The Mulaney Test

The Mulaney Test is the informal name of the "worse word" scenario outlined in John Mulaney's hit 2012 standup special "New in Town." Mulaney describes a situation in which he is writing for an awards show and uses the word "midget" in a script. Mulaney is confronted by network personnel and told that he "can't put the word midget on TV" because "'Midget' is as bad as the 'n-word" to which Mulaney retorts "First off: no. No, it's not! "Do you know how I know it's not," I said to him, "is because we’re saying the word 'midget,' and we’re not even saying what the 'n-word' is!"

Finally, Mulaney offers The Mulaney Test succinctly: If you're comparing the badness of two words, and you won’t even say one of them? That's the worse word.