The television show “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In,” popular in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, was famous for awarding its goofy trophy, the Flying Fickle Finger of Fate. But the term fickle finger of fate is actually decades older than that. This is part of a complete episode.
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I just read a review of a 1950 movie called “Texas Dynamo” in which Smiley Burnette sings a song “Fickle Finger of Fate”.
My dad recently used the term “fickle finger of fate” as a euphemism for the “flipping the bird” gesture – the middle finger, the FU. I had never heard the term before and thus ended up here. So there does seem to be some element of “you’re effed” by the fickle finger of fate, for sure… and it seems like Laugh-in’s awards were basically “giving someone the finger” thought they made it less offensive perhaps by using the pointer-finger for their “award” instead. There’s also a 1967 film with the title. Love slangy stuff like this!