sin-eater”, an example being The Sin Eater (2020) by Megan Campisi (b 1976), a dystopian novel in which a young woman is forced into the role as a punishment.

Nice work if you can get it: The Sin-Eater, Misty Annual 1986.  Misty was a weekly British comic magazine for girls which, unusually, was found also to enjoy a significant male readership.  Published by UK house Fleetway, it existed only between 1978-1980 although Misty Annual appeared until 1986.  The cover always featured the eponymous, raven haired beauty.

There’s the obvious connection with Christianity although aspects of the practice have been identified in cultures where they arose prior to contact with the West.  The novel The Last Sin Eater by born-again US author Francine Rivers (b 1947) was set in a nineteenth century Appalachian community and dealt with sin, guilt & forgiveness, tied to the “atonement of the sins of man” by the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and thematically that was typical of the modern use.  However, the relationship between sin-eating and the Christian ritual of communion is theologically tenuous.  The communion, in which bread symbolizes the body of Christ and wine symbolizes His blood is actually literal in the Roman Catholic Church under the doctrine of transubstantiation which holds that during the sacrament of the Eucharist (or Holy Communion), the bread and wine offered by the priest to the communicants transforms into the body and blood of Christ.  That obviously requires faith to accept because while the appearances of the bread (usually a form of wafer) and wine (ie their taste, texture, and outward properties) remain unchanged, their substance (what truly they are at the metaphysical level) is said to transform into the body and blood of Christ.  Once unquestioned by most (at least publicly), the modern theological fudge from the Vatican is the general statement: “You need not believe it but you must accept it”.

Sin-eating and communion both involve the consumption of food and drink in a symbolic manner.  In sin-eating, a sin-eater consumes food placed near or on the corpse symbolically to “absorb” their sins so the soul of the deceased may pass to the afterlife free from guilt while in the Christian Eucharist, the taking of bread and wine is a ritual to commemorate the sacrifice of Jesus who, on the cross at Golgotha, died to atone for the sins of all mankind.  So the central difference is the matter of who bears the sins.  In sin-eating, that’s the sin-eater who personally takes on the spiritual burden in exchange for a small payment, thus becoming spiritually tainted in order that another may spiritually be cleansed.  In other words, the dead may “out-source” the cost of their redemption in exchange for a few pieces of silver.  In the Christian communion, it’s acknowledged Jesus has already borne the sins of humanity through His crucifixion, the ritual an acknowledgment of His sacrificial act which offered salvation and forgiveness of sin to all who believe and take him into his heart.  One can see why priests were told to discourage sin-eating by their congregants but historically the church, where necessary, adapted to local customs and its likely the practice was in places tolerated.

Sqound

Sqound (pronounced skwu-kuhl)

An object in the shape of a square with rounded corners.

1990s: The word was coined by a person or persons unknown to distinguish between the (round) taillights used on (most) C4 Chevrolet Corvettes between 1983-1989 and those built subsequently (1990-1996), the construct being sq(uare) + (r)ound).  Square was from the Middle English square, sqware & squyre, from the Old French esquarre & esquerre, (which endures in modern French as équerre), from the Vulgar Latin exquadra, the construct being ex- (the prefix used as an intensive) +‎ quadro (four cornered; make square), from quadrus (square).  It displaced fēowerecge (four-edged).  Round was from the Middle English round & rounde, from the Old Northern French roünt & rund & the Old French ront, runt & reont (which endures in modern French as rond), from the Late Latin retundus & the Classical Latin rotundus.  The noun developed partly from the adjective and partly from the corresponding French noun rond.  Sqound is a noun & adjective; the noun plural is sounds.

1993 Chevrolet Corvette ZR1.

Perhaps the ultimate “niche word”, the only known use is among members of the “C4 ZR1 ‘Vette cult” (those devoted to that model in the fourth series (C4) Chevrolet Corvette, 1984-1996) who use it as a noun & adjective to describe the taillights fitted to the Corvette ZR1 (1990-1995), released at the 1989 Geneva Motor Show.  Although an obvious visual clue, the ZR1 attracted most attention by its use of an all-aluminium, 350 cubic inch (5.7 litre; LT5) V8 which featured double overhead camshafts (DOHC) and 32 valve heads.  While the displacement was shared with the mainstream small-block Chevrolet V8s, so different was it in terms of construction and internal dimensions that the Corvette community (a priesthood with very firm views) regard it as something separate from the long-running (1954-2003 in production vehicles but still available as a "crate engine") small-block V8 family.  The engine was a co-development between Chevrolet and the UK-based Lotus Group which General Motors (GM, Chevrolet’s parent corporation) had acquired in 1986 (maintaining ownership until 1993) and was intended for use in a Corvette which could be marketed as the “world's fastest production car” (GM defining what constituted “production”); the V8 was given the internal designation LT5.  Although in the mid-1980s electronic engine management systems were still in their infancy, the LT5 did feature some genuine innovations in its fuel management, enabling the combustion chamber design to be optimized for power without this imposing the usual compromises in drivability at lower speeds.  Assembly of the (relatively) low-volume LT5 was sub-contracted to Mercury Marine which had long experience of the materials used in the construction.

LT5 V8 in 1990 (believed built in 1989) Chevrolet Corvette ZR1, one of 25 GM R&D (research & development) prototypes built to test the active-suspension system.

Perhaps of greater significance to GM was the expertise Lotus possessed in chassis design & tuning although the Corvette was a very different machine to the smaller, lighter cars with which Lotus had built their reputation, encapsulated by the philosophy of company founder Colin Chapman (1928–1982): “Simplify, then add lightness”.  Historically, that idea was most “un-Corvette” like and despite the aluminium engine block and heads, the ZR1 did emerge from development weighing some 200 lb (91 kg) more than the typical C4 Corvette, the additional heft the consequence of weightier components needed to support the greater speed and lateral forces made possible by the additional power and cornering capability.  On the road, the Lotus influence was certainly felt, the ZR1’s limits of adhesion as impressive as the then impressively wide (315-35 x 17 inch) tyres would suggest.  Befitting its role, the ZR1 was offered only as a coupé with a removable roof panel (no convertibles were produced) and as well as the wider wheels, it was distinguished from the rest of the range by a widened tail section with a convex rear fascia housing four “squond” taillights, the first time since the 1961 models anything but four round units had appeared on a production Corvette.

