Just so that Brandeis University can be deservedly embarrassed, let me quote some of this before they take it down:<p>Oppressive Language<p>Rule of thumb : This expression comes from an old British law allowing men to beat their wives with sticks no wider than their thumb.<p>Picnic : The term picnic is often associated with lynchings of Black people in the United States, during which white spectators were said to have watched while eating, referring to them as picnics or other terms involving racial slurs against Black people.