Throwing People Under Buses Since the ’80s

Summary

---

The Nightly — Episode Summary

Podcast: The Nightly
Host: Matt Bragg (Hatch Podcasts)
Episode Title: Throwing People Under Buses Since the ’80s
Date: July 31, 2026
Co-Host: Greta Johnsen (not present in this aired conversation)
Featured Caller: Elise, Brooklyn, NY

---

Episode Overview

This episode centers on language quirks—specifically, the idiom "throw someone under the bus." Matt and caller Elise take a late-night deep dive into the evolution, meaning, and propagation of idiomatic expressions, exploring where "throw under the bus" came from, why certain phrases suddenly become ubiquitous, and what our favorite sayings say about us. The mood is both curious and playfully self-deprecating, as the two share personal anecdotes and musings about language.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Origin and Spread of “Throw Under the Bus”

• Elise’s Curiosity: Elise opens with her fascination about the explosion of the phrase "throw someone under the bus," which she distinctly remembers hearing for the first time on Top Chef in the mid-2000s.
  • “I have a very distinct memory of hearing it on the show Top Chef when it first aired, and then all of a sudden, it seemed like everyone was using this phrase... Like, where did this phrase come from?” (03:18)
• Matt Investigates: Matt looks up its origins, noting its likely emergence in British politics or American business in the early 1980s.
  • “The phrase likely originated in British politics or American business in the early 1980s.” (06:39)

2. The Power of Vivid Idioms

• Matt and Elise agree the power of the bus idiom is in its visceral imagery:
  • “It’s quite. It's brutal, but somehow quite slapstick and funny.” (06:39, Matt)
  • Elise: “It’s very self-explanatory.” (06:10)

3. Idioms and Everyday Language

• Elise admits not using "throw under the bus" herself, but shares that idioms color everyday speech (“came out of left field”, “piece of cake”, “speak of the devil”):
  • “There’s so many idioms that we say all the time, right?... I probably in my day-to-day life say things all the time.” (09:08)
• Matt points out how British idioms are often rooted in naval traditions, giving several amusing examples:
  • “Chock a block, taken aback, three sheets to the wind, to toe the line, turn a blind eye—all naval.” (13:16–14:35)

4. Idioms in Cultural Context

• Elise reflects on how phrases from subcultures (ballroom culture of Black and Latino queer New Yorkers in the ’70s/’80s) enter mainstream Gen Z vocabulary (“slay,” “clock it”):
  • “Just the idea that a phrase from that time period can now make it into this cultural zeitgeist, I think is—I just think that’s really interesting.” (10:28, Elise)
• Matt notes the time lag between subcultures originating phrases and their mainstream adoption, often via media like RuPaul's Drag Race:
  • “It’s really interesting... there was a good, what, 50 year gap between them actually being used and... popular.” (10:28–11:14)

5. Words That Annoy—Or Amuse

• Elise’s pet peeve is “irregardless,” now common enough to be in the dictionary despite its nonstandard status:
  • “Another word I think about all the time, which is a very crazy thing to say, but the word irregardless. Because that's not a word, right?... But because we use that word so often in our culture, it's now become a word. It's even in the dictionary but it doesn't mean anything...” (11:16–12:10)
• Matt’s is “I could care less” vs. “I couldn’t care less”:
  • “If you could care less, then you care somewhat about it. It’s supposed to be if you couldn’t care less, then it doesn’t matter. That’s a strange one for me.” (12:25–12:53)

6. Self-Incrimination: Have You Thrown Anyone Under the Bus?

• Elise sheepishly admits:
  • “I’m sure I threw both of my brothers under the bus when I was younger... I can’t think of a particular thing. I’m sure they can.” (08:01–08:42)
• Matt reassures: “There’s no shame in that.” (08:23)

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Elise on idiom discovery:
  • “I felt like I was having a prank played on me. Like, where did this phrase come from?” (03:34)
• Matt on idiom visualization:
  • “I have to say, I use it quite often because I think in and of itself it's quite a funny image, I think, to throw someone under a bus.” (06:01)
• Matt on idioms:
  • “It's incredible how many idioms come from naval traditions in this country.” (13:16)
• Elise on language evolution:
  • “Because we use that word so often in our culture, it’s now become a word. It’s even in the dictionary but it doesn’t mean anything...” (11:25)
• Matt, tongue-in-cheek:
  • “I would like to say a very good night to the first person who threw one of their colleagues under a literal bus and got that phrase catching on. Big fan of your work and good night to you.” (16:36)

