Reclaiming the word “naughty”. And the word “nice”.

I found myself about to write it in a Facebook discussion earlier today, about to make reference to someone’s “naughty bits.”

By this, I of course meant genitalia. And it got me thinking: why should any of our parts be “naughty?”

Naughty carries with it connotations of badness. Of inappropriateness. We might choose to keep them private, but that is not because they are naughty, just because they are … intimate. Personal.

And that’s not the meaning I use when I use the word naughty. Naughty, these days, is not a bad word.

Originally the word meant someone having nothing (if you know anyone from Britain, you might noticed them using the word “naught” for zero).

About six hundred years ago, the word was used to describe someone who was poor or needy—someone who had naught. But like a lot of words at the time, the meaning shifted from not having any thing to not having any moral character. So in the 1500s being naughty described someone who was wicked, or even evil.

But words change, and over the next 100 years it went from being evil to being disobedient, so children who didn’t go to bed were naughty.

About two hundred years later, the word began to apply to women who did want to go to bed, if you know what I mean. Again, it started out as having a negative connotation, but quickly being called naughty was considered a benefit.

The word Nice similarly underwent a change. Originally, the word basically meant “no sense” or stupid, foolish, ignorant.

During the 14th and 15th centuries, its meaning diverged — possibly because of those using the word and those being labeled by it. It came to describe both “a person or actions considered excessively luxurious” and “someone who is finely arrayed.” One can certainly imagine a commoner referring to a noble in his frilliest finery as nice in a derogatory sense, and the noble accepting the label as a compliment.

Over the next three centuries, the word took on a number of other definitions in the common tongue, including shy or reserved, precise, trivial, discriminating, careless, clumsy, weak, poor, needy, simple, foolish. Indeed, for a while there it was hard to know what people meant when they used the word. It was only in the late 1700s and early 1800s that the word began to mean agreeable, delightful, kind and thoughtful, which is what the word meant up until fairly recently.

Both words have sexual connotations, too. Nice girls are usually more prudish, less racy. They dress more conservatively. Naughty girls, on the other hand, tend to be the exact opposite.

There is nothing wrong with being nice. There is nothing wrong with being naughty. Some people find modesty empowering, some people find being sexually open empowering. We need to stop judging the other—be they naughty or nice—by our own standards—be they naughty or nice.

The danger, though, with these words is they become labels. Someone who is naughty will always act one way. Someone who is nice will always act the opposite way. But the fact is, we are all humans, and all act in different ways in different situations all the time. Some of the nicest-seeming women can be very naughty, when the situation arises, while someone who might seem naughty can be fairly conservative, when it comes to sexual mores.

The questions “are you naughty or nice?” Is dichotomizing. Yes, I play around with the concept in a recent promotion, but with the hope that we can learn that the answer is yes. You are. Both. Neither.

You are You. You am not the labels that are placed on you. It’s okay to be naughty. It’s okay to be nice. Neither is wrong. Neither is bad. Both are acceptable ways to be, in moderation (the extremes of naughty can lead to nasty, while the extremes of nice can lead to judgemental), and both sides of your personality deserve to be explored with kindness and love and freedom.

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Best of 2022, Part 5