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The Hitchhiker's Guide wiki states that 'Belgium' is the rudest word in the galaxy. Why?

phantom42
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Dries
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3 Answers3

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Back in the late 70s/early 80s in the UK there was a meme doing the rounds that Belgium was the most boring country in Europe. For example there was a joke:

Name five famous Belgians - not including Hercule Poirot

Poirot is, of course, fictional - the point being there are no well know famous Belgians¹.

I would guess, though I know of no documentary evidence for this, that this is why Adams chose Belgium as the rudest word. It fits with his taste for the absurd.

¹ before I get flamed, this says more about the English than the Belgians

John Rennie
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  • Making fun of Belgium is done in loads of movies, but I thought maybe there was an explanation why it was rude to use the word. Now there are well known famous Belgians I guess :) – Dries Mar 11 '15 at 09:47
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    WRT your last paragraph, now you'll get flamed by English instead of Belgians. – Mr Lister Mar 11 '15 at 11:27
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    Now I am thinking about it, all the movies, series, people, etc. I know making fun of Belgium are english. what do the english have against Belgium? – Dries Mar 11 '15 at 12:44
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    They're jealous of our beer, chocolate, women, and Belgian fries, obviously! – Tsasken Mar 11 '15 at 12:56
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    @Dries They're English, so they'll flame him politely which makes all the difference – Andreas Mar 11 '15 at 13:25
  • @Tsasken I read that as "Beer, chocolate women and belgian fries". but you're right, they are just jealous – Dries Mar 11 '15 at 13:37
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    I don't think it's jealousy (well, maybe the chocolate women), just that it's a conveniently small country to use as a joke. I don't think Monty Python had anything against Belgium when they wrote this. – Fruitbat Mar 11 '15 at 14:14
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    It's like Americans making fun of small Midwestern states. We're all sure Indiana is a fine place, but it crosses your mind so rarely that using it as a punchline has a "oh yeah, that's a place" quality to it. – zeldredge Mar 11 '15 at 14:31
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    Not only is Poirot fictional, he 'lived' in the UK. ;) – mvherweg Mar 11 '15 at 14:38
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    @SirElderberry It's not like New York where everyone's like, "We're from New York and we're the best." or, "We're from Texas and we like things big." It's more like, "We're from Indiana, and we're gonna move." – KSmarts Mar 11 '15 at 15:04
  • More ON-TOPIC now, http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/2l29f3/if_belgium_is_mentioned_in_a_movie_why_is_always/ could have an explanation. So The guide used Belgium for some obscure reason, or perhaps even a coincidence, and this created a domino effect? – Tsasken Mar 11 '15 at 15:11
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    @Andreas They're English, so they'll stand in line queue for the appropriate time to flame him, politely. –  Mar 11 '15 at 18:17
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    For sure. Americans may not realise this but Belgium is just a "typical small" country "in Europe" .. particularly from the UK point of view. Actually, Belgium is well-liked. Interestingly, you probably *would not use say Eireland in this type of humorous example, since it would be, oh, rather "racist" let's say (the English did/do in fact suppress, etc, the Irish for the odd few hundred years). Indeed it's exactly like "indiana" as SirE points out above. – Fattie Mar 12 '15 at 05:26
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    Another exact example of this -- in one of the "Austin Powers" movies, Caine delivers the hilarious line "The only things I despise in this world are racists, and the Dutch." There's nothing particularly wrong with Holland per se -- the joke would work with any "small country". {Again - the joke is "ok" because, actually, everyone likes Holland! if the joke had run "racists, and some ethnic group who are actually often victims of racism" then it would be not funny at all.} – Fattie Mar 12 '15 at 05:31
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    One final point for US viewers. Often NY'ers will make fun of "Jersey" - but that's because "it actually sucks" (from a Manhattanite's viewpoint), i.e. it's small-town, has no nightlife, etc. The Belgium example is not like that -- people actually like Belgium. It's just like the "Indiana" example above ("any small harmless state..."). – Fattie Mar 12 '15 at 05:32
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    @JoeBlow in austin powers, Dr. Evil is said to be from the french part of Belgium, as he also gives Belgian Chocolate 'from home' to Mini Me – Dries Mar 12 '15 at 07:33
  • Hi Dries. Lol good one. – Fattie Mar 12 '15 at 08:24
  • @JoeBlow I'm wrong, he's from Bruges, wich is flemish. "Dougie was raised by Belgians, which is what made him so complex and evil.Interestingly, despite the fact that he cites his home town is Bruges, which is situated in the Dutch-speaking Flemish Region of Belgium, he claims to not know how to speak "Freaky-Deaky Dutch", instead speaking French, the main language of southern Belgium." thats why I was wrong I guess – Dries Mar 12 '15 at 09:41
  • Doesn't hold up today, because we have Jean-Claude Van Damme, the Muscles from Brussels. – David Graham Mar 12 '15 at 21:23
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    I wish to hasten to point out that when our company cafeteria ran out of ketchup one day (yes, I know, but these things happen in the world of industrial food :-), I remembered something I'd learned watching de Rode Duivel's play in the World Cup and tried mayonnaise with my fries. It was...interesting... (Actually, it was pretty good :-) (And I'm from Ohio, which is right next door to Indiana - so just WATCH IT, OK!?!?!?!? :-) – Bob Jarvis - Слава Україні Mar 13 '15 at 02:19
  • These comments are starting to reach Critical Belgian Mass. Just a few more before it explodes in an orgy of fries and chocolate. –  Mar 13 '15 at 11:38
  • Nearing the choux event horizon perhaps? – John Rennie Mar 13 '15 at 11:49
  • But in WW1. .. > "To this day, the Belgian army is remembered for their stubborn

    resistance during the early days of the war, with the army – around a tenth the size of the German army – holding up the German offensive for nearly a month, giving the French and British forces time to prepare for the Marne counteroffensive later in the year." but yea... Other than Hercul Poirot, looks like there are no famous Belgian people.