1987 Chevrolet Corvette with the round taillights used between 1984-1990 (left) and 1993 Chevrolet Corvette ZR1 with sqounds.

The ZR1 was much admired although not all approved of the squonds.  However, Chevrolet’s stylists must have liked them because in 1990 the convex fascia and squonds were standardized across the range, presumably pleasing the accountants who probably never saw the point of producing two different moldings which fulfilled the same function.  Why the C4 cultists settled on “sqound” isn’t known but it’s likely to have been something which just “came to someone” searching for a word to describe a shape which was neither quite round or square; within the cult there is (as far as in known), no “linguistics & etymology” committee.  In 1990, there was no world wide web and the internet was almost unknown outside of universities and places like the Pentagon so it wasn’t as if Google was there to answer the question.  Had search engines been available, it’s likely sqound might never have been coined because the word “quartic” quickly (as least as quickly as a 2400 kbit/s modem on a dial-up connection permitted) would have been unearthed.

1960 Plymouth Fury four-door hardtop (left), 1974 Austin Allegro 1750 Sport Special (centre) and 2024 Chevrolet Corvette Z06 coupé (right).

Once a technical term in the arcane world of algebra and thus known to only a few, "quartic" first gained a larger audience in 1973 when, to general derision, British Leyland (BL) released the Austin Allegro, complete with a steering wheel which was “not quite round and not quite square".  Explaining it was chosen to afford the diver greater leg-room and provide a better view of the instruments, BL revealed the shape was “quartic”.  The idea actually wasn’t novel, dating back decades and had been used on quite a few American cars during the early 1960s but for whatever reasons, the presence of one in the Allegro attracted little but criticism, something the rest of the vehicle would soon suffer.  BL also attracted the scorn of mathematicians who hastened to point out a quartic is “an algebraic equation or function of the fourth degree or a curve describing such an equation or function” insisting the correct description for a "square with rounded corners" is “squircle” (in algebraic geometry "a closed quartic curve having properties intermediate between those of a square and a circle"), the construct being squ(are) +c(ircle).  Few etymologists (and certainly no lexicographers) appear to have listed sqound as a "real" word but it's of interest because as a rare example in English of a word where a "q" is not followed by a "u"; such constructs do exist but usually in the cases where initialisms have become acronyms such as Qantas (Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services).  Such words do appear in English language texts but they tend to be foreign borrowings including (1) qat (or khat) (a plant native to East Africa and the Arabian Peninsula, often chewed for its stimulant effects), (2) qi (a term from Chinese philosophy referring to life force or energy), qibla (the direction Muslims face when praying (towards the Kaaba in Mecca)) and (4) qiviut (the soft under-wool of the musk-ox, valued when making warm clothing).  For a while, BL pretended to ignore the geometry pedants but within a year replaced the wheel with a conventional circular design.  Whatever the name, variations of the shape have since become popular with high-end manufacturers, Ferrari, Aston-Martin, Lamborghini and others all pursuing non-circular themes and one is a feature of the latest (C8) mid-engined Chevrolet Corvette, in which, unlike the unfortunate Allegro, it's much admired.

The antipodean Edsel: 1973 Leyland P76 Super V8 (left) and 1974 Leyland Force 7V (right).  Only 10 of the prototype Force 7V coupés survived the crusher but although it offered the novelty of a hatchback, the styling was ungainly and the very market segment for which it was intended was close to extinction.  Even had the range survived beyond 1974, success would have been improbable although the company should be commended for having intended to name the luxury version the Tour de Force (from the French and translated literally as "feat of strength"), the irony charming although En dépit de tout (In spite of everything) might better have capture the moment.      

Although 1973 was the last “good year” for the “old” UK economy and one during which British Leyland was looking to the future with some optimism, the corporation’s troubles that year with steering wheels were, in retrospect, a harbinger for what lay ahead.  In addition to the Allegro, also introduced in 1973, on the other side of the planet, was the P76, a large (then a “compact” in US terms) sedan which Leyland Australia hoped would be competitive with the then dominant trio, GMH’s (General Motors Holden) Holden, Ford’s Falcon and Chrysler’s Valiant, the previous attempts using modified variants of UK models less than successful.  Leyland at the time kept expectations low, claiming the target was nothing more than a 10% market share and the initial reception the P76 received suggested this might more than be realized, the consensus of press reports concluding the thing was in many aspects at least as good as the opposition and in some ways superior, the country’s leading automotive that year awarding the V8 version the coveted COTY (Car of the Year) trophy.  Unfortunately, the circumstances of 26 June 1973 when the P76 was launched didn’t last, the first oil crisis beginning some four months later which resulted in a spike in the price of oil which not only suddenly dampened demand for larger cars but also triggered what was then the most severe and longest-lasting recession of the post-war years.  Basic design flaws in the body engineering and indifferent quality control contributed to the debacle which is now remembered as the Australian industry’s Edsel and in October 1974 production of the P76 ended and Leyland closed its Australian manufacturing facilities, never to re-open.  Not even the much-vaunted ability of the P76 effortlessly to carry a 44 (imperial) gallon (53 US gallon; 205 litre) drum in its trunk (boot) had been enough to save the outpost of the old empire.

1973 P76 with the original sharp-edged steering wheel (left) and the later version, designed for the Force 7 (right).  The P76's steering wheel was one of many flaws which were planned to be rectified (or at least ameliorated) in the "facelifted" version scheduled for 1975 but before the end of 1974 the decision had been taken in London to axe the entire Leyland Australia project.    

