good = bad?

[Tedwonny]

When I was searching for some synonyms of 'good' - bad was one of them. Could someone please shed some light for me how bad can be synonymous with good please?

Good Synonyms, Good Antonyms | Antonyms & Synonyms For Good | Thesaurus.com

Thanks a lot

 

[Drear Pooson]

(Not a teacher.)

A word can mean whatever its speaker wishes it to mean (although it helps if his audience understands it to mean the same).

Why in some circles "bad" has adopted this meaning I do not know.

That said, if you click on the "Dictionary" tab in the top left-hand corner of the webpage to which you linked and search for "bad", the final adjective definition of the first listing (no. 36) confirms this meaning.

 

[probus]

I hesitate to weigh in here because I am so old. But taking the plunge, I think that the use of bad to mean good began as American slang in the black community. It has since spread beyond that community, but still retains a strong element of black culture. And it is still slang. Also it is often used in a sexual context. Consider the following quotation from urbandictionary.com (always a source of very dubious reliability):

"Describing a female/male appearance in a good way. Bad meaning you have a great body and it's fit. It's used to replace words like sexy and fine.


sam: wussup cuzin
fy: nuttin
a female walks by
sam: damnn she's bad
fy :girl you bad"