goon

• IPA^(key): /ɡuːn/

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• Audio (AU)

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• Rhymes: -uːn

Shortened from gooney, from obsolete gony ("simpleton", circa 1580), of unknown origin. Gony was applied by sailors to the albatross and similar big, clumsy birds (circa 1839). Goon first carried the meaning "stupid person" (circa 1921).

• The meaning of "hired thug" (circa 1938) is largely influenced by the comic strip character Alice the Goon from the Popeye series.
• The "fool" sense was reinforced by the popular radio program, The Goon Show, starring Spike Milligan and Peter Sellers.
• The "guard" sense was influenced by both senses 1 and 2, though not by the Goon Show reference, which arose about 10 years after WWII.

goon (plural goons)

1. A thug; a usually muscular henchman with little intelligence (also known as a 'hired goon').
   • 2009 February 22, Kevin Baker, “Blood on the Street”, in New York Times‎:

     Efforts to unionize were routinely met with clubbings, shootings, jailings, blacklistings and executions, perpetrated not only by well-armed legions of company goons, but also by police officers, deputies, National Guardsmen and even regular soldiers.

2. A fool; someone considered silly, stupid, awkward, or outlandish.
   • 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 5, in The China Governess‎:

     Mr. Campion appeared suitably impressed and she warmed to him. He was very easy to talk to with those long clown lines in his pale face, a natural goon, born rather too early she suspected.

3. (ice hockey, derogatory)  An enforcer or fighter.
4. (Britain, WWII, PoW slang) A German guard in a prisoner-of-war camp.
5. (Internet slang) A member of the comedy web site Something Awful.

• goony
• goon baiting
• goon squad

• goonie
• gooney
• gooney bird

Diminutive slang for flagon.

goon (uncountable)

1. (Australia, countable, informal) A wine flagon or cask.
   • 2009, Stephen Cummings, Will It Be Funny Tomorrow, Billy?: Misadventures in Music, page 11,

     We drank goons of cheap wine.

2. (Australia, uncountable, informal) Cheap or inferior cask wine.
   • 2010, Patrick Holland, The Mary Smokes Boys, unnumbered page,

     ‘On the night of our school graduation he stole a flagon of goon wine and disappeared into the woods. The police found him the next day asleep on the creek. […] ’

   • 2010, Jason Leung, This All Encompassing Trip: Chasing Pearl Jam Around the World, page 384,

     With these instructions, we take turns sipping the wine directly from the bottle on the beach. It′s not the classiest thing to do but the fact that it′s in a bottle already makes it classier than all the boxes of goon we′ve consumed this trip.

   • 2011, E.C. McSween, et al., Boganomics: The Science of Things Bogans Like, unnumbered page,

     Red wine was consumed largely by posh folk, white wine meant goon, mention of a Jägerbomb would have sent its father ducking for cover, and ‘sex on the beach’ meant just that.

• box wine
• cask wine

• gono-, no go, no-go, nogo

goon

1. accusative singular of goo

goon

1. Rōmaji transcription of ごおん

goon

1. Alternative form of gon (“to go”)