Given the geo-political situation, rampant inflation and troubled industrial relations of the time, the P76’s steering wheel is really just a footnote in the sad tale but, like the Allegro’s “quartic” venture it was emblematic of the self-inflicted injuries to which Leyland would subject itself, both in the UK and its antipodean offshoot.  When the P76 made its debut in 1976, there was some comment that the steering wheel’s boss had a horn-pad in the shape of a boomerang, emphasizing the Australian connection but what was criticized was the rim which had a bizarre, concave cross-section, meaning a quite sharp edge faced the driver, leaving an impression on the palms of the hands after only a few minutes driving; it wasn't comfortable and those selling steering wheel covers did good business.  The industry legend is the shape was a consequence of the typist (in 1973 it was SOP (standard operational procedure) to blame women whenever possible) who prepared the final specification-sheet having mixed up “concave” & “convex” but even if that’s true it’s remarkable the obvious flaw in the design wasn’t rectified at the prototype stage.  Some have doubted the veracity of the story but such things do happen.  On 23 September, 1999, NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) lost the US$125 million Mars Climate Orbiter spacecraft after its 286-day journey to Mars and that was a time when US$125 million was still a lot of money.  There was of course the inevitable review which found the craft’s directional thrusters had, over the course of several months, been incorrectly fired because the control data had been calculated in incorrect units.  The contractor Lockheed Martin (responsible for the calculations) was sending data in Imperial measures (pounds) to NASA, while NASA's navigation team, expecting metric units, interpreted the numbers as Newtons).  As far as is known, neither the contractor nor the agency attempted to blame a typist.

Picture of Lindsay Lohan in sqound frame (frame by Hanna Zasimova) (left) and sqound headlight surrounds on 1971 Chrysler (Australia) VG Valiant VIP (right).  Passing usually unnoticed, sqounds are all around us although mathematicians insists the shape is neither a sqound nor a quartic but a squircle.

Cynophagia

Cynophagia (pronounced)

The practice of eating dog meat.

Late 1700-early 1800s: The construct was cyno- + phagia.  Cyno was a combining form of the Ancient Greek κύων (kúōn or kýon) (dog) and the suffix –phagia was from the Ancient Greek -φαγία (-phagía) (and related to -φαγος (-phagos) (eater)), corresponding to φαγεῖν (phageîn) (to eat), infinitive of ἔφαγον (éphagon) (I eat), which serves as infinitive aorist for the defective verb ἐσθίω (esthíō) (I eat).  In English, use is now most frequent in mental health to reference the consumption of untypical items.  Being a cynophagist (a person who engages in cynophagia) is not synonymous with being a cynophile (a person who loves canines) although it’s not impossible there may be some overlap in the predilections.  The construct was cyno- +‎ -phile.  The –phile suffix was from the Latin -phila, from the Ancient Greek φίλος (phílos). (dear, beloved) and was used to forms noun & adjectives to convey the meanings “loving”, “friendly”, “admirer” or “friend”.  In the context of metal health, the condition would be described as cynophilia.  The -philia suffix was from the Ancient Greek φιλία (philía) (fraternal) love).  It was used to form nouns conveying a liking or love for something and in clinical use was applied often to an abnormal or obsessive interest, especially if it came to interfere with other aspects of life (the general term is paraphilia).  The companion suffix is the antonym -phobia. The related forms are the prefixes phil- & philo- and the suffixes -philiac, -philic, -phile & -phily.  Cynophagia, cynophagy, cynophagism & cynophagist are nouns and cynophagic is an adjective; the noun plural is cynophagists.

The word cynophagia was coined as part of the movement in European scholarship in the late eighteenth & early nineteenth centuries which used words from classical languages (Ancient Greek & Latin) as elements to create the lexicon of “modern” science & medicine, reflecting the academic & professional reverence for the supposed purity of the Ancient world.  The reason there was a cynophagia but not a “ailourphagia” (which would have meant “the practice of eating cat meat”) is probably because while the reports from European explorers & colonial administrators would have sent from the orient many reports of the eating of dogs, there were likely few accounts of felines as food.  The construct of “ailourphagia” would have been ailour-, from the Ancient Greek αἴλουρος (aílouros) (cat) + phagia.  The Greek elements of ailouros were aiolos (quick-moving or nimble) & oura (tail), the allusion respectively to the agility of cats and their characteristic tail movements.  There are of course ailurophiles (one especially fond of cats), notably the "childless cat ladies" and disturbingly, there's also paedophage (child eater).

Photograph of a sign announcing the impending opening butchery specializing in dog meat, Paris, 1909.

The image is from time-to-time posed on various Reddit subs, eliciting responses usually somewhere on the redditor spectrum (outrage, disgust, amusement, blame Donald Trump etc) but historian Stéphane Le Bras (b 1977) traced the image’s source and revealed it was fake news, a hoax created to have something to sell to the newspapers, the photographer knowing editors would run it because of recent debates about the French ban on dog meat consumption.  It’s said the hoax’s total production costs were around 20 francs while revenue from the image was almost 500.  Some months later, in April 1910, the truth was told in La vie sportive et mondaine. 

Historically, east of Suez, consuming dog meat was not uncommon and in some cultures it was a significant contribution to regional protein intake while in other places it was either unlawful of taboo.  Carnivorism (the practice of eating meat) is an almost universal human practice but what is acceptable varies between cultures.  Some foods are proscribed (such as shellfish or pig-meat) and while it’s clear the origin of these bans was as a kind of “public heath” measure (the rules created in hot climates in the pre-refrigeration age), the observance became a pillar of religious observance.  Sometimes, a similar rule seems originally to have had an economic imperative such as the Hindu restriction on the killing of cattle for consumption, thus the phrase “sacred cow”, the original rationale being the calculation the live beasts made an economic contribution which much outweighed their utility as a protein source.  So, what is deemed acceptable and not is a cultural construct and that varies from place-to-place, the Western aversion to eating cats & dogs attributable to the sentimental view of them which has evolved because of the role for millennia as domestic pets.  Over history, it’s likely every animal in the world has at some point been used as a food source, some an acquired taste such as the “deep fried tarantula” which, long a tasty snack in parts of Cambodia, became a novelty item in Cambodian restaurants in the West.  There are though probably some creatures which taste so awful they’re never eaten, such as parrots which ate the seeds of tobacco plants, lending their flesh a “distinctive flavor”.  The recipe for their preparation was:

(1) Place plucked parrot and an old boot in vat of salted water and slow-cook for 24 hours.
(2) After 24 hours remove parrot & boot.
(3) Throw away parrot and eat old boot.

