cougar
Who taught : Jake and friends
Cougar (itpleasesme.com)
A few weeks ago, I was having lunch together with my friends. During lunch, we had a few different talks and one of my friends talked about a guy who is dating a lady. Pretty typical until that moment. But then, she mentioned that the guy is young like 25 and the lady is old like 37. As soon as she said that, all of the other friends asked the same question to her, “Is she a cougar?”
Well, I was the only one who did not understand what that means. As you know, cougar is an animal. I think it is Puma but not sure. They look pretty much the same.
I will give you the best example for you. Do you know Demi Moore? She is 47 years old. Now, do you know whom she is married to? He is Ashton Kutcher and he is 32 years old. The age difference is 15 years. It is quite big, isn’t it? So, in this situation, people call Demi Moore cougar. Interesting thing is she said, “I am a Puma not a Cougar,” when she had an interview with CBS. What is the difference? No idea!
There are a few questions I have related with this expression.
1. If a lady is a cougar, does she have to be hot?
The answer is NO but she should be a little bit attractive, though, to be qualified for being a Cougar.
2. How much age difference should be there?
I guess it should be pretty significant because small difference is not really interesting at all. Maybe more than 10 years? What do you think?
3. Why cougar?
I have no idea about this but Jake told me people used cougar because the mental image of her is hunting the boys.
Speaking of cougar, there is a TV show, called Cougar Town, and its story is totally about a lot of cougars. I mean ladies of hunting young guys if you know what I mean. 🙂
One last question! Is this expression offensive or not?
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During lunch, we had a few different talks and… is not so good. I would say, “During lunch, we talked about a few different things and…” or maybe “During lunch, we had a few different conversations and…”
Now, on to cougars! I’ve never heard of pumas either. Urban dictionary says it’s a younger version of a cougar, but it’s not a very well-known expression, in my opinion. In order to be a cougar, not only does the woman have to date younger men (10+ years seems correct), but she has to be older, I’d say 50+ years old. A young woman who is dating an even younger man, I guess you could call her a “puma”, but the much more common expression is a “cradle robber”. But “cradle robber” is not gender specific — that is, it can be used regardless of which person is older than the other. “Demi is such a cradle robber!” It can also be used as a verb — “You’re dating her? She’s only 21! You’re robbing the cradle!”
“Cougar” is not offensive if you’re talking about a celebrity or a TV show, but it would not be polite to tell someone you’ve just met that she’s a cougar. Even a friend might get defensive if you call them that, especially if they’ve only dated one younger person, or if they feel self-conscious about their relationship. I feel like “cougar” implies an older woman who dates and/or sleeps with many young men, which is not a particularly nice thing to say to someone, unless you are really joking and they know that too.
Patty, Thank you so much! You just told me everything I was curious about Cougar. I guess cradle robber is also offensive if I use it to my friends or someone I just met.
The other question is why “had a few different talks” does not sound good?
Terry, you ask such good questions! I had to give this some thought about how to explain it. I don’t think I could ever learn another language!
Okay, so when “talk” is used as a noun in this type of sentence, it doesn’t mean “conversation” which is what you intended. It means more like a presentation or a lecture. For example, if you go to a professor’s seminar — “We went to a talk about lasers. Dr. Smith’s talk was very interesting” . Your sentence would be correct in a different situation — if maybe you organized a conference, and someone asked you what topics were covered, you could say “We had a few different talks about the state of the economy…”
Slightly off topic, but do you know what “the talk” is? Let’s say a mother and father have a child who is asking about where babies come from. They might say, “It is time for the talk.” “The talk” is when a parent tells a child about “the birds and the bees” aka sex. For older children (teens) it might be a lecture about waiting to have sex or safe sex. “I had the talk with my son yesterday.”
Wow, that is really fun to hear. Your explanation is so great. I think you can be an amazing English teacher.
The talk is almost like the same as the question in “pop the question” context?
I’m 12 years old and what is sex?
You are Mark, aren’t you?
Outside of the context of idioms, a puma is a mountain lion is a cougar – they’re just different locales’ names for the same animal. I’ve only ever heard cougar used as an expression for a lady.
It really is an intriguing entry again. I didn’t know adding “the” before “talk” makes such a commonly used varb into an expression with a specifit meaning. Many many thanks to your friends!
Isn’t it? Learning English is a continuous surprise. I am planning to write about this later with more details. Many thanks to come and comment about what you think! How’s it going?