NOW THAT’S INSULTING!

What is insulting varies from person to person. One person’s joke is another person’s wound. And insults vary by subculture. What I’ve collected here are words and phrases from across the web that at least some people consider insulting. I’ve not included insults that seem to be tied to specific subgroups, such as shiksa. There are too many of them and this is just an (extensive) sample. I’m neither condoning nor condemning the use of any of these!

Insults to One’s Intellect or Cognitive Skills

*“I’ll explain, and I’ll use small words, so you’ll be sure to understand.”* ~Wesley, **The Princess Bride** (1987)

Dumb as a rock/post/bag of turnips/hammers
Addleheaded
Airhead
Bubblehead
I don’t have the time or the crayons to explain it to you.
Biscuit not done in the middle.
One card short of a full deck
Not playing with a full deck
Not the brightest bulb in the pack.
The communication skills of an alarm clock.
Bad luck when it comes to thinking.
The same sense of direction as Christopher Columbus.
If you had another half a brain you’d be a halfwit.
Sharp as a [rubber] ball.
Stupidity is not a crime. [You’re] free to go.

*“To call you stupid would be an insult to stupid people. I’ve known sheep that could outwit you. I’ve worn dresses with higher IQs. But you think you’re an intellectual, don’t you, ape?”* ~Wanda, **A Fish Called Wanda** (1988)

*“If your brains were dynamite, there wouldn’t be enough to blow your hat off.”* ~Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Congratulations on being the top of the bell curve.
You are the human equivalent of a participation trophy.
Suffering from delusions of adequacy.
The attention span of an ice cream in July.
A battle of wits with someone who is unarmed.
It appears that your brain cells are not holding hands right now.
I smell something burning. Are you trying to think again?
Better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.
You changed your mind? Here’s hoping this one works better.
It’s great that you don’t let education get in the way of your ignorance.
No need to fear success. You have nothing to worry about.
If [you] ever had a thought, it would die of loneliness.
You’d struggle to pour water out of a boot with instructions on the heel.
Who’s using the family brain cell at the moment?

Insults to One’s Character/Personality

*“Why, you stuck-up, half-witted, scruffy-looking nerf herder.”* ~Leia Organa, **The Empire Strikes Back** (1980)

I forgot the world revolves around you. My bad!
Nose so high in the air s/he sniffs clouds
If her/his lips are moving, s/he is lying.
A sharp tongue doesn’t indicate a keen mind.
I’d give you a nasty look, but you already have one.
f you were a spice, you’d be flour.
Useful as a lighthouse in a desert.
Useless as the “ueue” in “queue.”
Useful as a soup sandwich.
Just like a Russian doll—full of yourself.
Your face is just fine. It’s your personality that’s the issue.
Whatever is eating you must be suffering terribly.
All the tact of a bowling ball.
Did the middle of my sentence interrupt the beginning of yours?
It’s impossible to underestimate you.
You have the rest of your life to be a knucklehead. You can take today off.

*“If they can make penicillin out of moldy bread, then they can sure make something out of you.”* ~Muhammad Ali

You are proof that the universe has a sense of humor.
S/he has no off switch.
You should use glue instead of chapstick.
Is there an intermission to this drama?
Deep as a puddle in a parking lot.
A slightly tilted picture frame.
You really should come with a warning label.
A personality that’s a vibrant shade of beige.
As useful/helpful/necessary as a screen door on a submarine.
Such a conversation starter. It gets underway as soon as you leave.
Two-faced.
Crooked as a corkscrew.
So crooked he had to be screwed into his grave.
Charismatic as a wet sock.
Someone who takes more than 15 items through the express lane.
Your ambition outweighs your skills.

*“You’re somewhere between a cockroach and that white stuff that accumulates at the corner of your mouth when you’re really thirsty.”* ~Nic Cage, **Con Air** (1997)

Insults to One’s Person

*“I never forget a face, but in your case I’ll make an exception!”* ~Groucho Marx

Looks like the south side of a horse heading north.
A nose that could chop wood.
If you were fruit you’d be a perfect pear/apple.
Not the ugliest wo/man in the world—unless the other one has died
I’ve seen salads dressed better than you.
You have a face for radio.
If my dog was as ugly as you are, I’d shave his butt and walk him backward.
Can I have the name of your hair cutter? I need to know where not to go.
Whatever kind of look you were aiming for, you missed.
Two left feet.
Sweet as rhubarb.
Walleyed.
Face so ugly s/he should walk backward.
Nobody could be as dumb as you look.
My life may be a joke, but it’s not as funny as your outfit.

Wishing Someone Ill

May your life be as unpleasant as you are.
May you live in interesting times.
May your cheek always find the hot side of the pillow and the heel of your left sock always slip down inside your shoe.
Wishing you all the happiness you deserve—and not one ounce more.
May the chocolate chips in your cookies always turn out to be raisins.
May you have a sparsely attended funeral.

