the bird

What is proper flipping off etiquette: thumb in or thumb out?

If I’m remembering correctly, I was flipped off six times this weekend. That is unusually high for me. I noticed that four times I was flashed the bird with the thumb out, and the other two times the thumb was tucked firmly into a balled fist.

Personally, the last time I used the folded thumb formation was back in elementary school. I think we all start out that way. It seems as if folded thumbs dominate the pre-developmental stages of the gesture due to its simplicity. Maybe first-grade motor skills are incapable of handling the rigidly complex thumb-out position. Or perhaps children’s fondness for thumb-in is perpetuated by the way adults describe the gesture as, “The finger.” It’s not described as, “The finger plus thumb.” Equally possible is that children find a straightforward majesty in the forlorn middle finger standing alone, empowered by its solitude. But is the thumb-in form relegated to elementary school playgrounds or is it a viable option for adults? Thumb-in hearkens back to the days of innocent wonder at the power of a mere gesture. The folded thumb flip off is the primordial gesture of “fuck you”, universal and timeless.

Is thumb-out an evolved form of the bird or a bastardized subset? An extended thumb usually accompanies crisply bent knuckles. It’s form and formality is akin to a military salute or a gang sign. Thumb-out is not as sloppy as its brethren, thumb-in, and therefore projects an overt threat backed by the violence of its rigidity. Like a Shaolin Kung Fu style, the unbending thumb-out flip off transforms the hand into a spearhead of a weapon. Aggression is the key to the thumb-out form and aggression is the missing element from the thumb-in. Finally, the sample set from this weekend tells me that thumb-out is the way to go: four out of six users prefered the thumb-out over thumb-in.

I’ll try switching up my technique and through experience I will determine which flip off form, thumb-out or thumb-in, conveys the message and subtext that I’m striving for.
...and so it was written, shenry at 5/19/2003 03:10:00 PM.
...and so it was appended with .