Analysts had expected “more of the same” from Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) in his debate with Kamala Harris (b 1964; US vice president since 2021): the southern border, illegal immigrants, inflation et al.  What none predicted was that so much of the post-debate traffic would be about Mr Trump’s assertion Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio (one of literally dozens of localities in the country so named, one factor which influenced it becoming the name of the town in the Fox cartoon series The Simpsons) were eating the pets of the residents (ie their cats & dogs).  As racist tropes go, it followed the script in terms of the “otherness, barbarism, incompatibility” etc of “outsiders in our midst” although there seemed to be nothing to suggest there was any tradition of such consumption in Haiti.  Still, at least it was something novel and it wasn’t the first time pet cats had been mentioned in the 2024 presidential campaign, Mr Trump’s choice of running mate as JD Vance (b 1984; US senator (Republican-Ohio) since 2023) bring renewed attention to the latter’s 2021 interview then Fox News host Tucker Carlson (b 1969) in which he observed the US had fallen into the hands of corporate oligarchs. Radical Democratic Party politicians and “…a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they've made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too.”

Eventually, that would be answered by the childless cat ladies, notably the most famous: the singer Taylor Swift (b 1989) who posted an endorsement of Kamala Harris, posing with Benjamin Button, the Ragdoll she adopted in 2019.  Benjamin Button was no stranger to fame, the seemingly nonplussed puss appearing of the cover announcing Ms Swift as Time magazine’s 2023 Person of the Year.

Childless cat lady Taylor Swift with Ragdoll Benjamin Button, named after the eponymous character in the movie The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008), Time Magazine cover for “Person of the Year” edition, 25 December, 2023.  Ragdoll cats make good stoles because (due apparently to a genetic mutation) they tend to “go limp” when picked up. 

Ms Swift is of course a song-writer so well accustomed to crafting text to achieve the desired effect and one word nerd lawyer quickly deconstructed, much taken by the first three paragraphs which interlaced the first person (“I” & “me/my”) and the “you” while avoiding starting any sentence with “I” (a technique taught as a way of conveying “objectivity”) until the she announces her conclusion:

 “Like many of you, I watched the debate tonight. If you haven’t already, now is a great time to do your research on the issues at hand and the stances these candidates take on the topics that matter to you the most. As a voter, I make sure to watch and read everything I can about their proposed policies and plans for this country.”

“Recently I was made aware that AI of ‘me’ falsely endorsing Donald Trump’s presidential run was posted to his site. It really conjured up my fears around AI, and the dangers of spreading misinformation. It brought me to the conclusion that I need to be very transparent about my actual plans for this election as a voter. The simplest way to combat misinformation is with the truth.”

“I will be casting my vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz in the 2024 Presidential Election. I’m voting for @kamalaharris because she fights for the rights and causes I believe need a warrior to champion them. I think she is a steady-handed, gifted leader and I believe we can accomplish so much more in this country if we are led by calm and not chaos. I was so heartened and impressed by her selection of running mate @timwalz, who has been standing up for LGBTQ+ rights, IVF, and a woman’s right to her own body for decades.”

So, a classic example of a technique which might be used by someone disinterested: two premises which lead to a conclusion, the rhythm of the lyric being “I, I, you, you, you.”  Then, after the “you, you, you” of the “discussion” has made it clear where her focus is, every sentence in the third paragraph begins with “I”, emulation a cadence which might appear in a musical track: “I’ve done my research, and I’ve made my choice. Your research is all yours to do, and the choice is yours to make.”  One can see why her songs are said to be so catchy.

The intervention of Ms Swift and Benjamin Button produced reactions. 

Newspapers haven’t always been effective in changing voting intentions or nudging governments in particular public policy directions.  During the inter-war years the Beaverbrook (the Daily & Sunday Express and the less disreputable Evening Standard) press in the UK ran a long and ineffective campaign promoting “empire free trade” and the evidence suggests the editorial position a publication adopted to advocate its readers vote one way or the other was more likely to reflect than shift public opinion.  One reason is that in the West, while politics is very interested in the people, the people tend not to be interested in politics and most thoughtful editorials are barely read.  People are however rabid consumers of popular culture and one opposition leader would later claim an interview a woman’s magazine conducted with his (abandoned) ex-wife did him more political damage than anything written by political or economics reporters, however critical.  With 283 million followers on Instagram (Ms Harris has 18 million), Ms Swift’s intervention may prove decisive if she shifts just a few votes in the famous “battleground states”.

Celebrity endorsements are not unusual; some successful, some not.  In 2016, Lindsay Lohan endorsed crooked Hillary Clinton (who did win the popular vote so there was that).

Whether Ms Swift’s endorsement of Kamala Harris will shift many opinions isn’t known (many analysts concluding the electorate long ago coalesced into “Trump” & “anti-Trump” factions) but the indications are she may have been remarkably effective in persuading to vote those who may not otherwise have bothered, the assumption being most of these converts to participation will follow her lead and it’s long been understood that to win elections in the US, the theory is simple: get those who don’t vote to vote for you.  In practice, that has been difficult to achieve at scale (the best executions in recent years by the campaign teams of George W Bush (George XLIII, b 1946; US president 2001-2009) in 2004 and Barack Obama (b 1961; US president 2009-2017) in 2008.

However, in including a custom URL which directed people to vote.gov where they could register to vote produced a spike in voter registration, the US General Services Administration (GSA) revealing an “unprecedented” 338,000-odd unique visits to their portal in the hours after Ms Swift’s post.  Although the “shape” of the hits isn’t known, most seem to be assuming that (as well as some childless cat ladies), those who may be voting for the first time will tend to be (1) young and (2) female, reflecting the collective profile of Ms Swift’s “Swifties”.  They are the demographic the Democratic Party wants.  The GSA called it the “Swift effect” and added that while in the past there had been events which produced smaller spikes, they were brief in duration unlike the Swifties woh for days kept up the traffic, the aggregate numbers dwarfing even the “intensity and enthusiasm” in the wake of the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) overturning Roe v Wade (1973) prior to the 2022 mid-term congressional elections.