---

Timestamps for Important Segments

• [00:24–02:23] — Matt’s kitchen cupboard anecdote; intro to the night’s theme
• [02:23–03:18] — Elise introduces the “throw under the bus” question
• [03:38–05:26] — Evolution of the phrase via Top Chef; idioms in competition
• [06:39–07:52] — Exploring origin and synonyms; confession booth
• [09:08–10:28] — Idioms in daily speech and cultural shifts
• [10:28–11:14] — Ball culture idioms and RuPaul's Drag Race influence
• [11:16–12:10] — “Irregardless” and failed negatives
• [12:25–12:53] — “Could care less” pet peeve
• [13:16–14:35] — British naval idioms explained
• [14:54–16:11] — Why “throw under the bus” spread so fast; cultural stickiness
• [16:23–16:36] — Goodbye and thanks with comic sign-off

---

Tone & Style

Conversational, self-aware, witty, and gently nerdy—Matt and Elise balance late-night confessional warmth with genuine linguistic curiosity.

---

For Those Who Haven’t Listened

This episode offers a brisk, engaging exploration of why certain idioms catch on, how language mutates through pop culture, and why we all occasionally “throw someone under the bus”—even if we don’t realize it. With personal stories, trivia, and plenty of good humor, it’s prime late-night company for anyone fascinated by words, phrases, and the everyday, sneaky ways they worm their way into our lives.

---

Transcript

[A]

Audio for sleep by hatch.

[B]

All right, I'm Matt. Welcome to the nightly from Hatch, where your late night thoughts go to. And mine as well. That's part of the deal. Get to. Get to do mine as well. And I got a lot of late night thoughts, actually. I've had a very traumatic day today. Not to dump it all on you, obviously, but I opened a kitchen cupboard this morning and the door fell off. So as you can imagine, I dealt with that incredibly calmly and in a very reasonable fashion. And by that I mean I did shout and scream a lot and said to my girlfriend that I'm putting the house on the market and I'm done. I want to get away from this place because I'm sick of it. But after that subsided, actually did deal with it and it. I thought this was quite interesting. It's not that interesting. I'll tell you what's interesting. If you've got a cupboard door that's just fallen off, you'll enjoy this. What you need to do is go and buy a load of matchsticks from the shop because what's often happened is the, the hole has gotten too big in the unit and it. The screws sort of loosened and fallen out. So you need to get some big industrial glue, pack it with a little matchsticks, let it dry, cut the matchsticks off, you can put a new screw straight in and. Yeah, new cupboard door. So there you go. I did it today and I. Well, I was gonna say without any fuss, that would be a lie because it's still hot as well. So I was sweating and very angry, but I got it done in the end. Anyway, tonight we have a caller on the line which should be there now. Can you hear me, Elise?

[A]

Yes, I can hear you.

[B]

Excellent news. How are you, Elise?

[A]

I am doing well.

[B]

Excellent. You don't sound so sure of it, but I'll take your word for it.

[A]

Some days I'm doing more well than other days.

[B]

Yeah, well, yeah, yeah, like me, I've had a rough one today, so I'm glad to be chatting to you. Where are you calling from?

[A]

I'm calling from Brooklyn, New York.

[B]

Brooklyn, New York. Very nice. How did you find the whole World cup experience?

[A]

I work in midtown Manhattan, which meant that there was a lot of disturbance in midtown for various FIFA events. So although it was fun to be part of it all, it did make my day to day. A little bit of a nuisance.

[B]

Got you. That's the most polite way of saying it was an absolute nightmare and I hated it. That I've ever heard. So what. What's on your mind tonight, Elise?

[A]

So I find language very interesting, and I find the way that we speak to each other very interesting. And particularly, there's a phrase that, to me, it appeared out of nowhere, which is the phrase, throw someone under the bus.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I have a very distinct memory of hearing it on the show Top Chef when it first aired, and then all of a sudden, it seemed like everyone was using this phrase. And I felt a bit like a crazy person because I felt like I'd never heard it before. And I thought maybe everyone. I felt like I was having a prank played on me. Like, where did this phrase come from? And why do we. Why does everyone use it all of a sudden?

[B]

I see. So it could be a situation like when you buy a new car, and then all of a sudden, you see the same car everywhere you go. So maybe it was one of those where you hadn't. You just sort of tuned it out, and then it became more apparent after you heard it on Top Chef. Which. What is Top Chef, by the way? Let's get that out the way, because I don't know.

