Jacked up

[goingtocalifornia]

Jacked up - not proper (question)
Is “jacked up” American slang only, and not English, is it slang at all?

Thank you

 

[Rover_KE]

Context?

 

[goingtocalifornia]

Context?

Let me ask you a question.


Just us.


How did you...


...pull it back together
after what happened to you?


You don't.


I'm sorry.


- No, no.
- Jacked-up question, man.


It's a fair question. You...


You become someone else.


A stranger.


You must have loved him very much.


Yeah.


Sometimes that just makes it harder,
you know. You just wish you didn't.


So, come on, some more cop stuff.


- Or are we done?
- No, l... We're good.


Thanks.

 

[goingtocalifornia]

I think my question was one of those jacked-up questions.

It’s good to know whether slang you came across in American English you could also use in Great Britain. Like flossing which apparently means also “showing off” in America and not known in the UK (as “showing off” of course).

 

[Tdol]

I've not come across it in BrE. It sounds good, though.

 

[SanMar]

Jacked up also means being on some kind of drug that makes you wired.

What was wrong with him?
-Oh he was all jacked up on coke.

It's not unknown but it isn't one of the really popular expressions as far as I know, in Canada that is.

Not a teacher.

 

[bhaisahab]

The verb "to jack up" was used in the 70s to mean "to inject heroin".

 

[SanMar]

The verb "to jack up" was used in the 70s to mean "to inject heroin".

Interesting, I'd never heard of that. I've heard "to shoot up".

Not a teacher.

 

[Tdol]

Both were used in BrE.

 

[Vidor]

not a teacher

"jacked up"--messed up, broken, damaged

Like flossing which apparently means also “showing off” in America

No. The only meaning I have ever heard for "flossing" is the dental hygiene one.

 

[J&K Tutoring]

Slang expressions often have regional differences, and they are regularly 'recycled'. Back in the 60s and 70s, young people would often put wider tires on the back of their car and raise the springs so the body would clear the bigger tires. The car was thus 'jacked up'.

I also heard "jack him/her up" used to refer to reminding someone about a commitment. "He must have forgotten to send the merchandise. I'm going to have to jack him up on that."

The other uses of Jacked Up mentioned are all good ones, meaning that something is supported- perhaps even elevated- but not very solidly...

 

[britintheUS]

I hear it a lot around where I live. I never heard it at all in the UK, but in the US, it's used a lot.

The other day in classes, we had just found out that our exam was going to last 2 hours and we couldn't leave right after we finished and a guy across the room said " Man, that's jacked up" as in... you know, an injustice or "that's not right!"

 

[jahildebrandt]

Jacked up = messed up; amped up. Also includes connotations of mugging.

Your face got jacked up. (Your face got messed up)
My car got jacked. (My car is stolen)
She was all jacked up on Red Bull and ran around the block four times.

It can also be somewhat of a more PG alternative to F---ed up at times.

 

[sawenurse]

In the south United States a truck can be jacked up (as someone else mentioned) which means the body has been raised and it has large tires.

Also something you own can be jacked which means stolen. Like, my computers been jacked.

 

[TheEditor]

It seems likely to me that the "stolen" connotation of "jacked" derives from the more established term "hijacked."

That is, if an airplane can be hijacked, an automobile can be "carjacked" ... which is then shortened to just "jacked."

Creating new words with old suffixes is a common practice in English, as evidenced by such examples as "dognapping" and "Climategate."