In an interview with JD Vance, Fox News asked what he thought might be the significance of Ms Swift mobilizing the childless cat lady vote and he responded: “We admire Taylor Swift’s music. But I don’t think most Americans, whether they like her music, or are fans of hers or not, are going to be influenced by a billionaire celebrity who I think is fundamentally disconnected from the interests and problems of most people.  When grocery prices go up by 20 per cent, it hurts most Americans. It doesn’t hurt Taylor Swift. When housing prices become unaffordable, it doesn’t affect Taylor Swift, or any other billionaire.”  Fox News choose not to pursue the matter of whether self-described “billionaire celebrity” Donald Trump could be said to be “…fundamentally disconnected from the interests and problems of most people.”

In “damage-limitation” mode, the Trump campaign mobilized generative AI in an attempt to re-capture the childless cat lady vote.  After the debate, Mr Trump had added geese to the alleged diet of Springfield’s Haitian residents.

Mr Trump may have himself to blame for Ms Swift’s annoying endorsement because he’d earlier posted fake, AI-generated images on his social media platform, Truth Social, suggesting she’d urged her the Swifties to vote for him.  Such things were of course not foreseen by the visionary AI (artificial intelligence) researchers of the 1950s, the genie is out of the bottle and given that upholding the “freedom of speech” guaranteed by the First Amendment to the constitution is one of the few things on which the SCOTUS factions agree, the genie is not going back.

The meme-makers have really taken to generative AI.

So while generative AI doesn’t allow mean the meme makers can suddenly create images once impossible, it does mean they can be produced by those without artistic skills or specialized resources and the whole matter of the culinary preferences of Haitians in Ohio is another blow for the state.  It was only in May 2024 that a number of schools in issued a ban on Gen Alpha slang terms including:

Ohio: It means “bad” with all that implies (dull, boring, ugly, poor etc).  Because of the way language evolves, it may also come to mean “people who eat pet cats & dogs”.  The implication is it’s embarrassing to be from Ohio.

Skibidi: A reference to a viral meme of a person’s head coming out of a toilet; it implies the subject so described is “weird”.

Sigma: Unrelated to the 18^th letter of the Greek alphabet, it’s been re-purposed as a rung on the male social hierarchy somewhat below the “alpha-male”.

Rizz: This one has a respectable pedigree, being the the Oxford English Dictionary’s (OED) 2023 word of the year.  It’s said technically to be a “Gen Z word”, short for “charisma”.  It has been banned because Gen Alpha like to use it in the negative (ie “lacking rizz”; “no rizz” etc).

Mewing: A retort or exclamation used to interrupt someone who is complaining about something trivial.  Gen Alpha are using it whenever their teachers say something they prefer not discuss.

Gyatt: A woman with a big butt, said originally based on the expression “goddam your ass thick.”

Bussin’: “Good, delicious, high quality” etc.

Baddie: A tough, bolshie girl who “doesn’t take shit form no one”.  It’s a similar adaptation of meaning to a term like “filth” which means “very attractive”.

Fedsurrection

Fedsurrection (pronounced fed-suh-rek-shuhn)

An ostensibly spontaneous, public event (protest, demonstration or rally) (1) actually arranged or organized by organs of a government or (2) such an event when government agents (posing as participants) infiltrate said event, inciting (or inducing others to incite) unrest and violence, either as a form of entrapment or to create a public perception of crisis, enabling repressive measures to be imposed.  The companion term is “fauxsurrection”, used in a similar vein.

1922: A portmanteau word, the construct being (fed)eral agent (or (fed)eral government) +‎ (in)surrection.  In federations, federal (pertaining to or of the nature of a union of states under a central government where sovereignty resides (a federation) as distinct from a looser constitutional arrangement in which sovereignty is shared between the constituent states and the central government (a confederation), as an adjective (often capitalized), is used to distinguish between the central and the state or provincial governments.  Federal dates from 1625–1630 and was from the French fédéral, replacing the earlier foederal, from the Classical Latin foeder- (stem of foedus) (formal agreement, treaty, league, covenant, alliance).  Insurrection was from the late Middle English insurreccion (uprising against a government, rebellion, revolt; civil disorder, riot; illegal armed assault”), from the Middle French insurrection, from the Old French insurreccïon (which persists in modern French as insurrection) and from their etymon the Latin īnsurrēctiōnem, the accusative singular of īnsurrēctiō (rising up, insurrection, rebellion), from īnsurgō (to rise up), the construct being in- (the prefix used in the sense of “in, inside, within”) + surgō (to arise, get up; to rise), the construct being su(b)- (the prefix used in the sense of (from) beneath, under)) + regō (to direct, govern, rule; to guide, steer; to manage, oversee) (ultimately from the primitive Indo-European hereǵ- (to right oneself, straighten; just; right)).  The Late Latin insurrēctiōn- was the stem of insurrēctiō, from insurrēct(us) (risen up, rebelled), the construct being the past participle of insurgere (to get up, ascend, rebel”; insurgent) + -iō (-ion); the –ion suffix was from the Middle English -ioun, from the Old French -ion, from the Latin -iō (genitive -iōnis).  It was appended to a perfect passive participle to form a noun of action or process, or the result of an action or process.  Fedsurrection, fedsurrectionism, fedsurrectionary & fedsurrectionist are nouns, fedsurrected & fedsurrectioning are verbs, fedsurrectious, fedsurrectional, fedsurrectory & fedsurrectionesque are adjectives and fedinsurrectionally is an adverb; the noun plural is fedsurrections.

The multi-media US personality Ye (the artist formerly known as Kanye West (b 1977)) in MAGA hat.

