Patsy

For the Italian comics character, see Nick Carter.

In American slang, a patsy is a person taken advantage of, especially one considered relatively naïve. The term is widely regarded as an ethnic slur, in light of the likely theory that it arose in the mid-18^th century when East Coast urban centers in the U.S. included a notable abundance of recent migrants from rural Ireland, among whom nickname Patsy (for Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland) was relatively common.

Two main contexts of the general term, at least in fiction, are:

confidence games, where the patsy in question is the "mark" intended to be deceived and thereby deprived of something of value, and
frame-ups by a perpetrator of a crime, who manipulates evidence to incriminate and thus scapegoat the patsy, who may be either an innocent party, or a confederate whom the framer regards as expendable. The description as patsies may apply over a wide range of circumstances, from the betrayal being an inherent part of the planned crime concealed from the patsy, to its being a spur-of-the-moment response to an unanticipated problem.

Patsy

See also