[A]

It is a reality show in the States. Cooking reality show to see who is the Top Chef.

[B]

I want to say it for a cooking show.

[A]

Yeah. I want to say it started probably in the mid-2000s. So, like, 2005, 2006. It's been on for a long time.

[B]

Okay. And do you. Do you remember the context in which somebody was thrown under the bus in this situation?

[A]

Sure. They were doing a challenge. So if I remember correctly, they would get paired up. The chefs would get paired together to do challenges, and then if your team lost, someone on your team would be voted off by the panel of judges. And it felt like a lot of people were throwing each other. Throwing each other under the bus when it came time to the judging portion and sort of throwing blame on each other.

[B]

Okay. So throwing people under the bus is probably. It's quite an important element of this show, by the sounds of it. Unless you yourself want to get thrown under the bus, you got to throw other people under the bus first.

[A]

Correct.

[B]

So, I mean, firstly, I just can't believe how much this has stuck in your head since 2007, at least. It's quite a considerable amount of time, as much else been going on since then.

[A]

You know, it's just something that whenever I hear the phrase, it reminds me how taken aback I was by it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And people say it quite often.

[B]

Yeah. I have to say I use it quite Often because I think in and of itself it's quite a funny image, I think, to throw someone under a bus.

[A]

It's very self explanatory.

[B]

I think that's why it's so great, isn't it? It's so. Yeah, it's so obvious what it means. Is it something you've taken on in your own kind of vernacular now?

[A]

I don't think I use it myself, no. But yes, the image of a bus coming very fast and you can't really stop a bus. Right. And then someone just pushes you in front of one, throws you under it. I get why people use it.

[B]

Yeah. It's quite. It's brutal, but somehow quite slapstick and funny. I'm just having a quick look now, at least to try and get to the bottom of this. It's obviously the meaning, as we know, sacrificing another person's reputation or well being to save your own skin. The phrase likely originated in British politics or American business in the early 1980s. So I guess because there is some synonyms here, there's obviously throwing someone to the lions, making someone a scapegoat, which I don't understand either. What's a scapegoat?

[A]

Yeah. If someone's a scapegoat. Yeah. You throw them to lions, you blame them, you make them the person that you blame. Or like a sacrificial lamb.

[B]

But is a scapegoat a type of goat? That might be a really stupid question.

[A]

I don't think so.

[B]

I don't believe it is. If anyone knows what a scapegoat is. I understand the mean, the meaning of the phrase, but I don't know what a scapegoat is. So have you got any particular favorite times where you've thrown someone under the bus, at least?

[A]

Oh my gosh. Wow. I didn't know I would be, you know, forced to bring up my bad habits.

[B]

We're all friends here.

[A]

Have I turned someone under the bus? I'm sure I have. Not on purpose. I'm sure at work I have. Especially if I don't want to get in trouble for something. I'm sure. I'm sure I threw both of my brothers under the bus when I was younger, when my mother was getting mad at us for whatever we did.

[B]

Oh, yeah, yeah. There's no shame in that.

[A]

I can't think of a particular. I can't think of a particular thing. I'm sure they can. I'm sure if we called either of them now, they would be able to point to many Instances where I threw them under the bus to save my own skin in my parents eyes.

[B]

It's great. I think we're really building up a picture here of what it's like to be around Elise. Is there any other. If you don't really. You don't use throwing someone under the bus in day to day life. You said before that you're kind of a fan of the language and sayings. Are there any others that you find yourself using on a daily basis that you know the sort of etymology of.

[A]

Oh. I mean, even as I was thinking about when I was starting to talk about this, I was about to say like this phrase came out of left field. There's so many idioms that we say all the time, right? Like we say things are like a piece of cake or we say like, oh, speak of the devil. I mean, I probably in my day to day life say things all the time. I think when I say that words are interesting, I think, or phrases are interesting. I think that the idea that a phrase becomes popular like I think now in the sort of Gen Z culture, there's a lot of phrases that come from like ballroom culture that are really popular, like, like sleigh or like clock it. And just the idea.

[B]

Where did you say they come from?

[A]

Ballroom culture, which is, you know, in the like 70s, 80s black and Latino queer community in New York City. And so the idea that a phrase from that time period can now make it into this cultural zeitgeist, I think is. I just think that's really interesting.