It’s not clear just who coined or first used fedsurrection but it spiked rapidly in use in January 2022 when, during a press conference marking the one-year anniversary of the 6 January Capitol attack, it was used by MAGA intellectuals Marjorie Taylor Greene (b 1974; US representative (Republican, Georgia) since 2021) & Matt Gaetz (b 1982; US representative (Republican-Florida) since 2017).  MAGA is the acronym for “Make America Great Again”.  Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) first (publicly) used the phrase in November 2012, the day after the 2012 presidential election in which Democrat Barack Obama (b 1961; US president 2009-2017) defeated Republican Mitt Romney (b 1947; governor of Massachusetts 2003-2007, US senator (Republican-Utah) since 2019) when he tweeted on X (then known as Twitter): “We will Make America Great Again!”  The initialism “WWMAGA” obviously wasn’t going to work as an acronym so it was truncated to MAGA which quickly Mr Trump registered as a trademark.  In political history, there have been a number of variations of the phrase, most famously: “Let's Make America Great Again”, used by Republican Ronald Reagan (1911-2004; US president 1981-1989) during his successful 1980 presidential campaign.  Since creating the MAGA trademark, Mr Trump used it as what he called “my theme” and in the modern parlance it became “his brand”, applied to the usual merchandise (T-shirts, USB sticks, baseball caps etc), all presumably manufactured somewhere in the Far East.

The event which inspired “fedsurrection” was of course the 6 January 2021 “Capitol attack” in Washington DC, the dramatic day which gained a new audience for the post Civil War (1861-1865) Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution (Section 3, 1866):

No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Fox News staples (for different reasons): Lindsay Lohan (left), Ted Cruz (centre) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (right).  The sublime to the ridiculous.

Fedsurrection describes what sounds a classic conspiracy theory: the assertion federal agents or informants orchestrated or incited the events of that day and while most were at least sceptical, the theory gained traction as it was discussed and promoted on a variety of conservative platforms, notably Tucker Carlson (b 1969), then hosting a nightly talk-show on Rupert Murdoch’s (b 1931) Fox News.  Although most analysts conclude Fox News “preaches to the converted”, the more controversial (some prefer “wacky”) content does get disseminated, its influence on political discourse thus extending well beyond the committed Fox audience.  Those who have chosen to promote (or at least less than critically discuss) fedsurrection, include two of the usual suspects, X owner Elon Musk (b 1971) and Ted Cruz (b 1970; US senator (Republican-Texas) since 2013); whether either believe the “theory” or its implications isn’t known but both will have their own reasons for finding it a helpful device.

Support for the theory is not restricted to a right-wing fringe in the US.  In July 2016, what came to be described as “a faction within armed forces”, staged a coup, attempting to overthrow the government of Turkey (now officially the Republic of Türkiye).  In the turbulent business of post-Ottoman Turkish politics, military coups are not unusual (some half-dozen of them since 1960) but the 2016 coup was as ineptly executed as the Wehrmacht’s failed attempt to overthrow the Nazi state in July 1944, both quickly suppressed.  However, so efficiently crushed were the Turkish plotters that almost immediately suggestions arose that it may have been something “staged” by the state to justify a long planned crackdown on dissent, a view given some credence by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (b 1954; prime-minister or president of the Republic of Türkiye since 2003) doing exactly that.  In one of the more unnecessary statements of political intent, in the coup’s aftermath, Mr Erdoğan warned those responsible they would “…pay a heavy price for this.” and he was a good as his word, his “counter-coup” notably more successful than that of the generals & admirals: within months, the purge claimed some 68,000 military & police officers, academics, judges, regional politicians and civil servants, variously arrested, suspended or jailed, some receiving life sentences.  The Turkish people understood Mr Erdoğan’s language and there has been no repetition of the misbehaviour though there’s little to suggest what happened in 2016 was a fedsurrection but that’s not to imply governments don’t use the tactic, “public” demonstrations known to have been encouraged (ie ordered or paid for) by administrations in the PRC (People’s Republic of China), The Islamic Republic of Iran and any number of regimes in the Middle East, the journalist Robert Fisk (1946–2020) noting in The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East (2005) that while it wasn’t unusual for crowds to turn up for “spontaneous demonstrations”, they were viewed in the Arab world as a threat only “when they are real and not the government sponsored variety.”

Platform

Platform (pronounced plat-fawrm)

(1) A horizontal surface or structure raised above the surrounding area, used for appearances, performances etc (speeches, music, drama etc) and known also as a dais or podium if used for public speaking.

(2) A raised floor constructed for any purpose (an area for workers during construction, the mounting of weapons etc.

(3) The raised area (usually a constructed structure) between or alongside the tracks of a railroad station, designed to provide passenger or freight ingress & egress.

(4) The open entrance area, or vestibule, at the end of a railroad passenger car.

(5) A landing in a flight of stairs.

(6) A public statement of the principles, objectives, and policy (often referred to as “planks”, the metaphor being the timber planks used to build physical platforms) on the of a political party, especially as put forth by the representatives of the party in a convention to nominate candidates for an election; a body of principles on which a person or group takes a stand in appealing to the public; program; a set of principles; plan.

(7) Figuratively, a place or an opportunity to express one's opinion (historically also referred to as a tribune; a place for public discussion; a forum.

(8) Figuratively, something (a strategy, a campaign etc) which provides the basis on which some project or cause can advance (described also as a foundation or stage).

(9) A deck-like construction on which the drill rig of an offshore oil or gas well is erected.

(10) In naval architecture, a light deck, usually placed in a section of the hold or over the floor of the magazine (also used in to general nautical design).

(11) In structural engineering, a relatively flat member or construction for distributing weight, as a wall plate, grillage etc.

(12) In military jargon, solid ground on which artillery pieces are mounted or a metal stand or base attached to certain types of artillery pieces.

(13) In geology, a vast area of undisturbed sedimentary rocks which, together with a shield, constitutes a craton (often the product of wave erosion).

(14) In footwear design, a thick insert of leather, cork, or other sturdy material between the uppers and the sole of a shoe, usually intended for stylish effect or to give added height; technically an ellipsis of “platform shoe”, “platform boot” etc.

(15) In computing (as an ellipsis of “computing platform”, a certain combination of operating system or environment & hardware (with the software now usually functioning as a HAL (hardware abstraction layer) to permit the use of non-identical equipment); essentially a standardized system which allows software from a variety of vendors seamlessly to operate.

(16) In internet use (especially of social media and originally as an ellipsis of “digital platform”), software system used to provide online and often multi-pronged interactive services.

(17) In manufacturing, a standardised design which permits variations to be produced without structural change to the base.

