ign'ant

Slang of the Week: ign’ant (adjective)
ignorant, stupid

Example:
Phillip was so ign’ant, he decided to smoke a cigarette even though he was covered in flammable paraffin.

Celebrity quote:
“Come then now do not correct it, let's get ign’ant let's get hectic.”
- The Black Eyed Peas on the song Let’s Get Retarded

As my mother used to say, you could see this one coming from a mile away. Back in June, I wrote about the fad of ghost riding the whip, an activity that involves dancing around (or on) your car while it’s moving (video example.) If you watched E-40’s video for Tell Me When to Go and observed this phenomenon, you probably thought, “Somebody’s going to get hurt.”

Many people have—and some have even been killed doing goofy car stunts that take them outside their cars. A month ago, a teenager in Stockton, California died after he leaned out of his vehicle during a stunt at a sideshow (a street gathering to show off car stunts) and hit his head on another car. And it’s not just teenagers. This fall, a 36-year-old Canadian man fell off the top of a moving car while dancing and died from his injuries. Stating the obvious, Stockton police spokesman Pete Smith remarked, “It did not take Einstein to look at this thing and say this was a recipe for disaster.”

It’s fair to guess that some example of ghost riding the whip will make it into the next edition of Wendy Northcutt’s Darwin Awards series. If you are unfamiliar with the books, they recount true stories of how people have accidentally killed themselves by being ign’ant. This week’s example is an actual story from Northcutt’s website.

Slang City encourages you not to try for this honor. Have a safe New Year and stay in your car while it’s moving!