page_title: The finger
section_title: In popular culture
hierarchical_section_title: The finger / Cultural impact / In popular culture
caption_attribution_description: Street boys of Keningau sniffing glue, Sabah, Borneo
context_page_description: In Western culture, "the finger" or the middle finger is an obscene hand gesture. The gesture communicates moderate to extreme contempt, and is roughly equivalent in meaning to "fuck me", "fuck you", "shove it up your ass/arse", "up yours" or "go fuck yourself". It is performed by showing the back of a hand that has only the middle finger extended upwards, though in some locales, the thumb is extended. Extending the finger is considered a symbol of contempt in several cultures, especially in the Western world. Many cultures use similar gestures to display their disrespect, although others use it to express pointing without intentional disrespect. The gesture is usually used to express contempt but can also be used humorously or playfully.
  The gesture dates back to ancient Greece and it was also used in ancient Rome. Historically, it represented the phallus. In the early 1800s, it gained increasing recognition as a sign of disrespect and was used by music artists. The index finger and ring finger besides the middle finger in more contemporary periods has been likened to represent the testes.
context_section_description: The use of the middle finger has become pervasive in popular culture. The band Cobra Starship released a song called "Middle Finger", and released a music video that showed people giving the finger. Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan installed a marble statue of a middle finger measuring 11 metres (36 ft), located directly in front of the Milan Stock Exchange. A now-famous photograph of Johnny Cash shows him giving the middle finger to a photographer during a 1969 concert at San Quentin State Prison, released as At San Quentin. However, the photo remained fairly obscure until 1998, when producer Rick Rubin made it the centerpiece of an ad in Billboard criticizing country radio for not giving airplay to Cash's Grammy-winning album Unchained. Cameron Diaz made the gesture during a photo shoot for Esquire. Harold Lloyd shot the finger to his own reflection in a Coney Island funhouse after getting paint on his suit in Speedy, his final silent feature, from 1928.
  Athletes, including Stefan Effenberg, Ron Artest, Luis Suárez, Juan Pablo Montoya, Iván Rodríguez, Danny Graves, Jack McDowell, Natasha Zvereva, Josh Smith, Bryan Cox, and Johnny Manziel have been suspended or fined for making the gesture. José Paniagua was released by the Chicago White Sox after giving the middle finger to an umpire; he hasn't played in the majors since. Baseball executive Chub Feeney once resigned after giving the finger to fans on Fan Appreciation Night. Bud Adams, owner of the National Football League's Tennessee Titans, was fined US$250,000 for giving both middle fingers to the fans of the Buffalo Bills during a game. Professional wrestler Stone Cold Steve Austin is also famous for flashing one or both middle fingers as part of his gimmick. Hockey star Jaromír Jágr made the gesture several times following goals in the early 1990s.
  The NME Awards, an annual music awards show in the UK, uses an extended middle finger design in the trophy handed out to the winners. Many musical artists, including Madonna, Lady Gaga, Eminem, Ariana Grande, Katy Perry, and Adele have publicly made the gesture. Britney Spears and Iggy Azalea have given the gesture towards members of the paparazzi, but had to apologize when fans interpreted the gesture as directed at them. M.I.A. gave the gesture during the Super Bowl XLVI Halftime Show. The National Football League, NBC, and M.I.A. apologized. The CD itself for Kid Rock's album Devil Without a Cause is a picture of his raised middle finger.  On the cover of Moby Grape's first album, Moby Grape, band member Don Stevenson was caught flipping the bird at the camera. The finger was airbrushed out of subsequent releases of the album.
  In automobile driving culture, giving the finger to a fellow motorist communicates displeasure at another person's reckless driving habits and/or their disregard for common courtesy.
  The finger is included in Unicode as U+1F595 🖕 REVERSED HAND WITH MIDDLE FINGER EXTENDED.
  The media sometimes refers to the gesture as being mistaken for an indication of "we're number one", typically indicated with a raised index finger. Sometimes, though, the "mistake" is actually an intentional euphemism meant to indirectly convey the gesture in a medium where a direct description would be inappropriate. For example, Don Meredith is famously noted in a 1972 Monday Night Football game describing the finger of a dejected Houston Oilers fan as, "He thinks they're number one in the nation." Ira Robbins, a law professor, believes the finger is no longer an obscene gesture. Psychologist David Walsh, founder of the National Institute on Media and the Family, sees the growing acceptance of the middle finger as a sign of the growth of a "culture of disrespect".
  Google Street View's picture of the area around the Wisconsin Governor's Mansion, taken in 2011 during the tenure of Scott Walker, shows a jogger giving the finger in the direction of the mansion.
caption: A group of homeless children in Keningau, Malaysia giving the finger while sniffing glue from a plastic bag.
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