(18) In automotive manufacturing (as an ellipsis of “car platform”, a set of components able to be shared by several models (and sometimes shared even between manufacturers).  The notion of the platform evolved from the literal platforms (chassis) used to build the horse-drawn carriages of the pre-modern era.

(19) A plan, sketch, model, pattern, plan of action or conceptual description (obsolete).

(20) In Myanmar (Burma), the footpath or sidewalk.

1540–1550: From the Middle English platte forme (used also as plateforme), from the Middle French plateforme (a flat form), the construct being plate (flat) from the Old French plat, from the Ancient Greek πλατύς (platús) (flat) + forme (form) from the Latin fōrma (shape; figure; form).  It was related to flatscape which survived into modern English as a rare literary & poetic device and which begat the derogatory blandscape (a bland-looking landscape), encouraging the derived “dullscape”, “beigescape”, “shitscape” etc.  Platform & platforming are nouns & verbs, platformer & platformization are nouns, platformed is a verb; the noun plural is platforms.  The noun & adjective platformative and the noun & adverb platformativity are non-standard.

In English, the original sense was “plan of action, scheme, design” which by the 1550s was used to mean “ground-plan, drawing, sketch”, these uses long extinct and replaced by “plan”.  The sense of a “raised, level surface or place” was in use during the 1550s, used particularly of a “raised frame or structure with a level surface”.  In geography, by the early nineteenth century a platform was a “flat, level piece of ground”, distinguished for a “plateau” which was associated exclusively with natural elevated formations; geologists by mid-century standardized their technical definition (a vast area of undisturbed sedimentary rocks which, together with a shield, constitutes a craton (often the product of wave erosion).  The use in railroad station design meaning a “raised area (usually a constructed structure) between or alongside the tracks of a railroad station, designed to provide passenger or freight ingress & egress” dates from 1832.

Donald Trump on the platform, Butler, Pennsylvania, 13 July 2024.

For politicians, the platform can be a dangerous place and the death toll of those killed while on the hustings is not inconsiderable.  Since the attempted assassination of Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021), he and his running mate in the 2024 presidential election (JD  James (b 1984; US senator (Republican-Ohio) since 2023) speak behind bullet-proof glass, the threat from homicidal "childless cat ladies" apparently considered "plausible".

The familiar modern use in politics was a creation of US English meaning a “statement of political principles policies which will be adopted or implemented were the candidates of the party to secure a majority at the upcoming election” and appeared first in 1803.  The use would have been derived from the literal platform (ie “on the hustings”) on which politicians stood to address crowds although some etymologists suggest it may have been influenced by late sixteenth century use in England to describe a “set of rules governing church doctrine" (1570s).  During the nineteenth century, platform came to be used generally as a figurative device alluding to “the function of public speaking” and even for a while flourished as a verb (“to address the public as a speaker”).

Lindsay Lohan in Saint Laurent Billy leopard-print platform boots (Saint Laurent part number 532469), New York, March 2019.  Of heels and soles, there is math in the way optimal stability is achieved.

On the internet, "cancelling" or "cancel culture" refers to the social (media) phenomenon in which institutions or individuals (either “public figures” or those transformed into a public figures by virtue of an incautious (in the case of decades-old statements sometimes something at the time uncontroversial) tweet or post are called publicly “shamed”, criticized, or boycotted for a behaviour, statement or action deemed to be offensive (problematic often the preferred term) or harmful.  Cancelling is now quite a thing and part of the culture wars but the practice is not knew, the verb deplatform (often as de-platform) used in UK university campus politics as early as 1974 in the sense of “attempt to block the right of an individual to speak at an event (usually on campus)”; the comparative noun & verb being “deplatforming”.  The unfortunate noun & verb “platforming” began in railway use in the sense of (1) the construction of platforms and (2) the movement of passengers or freight on a platform but in the early 2010s it gained a new meaning among video gamers who used it to describe the activity of “jumping from one platform to another.”  Worse still is “platformization” which refers to (1) the increasing domination of the internet by a number of large companies whose products function as markets for content and (2) also in internet use, the conversion of a once diverse system into a self-contained platform.  Software described as “cross-platform” or “platform agnostic” is able to run on various hardware and software combinations.

IBM: In 1983 things were looking good.

In computing, the term “platform” was in use long before “social media platforms” became part of the vernacular.  The significance of “platform” was compatibility, the rationale being that software sold by literally thousands of vendors could be run on machines produced by different companies, sometimes with quite significantly different hardware (the “bus wars” used to be a thing).  The compatibility was achieved was by an operating system (OS) creating was called the HAL (hardware abstraction layer), meaning that by a variety of techniques (most notably “device drivers”)’ an operating system could make disparate hardware manifest as “functionally identical” to application level software.  So, in a sign of the times, the once vital concept of “IBM compatibility” came to be supplanted by “Windows compatibility” and the assertion by in 1984 by NEC when releasing the not “wholly” compatible APC-III that “IBM compatibility is just a state of mind” was the last in its ilk; the APC-III architecture proving a one-off.  The classic computing platform became the “WinTel” (sometimes as “Wintel”, a portmanteau word, the construct being Win(dows) + (In)tel), the combination of the Microsoft Windows OS and the Intel central processing unit (CPU), an evolution traceable to IBM’s decision in 1980 to produce their original PC-1 with an open architecture using Microsoft’s DOS (disk operation system) and Intel’s 8088 (8/16 bit) & 8086 (16 bit) CPUs rather than use in-house products.  In the IBM boardroom, that at the time would have seemed a good idea but it was one which within a decade almost doomed the corporation as the vast ecosystem of “clone” PCs enriched Microsoft & Intel while cannibalizing the corporate market which had built IBM into a huge multi-national.  It is the Wintel platform which for more than forty years has underpinned the digital revolution and, like the steam engine, transformed the world.

