Twinkie, n.2
(ˈtwɪŋkɪ)
[A proprietary name for a brand of cup-cake with a creamy filling.]
Twinkie defence (U.S. colloq.), a legal defence of diminished responsibility in which the defendant's criminal behaviour is attributed to the effects of an unbalanced diet of convenience food; hence transf., any unlikely excuse, explanation, or defence.
The ‘Twinkie defence’ was first employed in 1979 in a San Francisco Supreme Court murder trial, but was disallowed as a legal defence by the U.S. Congress in 1981.
| 1979 Newsweek 4 June 31/1 In what the press dubbed the ‘Twinkie defense’,..Blinder told the jury that White's compulsive diet of candy bars, cupcakes and Cokes was..a source of excessive sugar that had aggravated a chemical imbalance in his brain. 1981 Economist 6 June 46/2 This argument [sc. of severe depression] has..become known as ‘the Twinkie defence’ after the cream-filled cakes on which..Mr White subsisted. 1988 Washington Post 22 Dec. a25/6 He [sc. President Reagan] elevated irresponsibility to an art form. And now in the waning seconds he sadly and unsuccessfully invokes the Twinkies defense. 1989 Christian Science Monitor 18 May 13/4 Blaming the sun for making you kill a man is a lame excuse, on a par with the ‘Twinkie’ defense. |