[B]

It's really interesting, isn't it, to see what sticks and also the gap there, because if that was sort of 70s culture, because I hadn't heard any of those like slay or clock it or anything until very recently. So there was a good, what, 50 year gap between them actually been using the. I don't know why that is.

[A]

I guess you could probably associate that with things like RuPaul's Drag Race, which has really come into popular culture,

[B]

of course.

[A]

So that probably has brought a lot of those phrases more to the forefront of our, you know, linguistic.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Another word I think about all the time, which is a very crazy thing to say, but the word irregardless, Because that's not a word, right? Like it doesn't mean anything. And I also have a very distinct memory of using that word and my mother telling me that's not a word. But because we use that word so often in our culture, it's now become a word. It's even in the dictionary but it doesn't mean anything because I suppose because

[B]

it means the same thing as regardless,

[A]

but it's really a double negative. So it's not a real word. But we say it all the time.

[B]

I don't think we really use irregardless over here, but I'm assuming. Does it mean the same thing as regardless then?

[A]

Yes. So it means the same thing as regardless. You could use it interchangeably, but yeah, it technically means the opposite of regardless. Right.

[B]

I would tell you that's another one that I think about often and it always winds me up when people say it wrong is, you know when people say I could care less.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Because it's like I couldn't care less.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I don't understand what the. What the difficulty is there. If you could care less, then you care somewhat about it. It's supposed to be if you couldn't care less, then it doesn't matter. That's a strange one for me.

[A]

You know, now people say it so often that it's become part of our cultural norm.

[B]

It has, yeah. It's become a sort of idiom in its own right. Which caused me. Causes me no end of ag that it really winds me up the same way when people say chatgpt instead of chatgpt. I don't know why that annoys me so much, but it does.

[A]

I haven't heard that.

[B]

Oh, you will. You will. It's coming. There's loads as well that I like that are from. Because in this country in particular, it's incredible how many of the idioms come from naval traditions. When you like when you see it, it's just so many of them that have. I guess they're probably. They've not stopped being used since like 16, 1700s, which is mad. There's stuff like chock a block taken aback. Apparently that's a naval thing.

[A]

Taken aback.

[B]

Taken aback, yeah. Which apparently refers to the sails of a ship being pushed flat against the mast by a sudden shift in wind. Three sheets to the wind. For someone being drunk. Again, that's some sort of sail related thing to toe the line. Obviously that's also a. That's an interesting one as well. Turn a blind eye. Apparently that was popularized by Admiral Nelson at the 1801 Battle of Copenhagen. When signaled to cease action, he famously held his telescope to his blind eye, stating that he didn't see the signal. It now implies intentionally ignoring a rule or situation.

[A]

So I think another reason why not to go back to throw someone under the bus. But you said it came about in like the 70s, 80s, apparently it's very new. Right. Opposed to all these other ones that you're just dating that are very old.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

That's sort of fascinating in itself that a phrase can so quickly take hold.

[B]

I suppose there's a big gap there, isn't there? Because I suppose before that you might say throwing them to the lions, which to me sounds like a pretty. A pretty Roman thing to do. And they didn't update the reference until the 80s when someone saw a bus for the first time, presumably, and went, oh, it'd be awful if you push someone under that. But it is weird how. Yeah, it suddenly changed to that and then caught on. And I've just got word actually from the producer who said, excuse me, chock a block. So for the benefit of the producer, Harry, chock a block is derived from a sailing ship's pulley system. When ropes pulled two blocks tightly together, no further movement was possible. Today, it means a place or traffic is completely full. Learn something new every day. Well, with that, I feel like we've covered a lot of ground here, Elise. I've enjoyed it. Has that answered any questions at all?

[A]

You know, the fact that we know where it came from? Possibly. We really have solved a lot today.

[B]

Yeah, loosely, possibly. Very, very possibly. But it's. It's something at least, isn't it? But thank you very much for getting in touch, Elise. It's been. It's been a pleasure. Hopefully talk to you soon.

[A]

Thank you.

[B]

And if you want to come on the show to talk about anything that's on your mind, please do email us or send a voice Memo to thenightlyach co or leave a voicemail at 9.04nightly. That's 904-644-4859. And thank you very much to Elise for getting in touch. And I would like to say a very good night to the first person who threw one of their colleagues under a literal bus and got that phrase. Catching on. Big fan of your work and good night to you. Thank you very much for listening and we will see you next time.

[A]

Sa. Sam. Sa.

[B]

To learn more about our phone free light and audio experience, head to Hatch Co. You can also follow us at Hatch Podcasts.