mixed company

mixed company (uncountable)

1. Men and women, both present at a gathering.
   • 1880, Charlotte M. Yonge, Clever Woman of the Family, ch. 5:

     "Imagine my one attempt at rational conversation last night. Asking his views on female emigration . . . ."

     "Perhaps the bearings of the question would hardly suit mixed company."

   • 1908, B. M. Bower, The Long Shadow, ch. 3:

     "Took 'er home all right, did yuh?" he leered, as if they two were in possession of a huge joke of the kind which may not be told in mixed company.

   • 2001 June 24, Leon Jaroff, "The Man's Cancer," Time:

     "Fifteen or 20 years ago, you couldn't even mention the word prostate in polite mixed company."

   • 2004 Stella Starsky, Quinn Cox, Sextrology: The Astrology of Sex and the Sexes - p.189

     Only a Cancer female can describe in mixed company a night spent with a lover and a double-sided dildo without a sniff of shame or irony.

• Often used to indicate a social situation in which rude or other unseemly behavior is especially inappropriate.

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