fuck-upn.
/ˈfʌkʌp/, U.S. /ˈfəkˌəp/ coarse slang.
1. Originally U.S. Military. A person who (habitually) makes a mess of things; an incompetent person, a blunderer; a maladjusted person, a misfit.
ΘΚΠ
the world > action or operation > ability > inability > unskilfulness > [noun] > unskilful action or working > person
blundererc1440
blunt-workerc1440
botcher1440
bumblerc1530
bungler1533
haggler1577
bumbiea1585
tool1699
screw-up1944
foul-up1945
fuck-upc1945
omnishambles2009
c1945 in J. Cheever Lett. (1989) 108 Last night two fuckups were discussing their disatisfactions [sic] with the army.
1956 T. Anderson Your own Beloved Sons 8 Whenever he screwed up they knew it. He was a fuckup.
1968 G. Vidal Myra Breckinridge xii. 41 What you have assembled here are the national dregs, the misfits, the neurotics, the daydreamers, the unrealists, the—in short—fuckups.
1980 S. B. Kopp Mirror, Mask & Shadow 81 I become..[an] uncomfortably vulnerable fuck-up whose blunder is now exposed to my eyes and to theirs.
1994 I. Welsh Acid House 26 It was strange, but as Chrissie was such a fuck-up, I half thought of her a few days later when they said the body of a woman had been fished out of Oosterdok.
2004 S. Grafton R is for Ricochet (2005) vi. 62 All of us were in there because we got caught. Why would I take instruction from a bunch of fuckups?
2. A blunder, a mistake.
ΘΚΠ
the world > action or operation > ability > inability > unskilfulness > [noun] > unskilful action or working > a bungle
miscarriage1590
bungle1656
bumble1823
boggle1834
muff1867
car wreck1877
mismove1877
miscue1882
muddle1884
bobble1887
mess-up1902
floater1913
bollock1919
fluff1928
balls-up1929
muck-up1930
balls1938
snafu1943
foul-up1944
fuck-up1949
clusterfuck1969
car crash1992
dumpster fire2008
omnishambles2009
1949 E. Partridge Dict. Slang (ed. 3) 1054 F*ck up of, make a, to fail miserably at; to spoil utterly.
1954 W. S. Burroughs Let. 2 May (1993) 208 I can not think he is completely out of touch, and the return of your money may well have been simply a bureaucratic fuck-up.
1958 J. O'Hara From Terrace (1959) 257 Such a Goddam fuck-up.
1968 M. Richler Cocksure iv. 29 I'm sorry about this fuck-up, Mr Griffin.
1986 R. Sproat Stunning the Punters 116 I think there was some monumental fuck-up with the distribution deal.
2006 G. Malkani Londonstani iv. 38 I hate the way people bring up your fuck-ups from the past to make your fuck-ups in the present seem even worse.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2008; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.c1945