[inflatableDodo]

The word is a perjorative for homosexual across the UK and in the private boys schools since the 1700's, fagging has been the term used to describe the practice of senior pupils enslaving younger ones, who are then known as fags.

The perjorative is the most common use, however it also describes a food and small bits of firewood. People generally seem to work out the meaning from the context relatively easily, homonyms being a thing.

To illustrate, here is a picture of a man with a giant cock - http://cdn.ecommercedns.uk/files/5/227995/1/5014991/kmk023-h...

[Nursie]

Fags and Fagging are a different root to Faggot, IMHO, which definitely seems more American.

I went to a minor public school and though fagging had been abolished many years prior, the first year of the senior school (age... 12/13ish) were still informally known as the fags. It wasn't particularly a homophobic slur, IIRC, though playground homophobia was rife back then (around 1990) so who knows really.

I do know I see "Faggot" used more for the food than as a slur these days, but then I don't hang around the *chans...

[inflatableDodo]

I hear 'faggot' being used more often as a slur than as the food, with the term 'fag' used pretty much synonymously.

Then again, I'm a man who sleeps with other men, went to a crumbling concrete block of a state school and often can be found working in factory environments and hanging around with bikers.

I guess it varies greatly according to one's milieu.

[hprotagonist]

fag/fagging is probably from the verb form, "to tire out/exhaust" -- ie, underclassmen get to do all the work.

Why the verb "to fag" means what it does seems to be an open question, and doesn't seem to be related to the pile-of-sticks root.

https://www.etymonline.com/word/fag?ref=etymonline_crossrefe...