Someone recently passed this article on to me, which I posted on another board. It was promptly removed. So sad . . .

Frightening News from France

Once again, the real news in France is conveniently

not being reported as it should. To give you an idea

of what's going on in France where there are now

between 5 and 6 million Muslims and about 600,000 Jews,

here is an email that came from a Jew living in

France. Please read! Will the world say nothing - again - as it did in Hitler's time?

"I AM A JEW -- therefore I am forwarding this to

everyone on all my e-mail lists. I will not sit back

and do nothing." Nowhere have the flames of

anti-Semitism burned more furiously than in France:

Lyon, a car was rammed into a synagogue and set

on fire. In Montpellier, the Jewish religious center

was firebombed; so were synagogues in Strasbourg and

Marseilles; so was a Jewish school in Creteil - all recently.

A Jewish sports club in Toulouse was attacked with

Molotov cocktails, and on the statue of Alfred

Dreyfus in Paris, the words "Dirty Jew" were

painted. In Bondy, 15 men beat up members of a

Jewish football team with sticks and metal bars. The

bus that takes Jewish children to school in

Aubervilliers has been attacked three times in the last 14 months.

According to the Police, metropolitan Paris has seen

10 to 12 anti-Jewish incidents PER DAY in the past

30 days. Walls in Jewish neighborhoods have been

defaced with slogans proclaiming "Jews to the gas

chambers" and "Death to the Jews."

A gunman opened fire on a Kosher butcher's shop

(and, of course, the butcher) in Toulouse , France;

a Jewish couple in their 20s were beaten up by five

men in Villeurbanne , France . The woman was

pregnant; a Jewish school was broken into and

vandalized in Sarcelles , France . This was just in

the past week.

So I call on you, whether you are a fellow Jew, a

friend, or merely a person with the capacity and

desire to distinguish decency from depravity, to do,

at least, these three simple things:

First, care enough to stay informed. Don't ever let

yourself become deluded into thinking that this is

no t your fight. I remind you of what Pastor

Neimoller said in World War II: "First they came for

the Communists, and I didn't speak up, because I

wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and

I didn't speak up, because I wasn't a Jew. Then they

came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up,

because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me,

and by that time there was no one left to speak up

for me".

Second, boycott France and French products. Only the

Arab countries are more toxically anti-Semitic and,

unlike them, France exports more than just oil and

hatred. So boycott their wines and their perfumes.

Boycott their clothes and their foodstuffs. Boycott

their movies. Definitely boycott their shores. If

we are resolved we can exert amazing pressure and,

whatever else we may know about the French, we most

certainly know that they are like a cobweb in a

hurricane in the face of well directed pressure.

Third, send this along to your family, your friends,

and your co-workers. Think of all of the people of

good conscience that you know and let them know

that you and the people that you care about need

their help. The number one best selling book in

France is "September 11: The Frightening Fraud,"

which argues that no plane ever hit the Pentagon."

Ron's not been here for a couple of days. Wonder if he finally gave up the goat?

Probably just playing Possum.

Gave up the goat? I'm a little slow tonight.

Gave up the goat? I'm a little slow tonight.

Basically a redneck way of saying "he gave up".

Oh, okay. I thought it meant he fell out of love. :omg: :heh:

Oh, okay. I thought it meant he fell out of love. :omg: :heh:

Bad Bjean, BAD!

Oh, okay. I thought it meant he fell out of love. :omg: :heh:

Are you trying to get his Goat?:amen:

I always thought it was "gave up the ghost".

I always thought it was "gave up the ghost".

In the North it is, but in the South it is "Give up the Goat".

You know, I think I meant to type "gave up the ghost". It makes more sense than "gave up the goat". But the implications aren't nearly as funny.

It's so nice to be understood.

Southerners use "give up the ghost"

Dam yankees spreading their lies, LIES I tell you.

(ok ok, Im KIDDING)

In the North it is, but in the South it is "Give up the Goat".

That can't be right. I'm a member in good standing of GRITS (girls raised in the South) and I've never heard anybody say "give up the goat".

That can't be right. I'm a member in good standing of GRITS (girls raised in the South) and I've never heard anybody say "give up the goat".

This quote below does not solve anything or prove that someone is right or wrong, but it does show that this "goat" vs "ghost" discussion has come up before.

The Eggcorn Database - v. 0.5

ghost » goat

Chiefly in: give up the goat

Classification: English – idiom-related

Spotted in the wild:

• My old 14″ monitor went completely wrong and after a few years trusty service it finally gave up the goat, hence my need to find a new monitor for my little machine. (Ciao.co.uk review, Feb. 18, 2001)
  
• The INS had finally given up the goat, and we were standby gauges only. (Naval Safety Center, Approach Magazine, 2004)
  
• Canon mp760 gave up the goat. (TGForumz, Sep. 22, 2005)
  
• One could argue that since he’s focused his practice largely on documentary filmmaking since the Eighties … he might as well have given up the goat for all the attention given to the form in theaters in the media until recently. (Reverse Shot Online, Winter 2006)
  
• Luckily our old Toyota just got us through and then gave up the goat. (ABC Rural, SA Country Hour, Jan. 11, 2006)
  
• Stay calm, collected, and don’t give up the goat. (Paul Davidson, Ten Rules for Making Rules, Apr. 16, 2006)

Analyzed or reported by:

• Jeanette Winterson (The Times, May 13, 2006)

Jeanette Winterson writes:

The other day my elderly country neighbour asked for a bit of help to get his new washing machine into the kitchen. That generation never use “it”, always, “he” or “she”, so I wasn’t surprised to hear the washing machine called “he”, but I was surprised by what followed: “My old washing machine, he’s given up the goat,” he said, in a broad Gloucestershire accent.

“The goat?” I replied. “Are you sure?” “Oh, yes,” said my neighbour, “ain’t you never heard that expression before, given up the goat?” “Well, not exactly . . . where does it come from?” “Ah well,” said my neighbour, “in the old days, when folks didn’t have much, and mainly worked the land, a man would set store by his animals, especially his goat, and when he come to die, he would bequeath that goat to his heirs, and that is why we say, ‘he’s given up the goat’.”

I am thrilled with this and from now on there will be no more ghosts, only goats.

| link | entered by Ben Zimmer, 2006/05/20 |

4 Commentaries on “goat”

1. <LI class=shara id=comment-37886>

4
Commentary by Shara , 2006/10/17 at 5:15 pm
Actually folks, if you read that paragraph of explanation just a bit closer, you might see that Winterson knew that the original expression was “give up the ghost.” She was simply saying that she liked the old man’s explanation better because it was rather funny that he explained it so matter-of-factly, even though he was entirely incorrect.
<LI class=minos id=comment-32309>3
Commentary by Minos , 2006/10/02 at 9:32 pm
I think that “give up the goat” is what you do when someone “gets your goat”.
<LI class=royjacobsen id=comment-25180>2
Commentary by Roy Jacobsen , 2006/08/21 at 7:42 pm
Actually, the King James version of the Bible has several passages with “gave up the ghost:” www.biblegateway.com/quic…
There are a couple for “give up the ghost” as well:
www.biblegateway.com/quic…1
Commentary by BabyCharmander , 2006/08/21 at 7:18 pm
Isn’t “given up the ghost” a refrence to the Bible passage in which Jesus dies? I recall the verse saying something along the lines of “gave up the ghost.”

Well, whaddaya know? I got something right even when I got it wrong.

wavydaby & Carlene:

I just wanted to get your (respective) Goats with my North/South remark.