Colors

Black Sheep

A black sheep is the underachiever or ne'er-do-well of a family or group.

In the United States, the relatives of the President are often seen as black sheep and the source of comedy.  For example:

• Jack Ford, the son of Gerald Ford, who admitted in an 1975 interview with the Portland Oregonian that he smoked marijuana;
• Billy Carter, the younger brother of Jimmy Carter, who was famous for introducing "Billy Beer" in 1977 soon after his brother was elected President, and for "Billygate," which was a controversy over his dealings with the Libyan government while his brother was President; and
• Roger Clinton, the half-brother of Bill Clinton, who was found guilty of conspiracy to distribute cocaine in 1984, before his brother was elected President.

How It's Used

“My butcher is Pino Cinquemani.  Pino is the son and grandson of butchers in Castrofilippo, Sicily, and his brother and sister still ply the trade in Italy.  (Another brother, the black sheep, works in construction, but Pino assures me, ‘he likes to cut meat too.’)”

"Donors can have their own agendas, too. The academic literature on donor psychology offers many examples, like a man who sought the adulation of his community by offering a kidney to his minister, a daughter who competed with her own mother to be the rescuer of another family member and a woman who told researchers that her motive for wanting to give a kidney to a stranger was to become 'Daddy's good girl.' Then there is the 'black-sheep donor,' a wayward relative who shows up to offer an organ as an act of redemption, hoping to reposition himself in the family's good graces. For others, donation is a sullen fulfillment of familial duty, a way to avoid the shame and guilt of allowing a relative to suffer needlessly and even die."

"At the same time, he admits that most sociologists do not do what he does. Most do not even approve. In purely academic terms, 'crossing the line' refers not so much to his putting himself in dangerous situations, as to his forming relationships that might invalidate his data. 'I am one of the black sheep of my discipline, because I go to live with people and talk to them. I might be open to bias or, God forbid, make emotional connections. Only a few of us do this kind of work, and we're constantly fighting to prove the value of it.'"

"There is a sense among Microsoft officials now that 'we have to buy our way out of this,' said Matt Rosoff, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft, an independent research firm. That's what the purchase of Yahoo Inc. was supposed to bring.

"For now, Microsoft's online services division remains the black sheep of the company, consuming billions of dollars of resources and hemorrhaging red ink. In the nine months ended March 31, the unit lost $745-million (U.S.) on revenue of $2.38-billion. Sales were up 35 per cent, but the loss widened by 83 per cent."

"In contrast, Prince William has been projected as the sensible, more serious elder son, as you would expect of a future king. Prince Harry's experimentation with cannabis at the age of 17, which resulted in a very public trip to a drugs clinic to see for himself the dangers of addiction, confirmed the early impression of the black sheep of the family."

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