Carrie
thanks for pointing out that  words change in meaning and origina meanings get lost-   the words modern words boob and booby [meaning either breast or idiot] come from 2 different words and I don't know anyone who uses boob or booby  to mean idiot nowadays; I think many   here [and so it  seems in Australia] use the word as a colloquial one for breast and see it as different  to the word we use for booby prize or trap or bird.  That's how we can  have puns -  look up the Scottish charity booby birds.  My grandmother's generation used the word tit or titty as their word,  and no offence was intended. She told the story of how her youngest brother was breastfed until he was 4,  and when he was unhappy  the siblings would tell their mother he needed titty.  Just a word. We have to look at what those who use a word mean by it.  Most British people manage to cope with seeing blue or  great tits  flying around in the garden without embarassment.  For English people  a hooter is a nose [usually a big one], car horn or a factory/mill siren

What I wonder would Walter Cronkite have found acceptable to say about why Marian was receiving   the award.  Would he have not been able to talk of a chimney-breast or  someone's breastbone,  or the  breastplate in a horse's tack,  or  in a knight's armour.  Would he have been able to  talk about important developments in treating breast cancer?  

I have memories of  a fish and chip shop we used to  use on occasion.   I usually preferred their chicken to their fish,  and used to  ask for a chicken breast [rather than a  leg].  The owner used to then  ask his fryer to   cook a 'chicken wing'.  What made this really funny for  me and my husband was that said fish shop  was plastered with pictures of semi-naked women from the tabloid press,  and yet the  owner couldn't bring himself to say  the word breast to describe part of a chicken


It's not the word,  it's what is meant by  those who use it,  and had never realised  how it is seen by Americans.  Never come across people being called boobs in England from English people either

Helen


Do you extend this reasoning to using the word Vagina? 

As the root of the word vagina comes from the roman soldiers collecting 'Sheaths' (=vagina in latin) for for their 'swords' in more ways than one while on tours of duty!

Carrie 

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