What is the difference between a peace sign and the British equivalent of flipping the bird?

Answer 1

• direction - peace - palm out and the F'off insult - back of hand out

I think that the comment of the person before me was right. I would hereby like to add to his explanation of the difference between those signs.

I am sorry to say that I do not know what the origin of the peace sign is.

What I do know is that Churchill, when using his so-called famous V- Sign, after some famous convention between America and Great-Britain, did not use the Peace- Sign.

One should not confuse the Victory sign "V for victory" with the Peace sign.

What he was actually using was the sign that is now also referred to as the British version of flipping the bird. I'm afraid though that it does not have the same meaning. It does not mean F-You, pardon my french, it only shows that the person still has the capability to fight, and that he doesn't care about you. I am almost sure that it is still a very rude sign to make towards another person. I think that for that reason Churchill was winking while he made that sign. That the sign was intended towards Hitler and not towards any other people.

This so called V-sign has its origin in the 100-year war between France and England during the late Medieval time era.

During that war the English longbow archers were a pain the eye of the French king, because of the fact that the longbows of the English archers were more powerful (read longer) than the French ones.

Because of those longer bows the English archers were capable of raining down arrows on the enemy army from a greater distance than the french bows, which gave the English a significant advantage in medieval battles.

The English longbow archers were well-known and feared across Europe in that time-era.

Those archers became that much a nuisance in the eyes of the French king, that at one point he decreed that every English archer, when caught, should have two of his fingers cut off. To be precise, it was ordered that those fingers that were used for pulling back the string of the bow, should be cut off and thrown away.

After that decree, the English made it custom to, whenever a battle against the French was about to begin, to show their enemy that they were indeed still capable of pulling back the string of their longbows, and therefore were still able to inflict some serious pain on the French side.

So..to pick up where I left off....Churchill was therefore not showing a peace-sign which is indeed with the palm facing towards the other person.

What he was actually showing to the English people and perhaps her allies, that he, and therefore the English still were able to use their force, that they still had enough strength left to wage war against the Germans.

As Churchill showed with his two fingers..(the so-called V-sign), was that England was by far beaten, and that they still were in possession of those two fingers to "pull that string and shoot that arrow" towards Germany.

If you look carefully at the images of Churchill stepping into his airplane, you can clearly see, that he was winking while he was making that sign. Winking at the English people, making it clear, that the fighting was not done. He apparently had that typical English humour.

With this further adding to the explanation of the difference between the V-sign and the "American equivalent of flipping the bird", I hope that the difference is now more clearer to people.

Furthermore, I would like to add that if you should notice faults in the use of the English language, that I am not a native speaker, but that I am of Dutch origin.