pinko

Etymology

From pink +‎ -o, a variation of red (“Communist”, noun), as pink is a lighter, more diluted form.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /pɪŋkəʊ/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /pɪŋkoʊ/
• Rhymes: -ɪŋkəʊ

• Audio (US):

  (file)

Noun

pinko (plural pinkos or pinkoes)

1. (informal, often derogatory, chiefly US) A socialist, particularly one who is not completely communist. [from mid-1930s]
   • 1934 October 22, “Gentlemen & Guttersnipes”, in Time Magazine‎, number 17, page 45:

     At Princeton a lone townsman cried "Down with Mussolini!" in the midst of a reception, was jostled by students, escorted off the campus. At Harvard the pinko National Students League protested to President Conant, but allowed the visitors to tour Cambridge in peace.

   • 1947 November 30, Thomas F. Brady, quoting Bryan Foy, “Hollywood Divided”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:

     “I agree with the decision one hundred per cent,” he said. “And if I find any pinkos that I don't know about on my lot I'll get rid of them if I can. They don't even have to be Communists. I'll try to clean out any leftists.”

   • 1966 March, Thomas Pynchon, chapter 6, in The Crying of Lot 49, New York, N.Y.: Bantam Books, published November 1976, →ISBN, page 136:

     He'd be on her ass in a microsecond, revoke her letters testamentary, they'd call her names, proclaim her through all Orange County as a redistributionist and pinko, slip the old man from Warpe, Wistfull, Kubitschek and McMingus in as administrator de bonis non and so much baby for code, constellations, shadow-legatees.

   • 2011 October 24, Archangel Michael, “The 147 Corporations Controlling Most of the Global Economy”, in Slashdot‎:

     Until society collectively starts using terminology like this effectively, all you'll end up with is a bunch of Commie Pinkos Stinking^[sic] up parks around the country "Occupying" without a clear goal or message.

   • 2014, Astra Taylor, quoting Kevin Kelly, chapter 4, in The People's Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age, Henry Holt and Company, →ISBN:

     Kelly reassures his readers that the people who run this emerging economy are not left-wing in any traditional sense. They are “more likely to be libertarians than commie pinkos,” he explains.

   • 2020 December 14, Bryan Bruce, “10 years since the Child Poverty documentary, what’s changed?”, in The Daily Blog‎:

     Almost 10 years ago I made a documentary called Inside Child Poverty. Some people (largely members of John Key’s government) got very angry with me. I was a left wing pinko journo making this stuff up in an election year.

See also

• communist
• red
• socialist

Etymology

Back-formation of pingottaa (“to stretch”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈpiŋko/, [ˈpiŋko̞]
• Rhymes: -iŋko
• Hyphenation^(key): pin‧ko

Noun

pinko (informal, derogatory)

1. Synonym of hikipinko (“studious student”).
   • 2022 June 22, Ulla Järvi, “Kuka selittäisi puritaaneille, että seksistä voi nauttia?”, in Yle‎:

     Olin koulussa pinko. Todistusnumeroilla oli minulle ennen kaikkea välinearvoa: pääsisin pois tylsästä kirkonkylästä opiskelemaan Tampereelle.

     I was a swot at school. The grades on my diploma had, above all, a purpose as an instrument: they'd get me out of the boring rural village to study in Tampere.

Further reading

• “pinko”, in Kielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish]‎ (in Finnish) (online dictionary, continuously updated), Kotimaisten kielten keskuksen verkkojulkaisuja 35, Helsinki: Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland), 2004–, retrieved 2023-07-03

Anagrams

• kipon, kopin, pokin