1940's Pet Peeve - the other "dirty" word = belly

The other day I wrote about how the word "stink" was very seldom used until about a year before WWII ended.

There's another word like that: "belly."

I'm not so sure why the use of belly is a dirty word but if you listen closely, you can hear people start to say it on OTR and ten they will back up and say "stomach" instead (to me, "stomach" sounds like a dirty word compared to "belly"...)

This may have something to do with pregnancy, but I dunno.

Speaking of which - try finding a 1940's or earlier photograph of a man without a shirt on, aside from swimming.

Anyway, here's one example of belly stomach; this from Fibber McGee and Molly, April 6, 1943:


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