    http://www.eupedia.com/belgium/famous_people.shtml bhahaha

     –  Mar 14 '15 at 17:51
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    You won't get flamed, but maybe Flemed ... – Hagen von Eitzen Mar 15 '15 at 21:16
  • The use of the word meme doesn't really seem to fit here. – Beta Decay Jul 28 '15 at 14:51
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    @BetaDecay: according to Wikipedia A meme is an idea, behavior, or style that spreads from person to person within a culture. This seems to me to perfectly describe the idea, circulating in the UK in the late 70s/early 80s, that Belgium is a boring place. – John Rennie Jul 28 '15 at 14:58
  • @JohnRennie Hmm you learn something new every day :) – Beta Decay Jul 28 '15 at 15:02
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I read somewhere that Adams ran into problems with his US publisher in 1979 for including a reference to

A Rory award for the most gratuitous use of the word "fuck" in a serious screenplay

He was forced by the publisher to change this, and chose the innocuous word Belgium instead.

He then got his "revenge" by writing about Belgium being actually the most offensive word in the universe, allowing him to suggest he hadn't given in, but had actually made it worse.

The Wandering Dev Manager
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    I still wonder why Belgium, guess it's just random just as '42' – Dries Mar 11 '15 at 10:15
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    Probably just the best sounding one in a list, also not a word likely to be revealed to have an alternative meaning, just a safe, inoffensive choice for the rudest word in the universe. – The Wandering Dev Manager Mar 11 '15 at 10:26
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    The quote has "gratuitous" rather than "prestigious". I'm sceptical about this explanation. Fit the Tenth (in which we hear about Belgium) was broadcast on 23 January 1980. First US publication was October 1980. The US text looks like it is lifted from the radio script, see: http://web.archive.org/web/20030214214643/http://www-personal.umd.umich.edu/~nhughes/dna/faqs/diff.html so I think your causation is wrong. Sorry. – Francis Davey Mar 11 '15 at 13:28
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    @FrancisDavey - from the linked page: Finally, the greatest Belgium-up of all times. Original UK phrasing (page 114): 'The Most Gratuitous Use Of The Word "Fuck" In A Serious Screenplay. It's very prestigious.' 'I see', said Arthur, 'yes, and what do you get for that?'

    Has been filled out to become: "The Most Gratuitous Use of the Word "Belgium" in a Serious Screenplay. It's very prestigious." - As I said I'd heard it and was working from memory, I seem to recall the incident with the publisher happened in 1979

     – The Wandering Dev Manager Mar 11 '15 at 13:41
  • And then he added in a whole sequence with Arthur asking why it's offensive, so it's just not substituted. – Random832 Mar 11 '15 at 13:57
  • You may be right, I am just sceptical about the direction of causation without more evidence, which it might be possible to dig up. If your answer were right it would be very interesting, but to my eye it looks like the US material was copied from the radio script rather than being written (in 1979) new and then adopted into the radio script in Jan 1980. – Francis Davey Mar 11 '15 at 14:09
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    Aha, in https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=cimXAgAAQBAJ at Chapter 9 it explains that Douglas Adams used the Belgium piece from the radio show. Of course because the Rory Award doesn't appear until Life, the Universe and Everything. So I am afraid this answer is wrong - the causal order was the other way around. Shame, because it would be a great answer otherwise. – Francis Davey Mar 11 '15 at 16:11
  • Added the profanity into the quote, it doesn't really matter I guess, but I was curious what the word was, and we're all adults. – TankorSmash Mar 11 '15 at 16:31
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    Belgium is a safe target because it's obviously a joke. If he'd chosen the Irish, or Jews, or Romanians, or Pakistanis, someone would have thought he was prejudiced. No-one could think that in the case of Belgians, because no-one has anything against them. – Michael Kay Mar 12 '15 at 09:35

  • I still wonder why Belgium... - At lest he didn't go with Smeg.

     – Simon Hibbs Mar 12 '15 at 11:12
  • @FrancisDavey: What makes you think he wrote every idea he had in sequential order? Lots of authors come up with ideas that don't fit with the plot/characters they're writing at the time, and only use or them or expand on them later in the series. That's actually sort of important for continuity. – Aaronaught Mar 14 '15 at 05:28
  • @Aaronaught In this case we know that he had written and published the Belgium narrative (in the form of the radio scripts) a couple of years before he was asked by an American publisher to censor Life, The Universe and Everything. This means that the need or desire to censor cannot have been the reason for using "Belgium" in the first place, that must have some other cause. – Francis Davey Mar 14 '15 at 08:24
  • -1 this is interesting, but it's not an answer. "Why then he chose 'Belgium'?" – o0'. Mar 14 '15 at 15:16
  • @Dries: well, I once have found a "phantasy" of the number-theorist G.H. Hardy, which does not let look "42" and its role in the hitchhiker so random: see http://go.helms-net.de/math/divers/GHHArdyAndTheNumber42.htm – Gottfried Helms Mar 14 '15 at 17:26
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I consider it likely that the meme started with the "Prejudice" sketch from Monty Python. It was broadcast first in 1973.

The choice of "Belgians" could well be arbitrary here as the sketch suggests being only one of a series.

user40555
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