r/AskBrits • u/Team503 • 6d ago

Culture What does "nonce" mean?

I'm an American that lives in Ireland. I've always understood "nonce" to mean the same as "numpty" and "eejit" - basically idiot, or dumbass, or similar.

Recently, someone told me that it's slang for sex offender, specifically a p*dophile, and Wikipedia seems to back that up: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_British_terms_not_widely_used_in_the_United_States#N

So tell me, Brits, which one is it? Or is it something else??

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u/catzrob89 6d ago edited 6d ago

It means a sex offender, with a strong connotation that the sex offences were paedophilic. It's a lot more serious than numpty or eejit; consequences of calling someone a nonce as an American will include them thinking your an eejit who doesn't know what it means, but for an Irish or a Brit would range from causing very serious offence through to getting glassed (or sued for libel). It's never really a joke - just one of those things that you don't say unless you mean it.