Reader question:

Please explain “milktoast candidate” in this: “Joe Biden is a milktoast candidate. Not progressive enough, for me.”

My comments:

Milquetoast, actually, but first things first.

Milktoast, as name suggests, is a mixture of milk and toast, browned bread, browned by heat. Milktoast, or rather milk toast is made by putting toast in warm milk.

Milk toast is a commonplace meal often made to feed babies, because it’s soft, nutritious and easily digested.

When toast is put in milk, it softens, of course. It loses its strength and becomes weak, watery or wishy-washy, if you like. And from this derives the figurative meaning of milk toast – a weak, enfeebled person who’s powerless, timid and ineffective.

To describe a person as milk toast, however, the correct and formal spelling is Milquetoast (capitalized).

So, a weak, indecisive and perhaps timid person is Milquetoast? How come?

That name is popularized by Caspar Milquetoast, the main character of a comic strip titled The Timid Soul. It’s created by American cartoonist H. T. Webster (1885-1952), who once described his character as “the man who speaks softly and gets hit with a big stick”.

More explanation, from an article from Columbia Journalism Review (The origin of the word ‘milquetoast’, April 16, 2018):

“Milk toast” has little substance, cannot hold its shape, and is practically liquefied. Get the connection?

Though the description of someone or something as “milquetoast” seems to take on a French accent, it, too, is an American invention.

The original “milquetoast” was a comic book character created by H.T. Webster for The New York World in 1924. Caspar Milquetoast appeared in the strip The Timid Soul, where he entertained through his timidity, literal readings of signs, and refusal to engage anyone in discussions that could turn to controversy. He enjoyed some popularity, even appearing with his creator on the cover of Time magazine in 1945, and he loaned his name to others who shared some of his traits. As time went on, and people forgot who Caspar was, the phrase just became “milquetoast,” usually lowercased.

Now, back to our top example. US President Joe Biden, who is running for reelection, is described by one voter as “a milktoast candidate”. To that voter, Biden is a weak and ineffective candidate.

He is old. We know that.

However, be as it may, remember this: Biden beat Donald Trump and, come November, may beat him again.

All right, here are a few media examples of milquetoast as adjective, meaning weak and ineffective:

1. Over the weekend, the country’s turbulent political climate was amplified when KKK members, neo-Nazis and white supremacists clashed with anti-racism protestors and police in Charlottesville, Virginia over the planned removal of a statue of confederate leader Robert E. Lee. Since then, President Donald Trump has responded with two statements, both of which have drawn criticism and outrage, the latest controversy erupting Tuesday afternoon during a press conference at Trump Tower.

On Saturday, Trump issued a statement that was greeted by members of both parties as milquetoast at best and willfully ignorant at worst: “We condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides.” A second statement followed on Monday, with the White House finally succumbing to overwhelming criticism: “Racism is evil. And those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including KKK, Neo-Nazis, White Supremacists, and other hate groups are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans. Those who spread violence in the name of bigotry strike at the very core of America.”

Today, after a hostile homecoming, Trump added to those in a reportedly “impromptu” press conference where he delivered a convoluted defense of the Charlottesville racists, saying “the press has treated them absolutely unfairly.”

“You had a group on one side and you had a group on the other and they came at each other with clubs and it was vicious and it was horrible and it was a horrible thing to watch,” Donald Trump said. “But there is another side. There was a group on this side – you can call them the left, you just called them the left – that came violently attacking the other group. So you can say what you want, but that’s the way it is. I think there’s blame on both sides.”

Trump also argued against the removal of the statue of the late confederate general, explaining “George Washington was a slave owner. Was George Washington a slave owner? So will George Washington now lose his status?… Are we going to take down statues to George Washington? How about Thomas Jefferson? What do you think of Thomas Jefferson? You like him? OK, good. Are we going to take down his statue, because he was a major slave owner…You’re changing history, you’re changing culture, and you had people – and I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally – but you had many people in that group other than neo-Nazis and white nationalists, OK? And the press has treated them absolutely unfairly.”

