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The "gay" of "gay women" did not mean "homosexual" back then, that meaning is not documented even for men before the 1920s, and for women even later: https://gr
by microtherion 5y ago
The "gay" of "gay women" did not mean "homosexual" back then, that meaning is not documented even for men before the 1920s, and for women even later: https://greensdictofslang.com/entry/pgc2e4q https://greensdictofslang.com/entry/pgc2e4q
What they meant was probably "promiscuous" or in some other form "leading an immoral lifestyle": https://greensdictofslang.com/entry/bzyd5jq https://greensdictofslang.com/entry/bzyd5jq
That might make it a bit more plausible why this epithet was removed.
- vincent-manis 5y agoOr, given that 19th c. “gay” had a multiplicity of meanings, the intended meaning might have been something like “women who wore flashy clothes”.