sticks and stones

sticks and stones

A shorthand way of referring to the phrase "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me," a childish rebuttal to teasing or other harsh speech. A: "There are some pretty unflattering rumors circulating about you now." B: "Oh, who cares? Sticks and stones."
See also: and, stick, stone
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.
See also:
  • I'm rubber, you're glue
  • I know you are but what am I?
  • so's your old lady
  • so there
  • so there!
  • see you later, alligator
  • later, alligator
  • aligator
  • How old are you?
  • poophead
References in periodicals archive
Lee, 38, from Nuneaton, a manager at Moat House Leisure Centre in Coventry, said: "Sticks and Stones is a low budget lm that I've made by myself.
is just what Coventry." needs: "Sticks and Stones has already been in a few festival.s, and it won the People's Choice Award at the Pennine Film Festival.
Jack Greenhough, |star of his dad Lee's film Sticks and Stones which will be shown at Coventry Film Festival on June 25.
I'm afraid they'll find that words can do a huge amount more that sticks and stones.
They had previously spent weeks wondering why the dog never returned the sticks and stones they had thrown for him to fetch, even though he'd go after them.
The chorus of the R 'n' B song is based around the well-known saying 'sticks and stones will break my bones but names will never hurt me'.
Sticks and Stones, the first entry in the series, was an American Library Association Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers, made the Amelia Bloomer list and was nominated for ALA Best Books.
When a nineteen-year-old died of a skull fracture in Kilkenny in 1873, the judge directed an acquittal since "the only motive that can be assigned is that the parties belonged to opposite factions." Four years later the Kilkenny quarter sessions chairman ordered an acquittal in a riot cases because: "It was a regular fight between parties on the public road, sticks and stones were fully used." Further evidence of the status of a faction fight as a sporting event can be seen in the fact that in 1878 a man was sentenced to six months for beating a friend after they watched a faction fight but none of the faction fighters was arrested.(27)
At the aptly named Strokestown fair in Roscommon in 1866, factions of more than one hundred men each had attacked one another with sticks and stones. Several men were charged with riot, but proving the charge of riot required evidence that reasonable people had been alarmed.
While brawling with sticks and stones was traditional, knives were considered alien.
Then Jujube returns to school to hear talk that she's "easy." Knowing nothing happened with Brent, Jujube tries to adopt the saying "Sticks and stones will break my bones but names will never hurt me." But it does hurt, badly!
The Sticks and Stones collection includes pendants and earrings in a mix of both, with sparkling diamonds set in white gold claws at either end of a yellow gold bar.
We have a Sticks and Stones pendant worth pounds 249 and matching earrings worth pounds 295 to give away, a complete prize totalling pounds 544 for one lucky winner.
But then about 80 protesters armed with sticks and stones broke through into a prohibited zone.