WASTE IS A TERRIBLE THING TO MIND
What’s so funny about this? This joke flips a couple of words in a well-known slogan for the United Negro College Fund. The ads have been around for many years and as far as I know the slogan is still in use. So it’s at least 40 years old. The slogan is, “A mind is a terrible thing to waste.” The ads showed bright-looking young African American girls and boys. The implication of the ad was that without financial help, these kids were not going to get the opportunity to go to college and have rewarding careers and not be able to contribute to society. Clearly it has been a very successful ad campaign. So successful, in fact, that the expression has found its way into general use in American English. Of course, once a saying has reached this status, it becomes fair game for jokes, puns and spoonerisms. That’s what todays joke is. We have something known as an “anastrophe”; by switching “waste” and “mind” we get a kind of bathroom humor. In the original, “mind” is a noun and “waste “is a verb. But in the joke they have switched both their positions and functions. WASTE in this case refers to fecal waste and MIND means to pay attention. Since feces don’t smell good and are generally disgusting, to have to take care of it, especially to clean it up, is pretty terrible. And THAT’s what’s so funny!
This joke was inspired by Gene Weingarten, columnist for The Washington Post
