Who Needs It

OF THE COLORFUL Yiddishisms now flooding the language (as the late A. A. Roback predicted they would'), one that seems to be especially popular is the cheerfully defiant needs As I have noted elsewhere,2 this expression comes from the Yiddish Ver darf es? It is closely related to another Yiddishism, asked for.. .? (Ver hot gebetn.. .?), which, as I have suggested, reflects the Old World Jew's difficult situation and his daily round of blessings and prayers. Constantly asking God for help, he naturally assumed, when he came up against something that did not suit him, that someone else had asked for it! That is, Who would have asked for this? Who needs it? Current use of needs has been taking a variety of forms, in a number of media. The simple question has been heard on the radio, as in: invented the fraction, anyway? Who needs it?3 It has also been seen in Sunday supplements, as in the squib for an article illustration: WHO NEEDS IT?No wonder mothers are anxiety-ridden and insecure, says Anna Freud; they're overadvised.4 It has appeared in daily newspapers, as in the Associated Press dispatch quoting New York's Mayor John V. Lindsay regarding the new supper-club feature of topless waitresses: It's a bad show. Who needs it?' Witness also the ironic newspaper advertisement of the Pennsylvania Oil Heat Council

Geography · American Jewish Fiction Analysis · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies