Editing Weasel word (section)

==Origin==
The expression ''weasel word'' may have derived from the egg-eating habits of [[weasel]]s.<ref>Theodore Roosevelt Association, [http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org/TR%20Web%20Book/TR_CD_to_HTML682.html Theodore Roosevelt Cyclopedia]{{subscription required}} {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120414220921/http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org/TR%20Web%20Book/TR_CD_to_HTML682.html |date=14 April 2012 }}</ref> An article published by the ''[[Buffalo News]]'' attributes the origin of the term to [[William Shakespeare]]'s plays ''[[Henry V (play)|Henry V]]'' and ''[[As You Like It]]'', which include [[simile]]s of weasels sucking eggs.<ref>E. Cobham Brewer, [http://www.bartleby.com/81/17333.html ''Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120210030708/http://www.bartleby.com/81/17333.html |date=10 February 2012 }}</ref> The article claims these similes are flawed because weasels have insufficient jaw musculature to be able to suck eggs.<ref>{{cite news |last=Rising |first=Gerry |date=15 March 1999 |title=Weasels |url=http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~insrisg/nature/nw99/weasels.html |newspaper=Buffalo News |postscript=,&nbsp;''Buffalo.edu''. |access-date=24 December 2013 |archive-date=31 July 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130731005013/http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~insrisg/nature/nw99/weasels.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

[[Ovid]]'s ''[[Metamorphoses]]'' provides an earlier source for the same etymology. Ovid describes how [[Juno (mythology)|Juno]] orders the goddess of childbirth, [[Lucina (goddess)|Lucina]], to prevent [[Alcmene]] from giving birth to [[Hercules]]. Alcmene's servant [[Galanthis]], realizing that Lucina is outside the room using magic to prevent the birth, emerges to announce that the birth has been a success. Lucina, in her amazement, drops the spells of binding, and Hercules is born. Galanthis then mocks Lucina, who responds by transforming her into a weasel. Ovid writes (in A.S. Kline's translation) "And because her lying mouth helped in childbirth, she gives birth through her mouth..."<ref>Ovid, Metamorphoses (tr. Anthony S. Kline), [https://ovid.lib.virginia.edu/trans/Metamorph9.htm#483366544 Book IX, 273–323] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141010063210/http://ovid.lib.virginia.edu/trans/Metamorph9.htm#483366544 |date=10 October 2014 }}</ref> Ancient Greeks believed that weasels conceived through their ears and gave birth through their mouths.<ref>{{Cite journal |title=Review of: Women and Weasels: Mythologies of Birth in Ancient Greece and Rome. Translated by Emlyn Eisenach; first published 1998 |url=https://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2014/2014.03.16/ |journal=Bryn Mawr Classical Review |issn=1055-7660 |first=Nikoletta |last=Manioti}}</ref>

Definitions of the word 'weasel' that imply deception and irresponsibility include: the noun form, referring to a sneaky, untrustworthy, or insincere person; the verb form, meaning to [[Psychological manipulation|manipulate]] shiftily;<ref>{{cite web |url-status=live |website=Merriam-Webster |url=http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/weasel |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120112111602/http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/weasel |archive-date=12 January 2012 |title=weasel }}</ref> and the phrase "to ''weasel out''," meaning "to squeeze one's way out of something" or "to evade responsibility."<ref>{{cite web|publisher=The Free Dictionary|url=http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/weasel+out|access-date=14 April 2014|archive-date=15 April 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140415113231/http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/weasel+out|url-status=live |title=weasel out}}</ref>

[[Theodore Roosevelt]] attributed the term to his friend William Sewall's older brother, Dave, claiming that he had used the term in a private conversation in 1879.<ref>''[[New York Times]]'', 2 September 1916, [https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1916/09/02/104689643.pdf "Origin of 'Weasel Words{{'"}}] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210225234135/https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1916/09/02/104689643.pdf |date=25 February 2021 }}</ref>
The expression first appeared in print in Stewart Chaplin's short story "Stained Glass Political Platform" (published in 1900 in ''[[The Century Magazine]]''),<ref name="dic">''The Macmillan Dictionary of Contemporary Phrase and Fable''</ref> in which weasel words were described as "words that suck the life out of the words next to them, just as a weasel sucks the egg and leaves the shell." Roosevelt apparently later put the term into public use after using it in a speech in St. Louis May 31, 1916. According to Mario Pei, Roosevelt said, "When a weasel sucks an egg, the meat is sucked out of the egg; and if you use a weasel word after another, there is nothing left of the other."<ref name="pei">{{cite book |last1=Pei |first1=Mario |title=Weasel Words: The Art of Saying What You Don't Mean |date=1978 |publisher=Harper & Row |location=New York |page=1 |isbn=9780060133429 |edition=1st |url=https://archive.org/details/weaselwordsartof0000peim_v4w7 |access-date=10 February 2022}}</ref>