We get our phrases and idioms from a lot of different sources in English and they tend to just arise up out of comfort,
out of familiarity, out of things that we're just used to seeing.
So many of our idioms like this do not in fact have literal application at first.
Coming up on Word Matters,
the phrase throw someone under the bus and the difference between doing a 180 and doing a 360.
I'm Emily Brewster,
and Word Matters is produced by Merriam-Webster in collaboration with New England Public Media.
On each episode, Merriam-Webster editors Neil Servin, Amin Shea, Peter Sakalowski,
and I explore some aspect of the English language from the dictionary's vantage point.
Throwing someone under the bus is about criticizing, blaming, or punishing someone,
especially when you're trying to avoid blame or gain an advantage.
The phrase evokes quite an image, but where did it come from anyway?
And why a bus?
Here's Amon Shea on the development of this unsavory but often applied idiom.
One of the peculiarities of English language is that words and idioms,
very often, we are presented with colorful explanations of where they came from.
And typically, it's kind of a rule that if somebody gives you an etymology,
the origin story of a word, and it sounds really interesting, it's almost certainly not true.
You know, all the things about posh, meaning port outward, whatever the hell it is.
They just don't hold water, so to speak.