batshitinsane one of mefi's most popular tags January 30, 2007 2:26 PM   Subscribe

Huh. While reading Occasional Superheroine, I came across this post, in which she discusses her reaction to her blog's MetaFilter appearance, which was tagged as "batshitinsane." As this particular tag has a special place in my heart, I was surprised to see that batshitinsane is now one of MetaFilter's most popular tags, with over 200 posts tagged as such. My baby's all grown up now!
posted by UKnowForKids to MetaFilter-Related at 2:26 PM (37 comments total) 1 user marked this as a favorite

I was told today that I should validate this kind of thing more. Yay U!
posted by frecklefaerie at 2:42 PM on January 30, 2007 [1 favorite]


Could you validate my parking ticket, please? TIA
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 2:55 PM on January 30, 2007


Yes, folks, if we all do a stupid thing often enough, then the moderators probably be overwhelmed and thus unable to stop us.
posted by koeselitz at 3:00 PM on January 30, 2007


overused tag, imo
posted by bob sarabia at 3:05 PM on January 30, 2007


Tags are supposed to be helpful, not cute. I suppose if people are interested in hearing what other users think is "batshitinsane" (OMG GEORGE BUSH SO CRAZY!!11), then this tag is worth the hoopla.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 3:20 PM on January 30, 2007 [1 favorite]


I'm a big fan of the OMGbatshitinsaneamiriteLOL tag. And Funions.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:24 PM on January 30, 2007


I'm trying to find early citations for "batshitinsane". I don't remember when tags came into being, but it was surely later than this January 16th, 2001 Advogato blog entry. Can anyone push back farther?

A Google search for the token batshitinsane yields ~79,000 hits.

A search for batshitinsane -metafilter yields only ~14,500.

There are ~2,300 raw hit for onsite instances of the word: batshitinsane site:metafilter.com, but that doesn't tell us a great deal since that covers a lot of redundant indexing ground.

No hits whatsoever in Google Groups. Don't know if that's a sign of poor indexing, non-use, or an artifact of their recent interface change or a flawed search on my part, but it's interesting.

The tag seems to be bound pretty strongly, but not absolutely, to Metafilter. I don't really know if that's a good thing or not.
posted by cortex at 3:27 PM on January 30, 2007


"Batshit insane" yields more than a few matches on Google Groups.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 3:49 PM on January 30, 2007


The earliest is on alt.religion.kibology, which seems apt.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 3:50 PM on January 30, 2007


I remember the first use of the tag, I mean, I remember when I first read it as a tag very soon after tags were introduced (way later than 2001), but I can't remember what the thread was.
posted by OmieWise at 3:54 PM on January 30, 2007


Oh, heck yeah. I didn't mean to imply the plaintext expression was particularly new, just the runitalltogether form.

What's Kibology?
posted by cortex at 3:55 PM on January 30, 2007


"What's Kibology?"

n00b.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 3:57 PM on January 30, 2007


FAQ
posted by mr_crash_davis at 3:58 PM on January 30, 2007


Bump, set, whiff. Way to blow it, crash.
posted by cortex at 3:58 PM on January 30, 2007


Hey, I never read it. I was trying to be helpful.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 4:08 PM on January 30, 2007


fight fight fight
posted by chrismear at 4:09 PM on January 30, 2007


overused tag, imo

Say it's a bit tired? Try guanoloco.
posted by carsonb at 4:53 PM on January 30, 2007 [5 favorites]


heh, woah. guanoloco. [previously]
posted by carsonb at 4:56 PM on January 30, 2007


Yeah, I just saw that too, carsonb. Serendipity!
posted by cortex at 4:58 PM on January 30, 2007


Didn't the term come from "Our Dumb Century"? It was in a headline about Michael Jackson. It's not metafilter-specific.
posted by interrobang at 5:01 PM on January 30, 2007


cortex writes "What's Kibology?"

Twenty bucks, same as in town.
posted by mullacc at 5:12 PM on January 30, 2007


THANK you.
posted by cortex at 5:13 PM on January 30, 2007


My family was batshitinsane back in the 50's, before it was cool.
posted by Iron Rat at 5:35 PM on January 30, 2007


People don't leave comments saying, "Needs a jurisprudence tag."
posted by ardgedee at 5:39 PM on January 30, 2007


The bat in my back-yard ate something that didn't sit well with him and he got really constipated. I heard him complaining about it to his lady bat, he said it was making him crazy.

I wonder what I should tag it when I post it to the blue?
posted by quin at 5:53 PM on January 30, 2007


I have a similar question about a certain superhero who is being driven mad by all the shit he has managed to accumulate in his cave.
posted by Astro Zombie at 6:19 PM on January 30, 2007


I love "batshitinsane" -- since I started reading MeFi, I've used bsi at least once per week (though not as a tag).
posted by ClaudiaCenter at 6:43 PM on January 30, 2007


OmieWise: would it be this one?
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 6:47 PM on January 30, 2007


Oh, ha ha, that was me, Ambrosia Voyeur. I went back and added tags much, much later.
posted by carsonb at 6:57 PM on January 30, 2007


My baby's all grown up now!

Thank Guano. Diapers are expensive. When is he eligible for retirement?

So, do I have to read the whole special place thread to find out how BSI got reinstated?
posted by and hosted from Uranus at 7:18 PM on January 30, 2007


overused tag, imo

to paraphrase:
"batshitinsane" is a better, more widespread use container for batshit insane things than "wtf" anyway.
Where would wtf be without loquacious?

Sorry to go again on that. "batshitinsane" is great surf.
posted by carsonb at 7:18 PM on January 30, 2007


i'm kind of curious as to why the original post was tagged batshitinsane.
posted by empath at 9:05 PM on January 30, 2007


I love batshitinsane in all its demented fecal chiropterian glory.
posted by kyleg at 9:21 PM on January 30, 2007


What's so insane about bat shit anyway?
posted by EndsOfInvention at 1:36 AM on January 31, 2007


bats + in the belfry + poop + head + unsanitary + mental + hygiene = funny. Or scary.

Besides, have you ever seen bat guano? In some caves, it lies so thick it would be dozens of feet over your head if you fell into it, but you'd never reach the bottom before the teeming hordes of beetles and bugs stripped you to dry bones.

That's some crazy shit.
posted by loquacious at 3:38 AM on January 31, 2007


it would be dozens of feet over your head if you fell into it, but you'd never reach the bottom before the teeming hordes of beetles and bugs stripped you to dry bones.

Just like MetaFilter!
posted by languagehat at 6:25 AM on January 31, 2007


it's a really useful tag : >
posted by amberglow at 5:22 PM on January 31, 2007


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