Talk:obnoxious

Is this word chiefly American? I know it from films, but I don't remember having heard it from the British people I know. This may be purely coincidental or even a wrong recollection on my part, though. Kolmiel (talk) 01:02, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

Is the "feel (ashamed etc.)" truly a separate sense?

Seems like "feel ugly", "feel horrible", "feel stupid". You might feel ashamed because you think yourself obnoxious, but that's cause and effect rather than an innately different type of obnoxious. Equinox ◑ 21:11, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

RFV discussion: April–July 2019

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obnoxious

"(preceded by "to feel") Ashamed; acutely aware of one's own offensive qualities." I don't think this is a correctly thought-out sense. If you feel obnoxious (despicable) in sense 1, then you are ashamed. It doesn't mean that "obnoxious" itself means "ashamed" in any sense. Equinox ◑ 18:38, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

I agree that this definition seems misconceived, but I wonder if some people do use it this way:

But once I felt so obnoxious in college, when a teacher whom most of the girls hated (you know what I mean) with a wicked laugh asked me about who named me so, my mom or my dad? [1]

I’m still iffy on the size as it was too large for my jeans pocket, where I usually keep my phone. I had to keep it in my purse which isn’t always convenient when chasing my three year old. I felt a little obnoxious pulling the phone out at the park or the bus stop. [2]

Would you actually feel "obnoxious" in the true sense in these situations? On the other hand, perhaps we could consider these merely as misuses -- people not understanding what the word means. Mihia (talk) 20:27, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

If we agree that these uses attest another sense, then surely that sense is “embarrased”, much weaker than “acutely aware of one's own offensive qualities”. But – unless this is more common than I think it is – I go with these uses being embarassing misuses.  --Lambiam 00:24, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

Well, these are (apparently) at the ashamed/embarrassed end of that definition, which is the part mainly being questioned. Mihia (talk) 10:48, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

Interesting cites, but I'm not sure we're seeing another sense of obnoxious. Couldn't a reading of the second cite above, for example, be "I felt I was (being) a little obnoxious pulling the phone out […] ."? It could be self-awareness without shame, certainly. I don't know how to read the first one with any of the current or proposed definitions. DCDuring (talk) 01:53, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

Regarding the second cite, it seems too extreme to me that she would feel "obnoxious", in the true sense, about displaying her mobile phone. My feeling is that she means to say that she feels ashamed of it or embarrassed about it. Mihia (talk) 10:48, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

A perhaps more entertaining example of the 'self-awareness' reading is:

• 1895, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit: Sermons‎^[3]:

  You are in a good way, my dear friend, when you begin to feel obnoxious to yourself, even as your sin has made you to be obnoxious to God. Self-loathing is one of the early stages of helpful spiritual life.

DCDuring (talk) 01:59, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

Self-loathing may also be the final stage of spiritual life. That aside, is this not simply a transparent use of obnoxious? Otherwise we also may need a new sense for ugly: (preceded by "to feel") Ashamed; acutely aware of one's own lack of beauty. ([4], [5], [6].)  --Lambiam 07:53, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

Yes, the "I felt a little obnoxious" and "feel obnoxious to yourself" citations still seem like the usual sense to me. (The "felt so obnoxious in college" could also be the usual sense.) I tend to agree this seems to have been misconcieved. - -sche (discuss) 16:22, 17 April 2019 (UTC)

RFV-failed Kiwima (talk) 22:11, 14 July 2019 (UTC)