These words didn’t sit well with many around the globe, including handfuls of celebrities who were quick to call out the inherent racism in his statements, from Lady Gaga to J.K. Rowling and more.

- Outrage Follows Donald Trump’s Latest Defense of Charlottesville White Supremacists, WMagazine.com, August 16, 2017.

2. More and more workers are switching sectors, and often seeking careers that offer greater purpose. This mass movement tells us a lot about how people view their jobs.

Marcin, 33, knew he needed a dramatic career shake-up. The New Jersey-based auditor had grown tired of a desk job in which his greatest interactions were over email, and his main day-to-day function was to serve a corporation's bottom line. “I was doing the same repetitive work every day, sifting through massive amounts of data,” he explains. “It felt meaningless, and I didn’t like my co-workers.”

The final straw, says Marcin, came while on holiday. “I completely soured my time away anticipating I had to go back to work in a few days – I was that unhappy. I wanted a job that carried a greater purpose than punching numbers into a spreadsheet for a few hours every day.”

So, Marcin switched from auditing to nursing. After grinding through three years of community college and one year of nursing school, he took a job in a hospital intensive-care unit in October 2021. Rather than kill time cyberloafing in the office, he was now entrusted with caring for sick and vulnerable patients. “It was all-consuming, intense and super stressful – but I was content,” he says.

For Marcin, switching industries has allowed him to find a job that aligns with his values. “I fell into finance after initially struggling to find a job after graduating from college: it was milquetoast, mediocre work for which I had no passion,” he says. “I used to come home tired and irritable. Now, when my head hits the pillow, I have the belief that my contribution of labour has had greater meaning.”

Following the Great Resignation, millions of workers are shifting to new roles. Some are seeking better pay or flexibility; others are job hopping to accelerate their career progression. However, a swathe of workers are changing their vocation entirely. According to a July 2022 global survey of nearly 2,000 workers by McKinsey & Company, 48% of those who quit their job in the past two years have moved to a different sector.

Industry hopping is another feature of the changed world of work. In some instances, employees like Marcin are seeking a career that offers them greater purpose in the wake of the pandemic. Others, however, may be pushed out of their sector by long hours and burnout. Whatever the motivation, all this shuffling offers insight into people’s shifting perceptions of what a career should mean – and how workers might choose jobs in the future.

- Why people are industry hopping, BBC.com, September 5, 2022.

3. The Toronto Raptors officially began a new era when they traded away OG Anunoby to the New York Knicks for a package consisting of two new starters in combo guard Immanuel Quickley and muscular wing RJ Barrett. If nothing else, both players represent offensive upgrades.

Some Raptors fans and media observers were quick to assert that Quickley, not the former No. 3 overall pick Barrett, is the prized asset in the trade despite the fact that Barrett is younger, under contract for the next few seasons, and has a longer history of being an above-average scorer at the NBA level.

Many of the anti-Barrett folks out there will point to the fact that he signed a multi-year contract (a deal will only increase in value as the years go on), which he hasn’t lived up to. Some around the league have an even more venomous take, one that calls into question Barrett’s status as a player.

Zach Lowe revealed on his Lowe Post podcast that many executives around the league view Barrett as a “toxic asset,” postulating that Toronto may have willingly chosen to be shouldered with that deal to secure Quickley.

Even if you want to hold the respectable belief that Quickley is the main attraction in this trade, it would be foolish to immediately decry Barrett as a poisonous player. While he's not perfect, and his efficiency could be much better, his ability to score in a variety of different ways is sorely needed on a milquetoast Raptors team.

It’s hard to view a 23-year-old player who has scored between 17 and 20 points per game in all but his rookie season five years ago as too negative of a player to acquire. The salary won’t look as tough as it does now as the cap continues to go up and less of it is taken up by the Barrett deal with each passing year.

- NBA executives calling Raptors’ RJ Barrett “toxic asset” is a bit of a reach, RaptorsRapture.com, January 3, 2024.

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About the author:

Zhang Xin is Trainer at chinadaily.com.cn. He has been with China Daily since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question for potential use in a future column.

（作者：張欣   編輯：丹妮）