Embedded Cattlemen's Rhetoric

Brother:

I wonder if this word is more common in cattle country.

·                                 Main Entry: ²goad

·                                 Function: transitive verb

·                                 Date: 1579

1 : to incite or rouse as if with a goad
2 : to drive (as cattle) with a goad

 

I always thought of this as "persistant persuasive pressure" and not the optionless prodding with a pointy stick.  

 

PukkaDave:

Naw, man,

Coax, or cajole, even,

But goad, is to use the sharp stick.

Or in modernity, the taser-like impetuatator .  .  .

 

Brother:

Now I know....but (whenever this term came up) it was always people "goading me" into things.   At least the way I heard it...I thought folks meant I was being talked into it but they meant I was being pressured to an inevitable outcome "right out of the chute"

 

PukkaDave:

Well it’s good that you know now, anyway . . . 8^D . . .

But I assumed you were the goad-er, not the goad-ee

 

Brother:

"The good of goad depends" he said.

Then added as he nodded,

"On which end of the stick you are:

The Prodder or the Prodded"