Citing Rick Santorum’s recent surge in the polls, as well as the “cultural significance” of the word, Merriam-Webster announced today that it would be adding ‘Santorum’ to the latest version of its dictionary.
‘Santorum’, meaning “that frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex”, was coined in 2010 by columnist Dan Savage in response to former Senator Rick Santorum’s perceived homophobic rhetoric. Savage encouraged his readers to “Google Bomb” the term in order to make it rank high on search engine results. Merriam-Webster stated that the search engine visibility played a huge role in adding the word to their dictionary.
The Santorum campaign condemned Merriam-Webster. “It is bad enough that Senator Santorum’s children can’t put their last name in a search engine, now they will be unable to read a dictionary.”