Just when you thought you had enough douchebags in your life, enter:
The Mac Daddy Mother of all Douchebags: The DOUCHE Bag.
What exactly is a douchebag, and how did we, a somewhat civilized society, come to use this French word meaning “shower” as an irreverent taunt? According to internet scholars, the first usage of douchebag in the pejorative sense dates back to James Jones’ classic 1951 novel From Here to Eternity:
“The trouble with you, Pete,” the voice that did not seem to come with him but from that cigarette said savagely, “is that you can’t see further than that douchebag nose of yours.”
This seems to be the only literary usage of douchebag as vulgar currency at the time. All other examples of douchebag refer to medicine or hygiene. The next such apparent usage appears in 1964 in a stream-of-consciousness passage from Hubert Selby’s novel Last Exit to Brooklyn:
“… and she yelled to Jack to comeon and she/d f***im blind not like that f***en douchebag he was with and someone yelled we’re coming and she was dragged down the steps …"
And who can forget the moment it appeared in one of America’s all-time favorite movies: “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial”?
Tyler: (talking to Elliot) Douche bag.
Mary: (slaps Tyler in the back of the head) No ‘douche bag’ talk in my house.
Show your love to those you hold near and dear, or offend your frienemies, with the gift of a Douche Bag.