50 FUCKS #15: Clusterfuck
A funny word with a war origin
A hilarious Fuck for a situation that’s gone tragically south. When you use this expression, it’s guaranteed that someone will laugh. That person is probably good people—they get it.
Defined
disastrous situation, epic mishandling
In a sentence
“Christ, what a clusterfuck.”
“You caused this clusterfuck, you fix it!”
Today kicks off the third week of 50 FUCKS given, and new subscribers have joined us—welcome!! The next 7 days will be devoted to expressions of Fuck used to describe less than ideal and troublesome situations. As the work year has swung into full force, I have no doubt that you will find these useful.
This Fuck variation stems from the Vietnam War.
You weren’t expecting that, were you? Neither was I. Disastrous situation, epic mishandling… yeah, that sounds like the Vietnam War. It was a military three-ring circus, with lots of dead bodies as the main act. That’s to say nothing of the “civilian casualties,” or the still ongoing medical and ecological fallout.
The exact terminology breakdown is debatable, but the essence of the phrase is this: people in command have fucked up to such a large degree, the situation is totally out of hand, and shit is hitting every possible fan. Also, it’s going to continue that way for about 20 fucking years. That is the Vietnam War in a nutshell.
There are two more Fucks with military origins that made the list. We’ll explore those January 17th and 18th. Mark your calendar, because I found some related military education footage that I’m appalled exists. It’s fucking wild.
Besides military usage, Netflix created a documentary called Clusterfuck. It’s about the failed attempt in 1999 to recreate the magic of the Woodstock Music and Art Fair of ‘69. The title of the doc is a great name choice, because that’s exactly what the festival was.
Long before the con of Fyre Festival, there was the mayhem of Woodstock ‘99. A bunch of VC and corporate assholes thought to themselves, “How do we take the greatness of Lollapalooza, and make it absolute capitalist shit?” It was oversold, under staffed, thousands treated for sicknesses because water wasn’t free, there weren’t nearly enough port-a-potties, massive violence, rapes, setting tons of shit on fire, and at least one death. Yep, that’s a Clusterfuck.
On a personal note, I’d like to punch the guys who put that Clusterfuck together, not because I was there, but because my parents wouldn’t let me attend a music festival for a year after. The hysteria the media drummed up among parents about festivals after ‘99 was insane. I had to beg and plead to attend the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Californication Tour in 2000, and my friend’s mom had to come with us.
Thank God they didn’t know Snoop Dogg was opening…