English

Alternative spellings

• laughing stock

Etymology

• laughing + stock. Thought to originate from the time when stocks were used to punish and humiliate petty criminals.

Noun

1. An object of ridicule, someone who is publicly ridiculed; a butt of sport. - Shakespeare

   Quotations

   When he talked, he talked nonsense, and made himself the laughingstock of his hearers. - Macaulay

   After I got drunk and fell asleep naked outside my manager's house, I've been the laughingstock of the club.

Related terms

• butt of the joke

Translations