EpicentRx Word of the Week: Quisling

Apr 1, 2024

“What do you call a Panda that betrays its own kind?”

“A Quis-Ling Ling”.

“What did Beyonce say when she found out Jay Z cheated on her?”

“Put a Quisling on it”.

“What did the geneticist say to the Quisling on Halloween?”

“Trait or treat?”

Quisling noun

kwiz-ling

Definition:

enemy supporter or traitor.

Example sentence:

“The biggest quisling in the tumor microenvironment is tumor associated macrophages (TAMs) that provide help and support not to the host organism but to cancer cells”.

Origin:

From Merrian-Webster dictionary online:

“Vidkun Quisling was a Norwegian army officer who in 1933 founded Norway’s fascist party. In December 1939, he met with Adolf Hitler and urged him to occupy Norway. Following the German invasion of April 1940, Quisling served as a figurehead in the puppet government set up by the German occupation forces, and his linguistic fate was sealed. Before the end of 1940, quisling was being used generically in English to refer to any traitor. Winston Churchill, George Orwell, and H. G. Wells used it in their wartime writings. Quisling lived to see his name thus immortalized, but not much longer. He was executed for treason soon after the liberation of Norway in 1945.”