Paying Attention

[rax]

Entity	Gives...	In exchange for...
Whore	Sex	Money
Slut	Sex	Sex
Madam	Whores	Money
Dealer	Amphetamines	Money
Deficit	Attention	Money
Attention Whore	Sex	Attention
Attention Slut	Attention	Sex
Attention Madam	Attention Whores	Money
Attention Dealer*	Attention	Money
Attention Deficit	Attention	Amphetamines

*colloq.: shrink

Comments

[q10.livejournal.com]

the usage of ‘attention whore’ characterized above is significantly narrower than the one i've encountered in my immediate linguistic community.

[rax.livejournal.com]

Well, that's actually what got me started on this whole thing. I
was trying to figure out what an "attention whore" actually was, and
failed to come up with an acceptable definition, so I started working
on unacceptable definitions...

[q10.livejournal.com]

i can try to come up with an analysis of the usage i'm familiar with, if you're still interested in that sort of information.

[rax.livejournal.com]

Sure! I don't think I actually know what the term means.

[q10.livejournal.com]

okay, my sense is that, on the more inclusive use of the term, an ‘X whore’ is a person whose unhealthy dependence on X makes him or her willing to sacrifice dignity for it in ways that a typical, reasonable, or well-adjusted person would not.

thus, i've been called a ‘tea whore’ on the evidence that i'm willing to drink embarrassingly low-quality tea when it's the only way to get my fix, and i've been called an ‘attention whore’ on the evidence that (less now than in the past) i've occasionally been known to go out of my way to make a public spectacle of myself.

i can't recall ever trading sex for either of those things, though, so i'm pretty sure that's not what people were talking about.