The noun & adjective platformative and the noun & adverb platformativity are non-standard.  Platformative was built on the model of “performative” which (1) in structural linguistics and philosophy is used to mean “being enacted as it is said” (ie follows the script) and (2) in post-modernist deconstructionist theory refers to something done as a “performance” for purposes of “spectacle or to create an impression”.  “Platformative is understood as some sort of event or situation which is (1) dependent on the platform on which it is performed or (2) something which exists to emphasise the platform rather than itself.  Platformativity was built on the model of performativity which as a noun (1) in philosophy referred to the capacity of language and expressive actions to perform a type of being and (2) the quality of being performative.  As an adverb, it described something done “in a performative manner”.  The actual use of platformativity seems often mysterious but usually the idea is the extent to which the meaning of a “statement or act” (ie the text) is gained or changed depending upon the platform on which it transpired (something of a gloss on the idea “The medium is the message” which appeared in Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (1964) by Marshall McLuhan (1911-1980).

The automotive platform

In automobile mass-production, the term “platform” tended to be generic until the post-war years and was used (if at all) interchangeably with “chassis” or “frame”, the basic underling structure used to mount the mechanical components and add the bodywork.  The growing adoption of “unitary” construction during the mid-century years radically changed the way cars were manufactured but didn’t much change the language, the underpinnings still often referred to as the “chassis” even though engineers cheerfully would point out one no longer existed.  What did change the language was sudden proliferation of models offered by the US industry in the 1960s; where once, each line (apart from the odd speciality) had a single model, emerging in the 1960s would be ranges consisting of the (1) full-size, (2) intermediate, (3) compact and (4) sub-compact.  The strange foreign cars were often so small they were often described variously as “micros” & “sub-micros”.  With such different sizes now being built, different platforms were required and these came to be known usually with titles like “A Platform”, “C Platform”, “E Platform” etc (although “A Body”, “C Body” etc were also used interchangeably).  Such nomenclature had actually been in use in Detroit as early as the 1920s but there was little public perception of the use which rarely appeared outside engineering departments or corporate boardrooms.  The concept of the platform was in a sense “engineering agnostic” because the various platforms could be unitary, with a traditional separate chassis or one of a variety of BoF (body-on-frame) constructions (X-Frame, Perimeter-Frame, Ladder-Frame etc).  Regardless, in the language of internal designation, anything could be a “platform”.

With the coming of the 1960s, the “platform” concept became the standard industry language, quickly picked up the motoring press which observed the most notable aspect of the concept was that the design of platforms emphasised the ability to be adapted to a number of different models, often with little more structural adjustment than a (quick & cheap) stretch of the wheelbase or a slightly wider track, both things able to be accommodated on the existing production line without the need to re-tool.  The designers of platforms needed to be cognizant not only of the vehicles which would be mounted atop but also production line rationalization.  What this implies is that the more models which could be produced using the single platform, all else being equal, the more profitable that platform tended to be and some of the long-running platforms proved great cash cows.  However, if a platform (1) proved more expensive to produce than the industry average and (2) was used only on a single or limited number of lines, it could be what Elon Musk (b 1971) would now call a “money furnace”.  Such a fate befell Chrysler’s “E Platform” (usually called the “E Body”), produced between 1969-1974 for two close to identical companion lines.  Exacerbating the E Platforms woes was it being released (1) just before its market segment suffered a precipitous decline in sales, (2) government mandated rules began to make it less desirable, (3) rising insurance costs limited the appeal of the most profitable models and (4) the first oil shock of 1973-1974 drove a final nail into the coffin.

1960 Ford Falcon (US, left) and 1976 Ford PC LTD (Australia, right).  Both built on the "Falcon Platform", the 1960 original was on a 109½ inch (2781 mm) wheelbase and fitted with a 144 cubic inch (2.4 litre) straight-six.  By 1973, Ford Australia had stretched the platform to a 121 inch (3100 mm) wheelbase and fitted a 351 cubic inch (5.8 litre) (335 series "Cleveland") V8.      

Ford in North America introduced the Falcon in 1960 in response to the rising sales of smaller imports, a phenomenon the domestic industry had brought upon itself by making their own mainstream production bigger and heavier during the late 1950s and tellingly, when later they would introduce their “intermediate” ranges, these vehicles were about the size cars had been in 1955; they proved very popular although rising prosperity did mean sales of the full-size lines would remain buoyant until mugged by economic reality in a post oil-shock world.  The Falcon began modestly enough and while the early versions were very obviously built to a (low) price and intended to be a commodity to be disposed of when “used up”, it found a niche and Ford knew it was onto something.  The early platform wasn’t without its flaws, as Australian buyers would discover when they took their stylish new 1960 Falcon to the outback roads the frumpy but robust Holden handled without complaint, but it proved adaptable: In North America, the Falcon was produced between 1960-1969, it lasted from 1962-1991 in Argentina and in Australia, in a remarkable variety of forms, it was offered between 1960-2016.

On the Falcon platform: 1965 Mustang (6 cylinder, left) and 1969 Mustang Boss 429 (right).  In the vibrant market for early Mustangs, although it's the high-performance versions and Shelby American's derivatives which attract the collectors, massively out-selling such things were the so-called "grocery-getters", configured typically with small (in US terms) 6 cylinder engines and automatic transmissions.  The "grocery-getters" used to be known as "secretary's" or "librarian's" cars but such sexist stereotyping would now attract cancellation (once known as "de-platforming).

In North America however, the platform wasn’t retired when the last of the Falcons was sold in 1970 because it was used also for other larger Fords (and companion Mercury & even (somewhat improbably) Lincoln models) including the Fairlane (1962-1970), Maverick (1970–1977) & Granada 1975-1980.  Most famously of course, it was the Falcon platform which was the basis for the first generation Mustang (1964-1973); if the development costs for the Falcon hadn’t been amortized by the time the Mustang was released, the extraordinary popularity of the new “pony car” meant the profits were huge.  It’s of course misleading to suggest a machine like the 1969 Mustang Boss 429 (7.0 litre) was “underneath the body just a Falcon with a big engine” but the basic design is the same and between the early versions of the two, there are many interchangeable parts.  Later, Ford would maintain other long-lasting platforms.  The Fox platform would run between 1979-1993 (the SN95 platform (1994-2004) is sometimes called the “Fox/SN95” because it was “a Fox update" but it was so substantial most engineers list it separately) and the larger Panther platform enjoyed an even more impressive longevity; released in 1979, the final Panther wasn’t produced until 2012.