Insulting to Men

*“His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork!”* ~Mae West

Bastard
Son-of-a-bitch
Thinks with his little head
You’re not one of the boys and you never will be
Angry white male
Mother f***er
Beta male
You’re just like your father
If you walked into a wall with an erection your nose would hit the wall first.
Bubba
Cock (slang)
Company man
Buffoon
Cuckold

*“Your mother was a hamster, and your father smelt of elderberries!”* ~French knights, **Monty Python and the Holy Grail** (1975)

*“Perhaps I am rather drunk to-night, but I shall be sober to-morrow morning; but you’re a damned fool tonight, and you’ll be a damned fool to-morrow morning.”* ~unnamed Parliamentarian, quoted by Augustus Hare

Fop
Your quiche is terrible!
Himbo
Dick
Incel
Master of the unsuccessful comb-over
Lothario
Lounge lizard
You are such a nice guy.
MAMIL (middle-aged man in lycra)
Manlet
Couldn’t get off a rabbit with that little dick.
Could wear a women’s bikini bottom, and nobody would look twice.
No sports car in the world could compensate for that tiny dick.
Need a magnifying glass to see his dick.
Does something that small really work?
Are you a pedophile? After all, you have a child size penis.
Looks like a eunuch.

*“You are a sad strange little man, and you have my pity.”* ~Buzz Lightyear, **Toy Story** (1995)

Do tiny dicks run in the family?
Leads with his zipper.
He has cotton balls
Mansplaining
Pantywaist
Manspreading
Manterrupting
Motherfucker
Bell end
Prick (slang)
Reply guy
White knight
I am searching for the bones of your father but cannot distinguish them from those of a slave. (said by Diogenes to Alexander the Great)

Insulting to Women

*“The woman speaks eight languages and can’t say ‘no’ in any of them.”* ~Dorothy Parker

Easy piece
Battle-axe (woman)
Bimbo
Cat lady
Cougar (slang)
Crone
Cunt (in some cultures, such as Australia, this is a common greeting among friends, rather than an insult)
Dyke (slang)
Fag hag
Female hysteria
Floozie
Gold digger

*“You wanna see a bad facelift? Helen Danvers, two o’clock. She looks like she’s re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere.”* ~Catherine Frazier, **The Women** (1939)

MRS degree
Bitch
Castrating bitch
Nasty woman
Nowhere girls
Puck bunny
Queen bee (sociology)
Radical chic
Shrew (stock character)
Slut
Cock teaser
Spinster
Suzy Homemaker
Termagant

*“In order to avoid being called a flirt, she always yielded easily.”* ~Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord

Trollop
Trophy wife
Twat
Virago
WAGs
Whore
Hoe
(Chest) flat as a pancake
Thunder thighs
Hag
Harpy
Lesbian until graduation
Moll

Generalized Insults

*“If you won’t be a good example, then you’ll have to be a horrible warning.”* ~Empress Catherine II of Russia

You are why the gene pool needs a lifeguard.
You’re a nonessential vitamin.
I have 90 billion nerves, and you’re on every single one of them.
I may not be perfect, but at least I am not you.
Yes, sometimes you’re an idiot. But don’t be sorry for who you are!
I like you. People say I have no taste, but I like you.
I don’t know where you were before we met, but I wish you were still there.
I’ll never forget the first time we met. But I’ll keep trying.
We were happily married for a month. Too bad it was our 10-year anniversary.
I admire the way you try so hard.
You’re entitled to your incorrect opinion.
You should have tried doing it the way I told you to in the the first place.
Well, at least you’re good-looking.
What the devil kind of knight are you, that can’t slay a hedgehog with your naked arse? (said by the Zaporozhian Cossacks to Sultan Mehmed IV)

Rare and Outdated

From Merriam-Webster:

“That trunk of humours, that bolting-hutch of beastliness, that swollen parcel of dropsies, that huge bombard of sack, that stuffed cloak-bag of guts, that roasted Manningtree ox with pudding in his belly, that reverend vice, that grey Iniquity, that father ruffian, that vanity in years?” ~William Shakespeare, (**Henry IV Part 1** [Act 2, Scene 4])

Cockalorum– a boastful and self-important person; a strutting little fellow
Snollygoster– an unprincipled but shrewd person
Pillock– a very stupid or foolish person
Lickspittle– a fawning subordinate; a suck-up
Smellfungus– an excessively faultfinding person
Ninnyhammer– ninny; simpleton, fool
Mumpsimus– a stubborn person who insists on making an error in spite of being shown that it is wrong
Milksop– an unmanly man; a mollycoddle (a pampered or effeminate boy or man)
Hobbledehoy– an awkward, gawky young man
Pettifogger– shyster; a lawyer whose methods are underhanded or disreputable
Mooncalf– a foolish or absentminded person
Saltimbanco– a mountebank; a person who sells quack medicines from a platform
Smell-feast– one given to finding out and getting invited to good feasts

Bottom Line: Tempting as it might be to fling insults around, consider the possible—probable?— escalation. Relationships might suffer irreparable damage.

Vivian Lawry

Writer