![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Why must so many news reports about COVID-19 include video clips of vaccine needles being pushed into and pulled out of arms? I'm only a little needlephobic (I avert my gaze when getting shots) and a little bothered when I see those videos. But I imagine many people are a lot more disturbed by seeing it, and might avoid watching the news because of it? Seeing all those needles may be adding to their anxiety about getting vaccinated instead of relieving it.
..
Another thing that oddly irritates me is hearing or reading the British term for it, "jab". The word "jab" makes me think of 2 friends walking down the street, and one of them giving the other a friendly shove of an elbow in the side. (Why do I associate it with that? Dunno.) So when I hear it used about the vaccine, it sounds like an attempt to downplay the fact that it's a needle piercing your skin. It sounds like a word you'd say to a small child to keep them from being afraid of it.
I have this reaction even though I know that's simply the term used in Britain and not a euphemism. And I know the word "shot" doesn't really describe an injection better than "jab".
WSJ has this intriguing-sounding article, but it requires a subscription to read: ‘Jab’: A British Term for a Covid-19 Shot, but Born in the U.S.A.
So I'm not the only American irritated by that word?
Here I found a screenshot of the article on twitter.
Hah, so just like that flu of 1918, the word "jab" started in the U.S., spread out in Europe, and then came back.
..
Damn:
SC tops entire country for COVID case rate as hospital reports record COVID patient count
..
Another thing that oddly irritates me is hearing or reading the British term for it, "jab". The word "jab" makes me think of 2 friends walking down the street, and one of them giving the other a friendly shove of an elbow in the side. (Why do I associate it with that? Dunno.) So when I hear it used about the vaccine, it sounds like an attempt to downplay the fact that it's a needle piercing your skin. It sounds like a word you'd say to a small child to keep them from being afraid of it.
I have this reaction even though I know that's simply the term used in Britain and not a euphemism. And I know the word "shot" doesn't really describe an injection better than "jab".
WSJ has this intriguing-sounding article, but it requires a subscription to read: ‘Jab’: A British Term for a Covid-19 Shot, but Born in the U.S.A.
The newly imported name for a vaccination actually originated on this side of the Atlantic ...
It might not be the most important point of contention in the pandemic era, but a British-style, three-letter word for a vaccination shot has proved irksome to many Americans: “jab.”
So I'm not the only American irritated by that word?
Here I found a screenshot of the article on twitter.
Hah, so just like that flu of 1918, the word "jab" started in the U.S., spread out in Europe, and then came back.
..
Damn:
SC tops entire country for COVID case rate as hospital reports record COVID patient count