fink

[fingk] /fɪŋk/
noun
1.
a strikebreaker.
2.
a labor spy.
3.
an informer; stool pigeon.
4.
a contemptible or thoroughly unattractive person.
verb (used without object)
5.
to inform to the police; squeal.
6.
to act as a strikebreaker; scab.
Verb phrases
7.
fink out,
  1. to withdraw from or refuse to support a project, activity, scheme, etc.; renege:
    He said he'd lend me his motorcycle, but he finked out.
  2. to become untrustworthy.
Origin
1900-05, Americanism; compared with German Fink literally, finch, colloquial epithet for an undesirable person, especially an untidy or loose-living one (often in compounds, as Duckfink sycophant, Schmierfink untidy writer); but the transmission of this word to English and the range of meanings of the English word have not been clarified fully
British Dictionary definitions for fink out

fink out

verb
1.
(intransitive, adverb) (slang, mainly US) to fail to carry something out or through; give up

fink

/fɪŋk/
noun
1.
a strikebreaker; blackleg
2.
an informer, such as one working for the police; spy
3.
an unpleasant, disappointing, or contemptible person
verb
4.
(intransitive) often foll by on. to inform (on someone), as to the police
Word Origin
C20: of uncertain origin
Word Origin and History for fink out

fink

n.

1902, of uncertain origin, possibly from German Fink "a frivolous or dissolute person," originally "finch;" the German word also had a sense of "informer" (cf. stool pigeon). The other theory traces it to Pinks, short for Pinkerton agents, the private police force hired to break up the 1892 Homestead strike. As a verb, 1925 in American English slang. Related: Finked; finking.

Slang definitions & phrases for fink out

fink out

verb phrase
  1. To withdraw from or refuse support to a project, movement, etc, esp in a seemingly cowardly and self-serving way; back out: he will ''fink out,'' as Kauffman believed he had done so far (1960s+ Counterculture)
  2. To become untrustworthy and a potential informer (1960s+)
  3. To fail utterly (1970s+)

fink

noun
  1. A strikebreaker; scab (1890s+)
  2. A labor spy; a worker who is primarily loyal to the employer: unpopular with the other waiters, who thought him a fink (1902+)
  3. A police officer, detective, guard, or other law-enforcement agent: This Sherlock Holmes, this fink's on the old yocky-dock (1925+)
  4. An informer; stool pigeon: Now he's looking for the fink who turned him in/ The glossary runs to such pejorative nouns as fink, stoolie, rat, canary, squealer (1920s+ Underworld)
  5. Any contemptible person; vile wretch; rat fink, shitheel: All men are brothers, and if you don't give, you're a kind of fink (1894+) v: Dutch knew I worked for his friend and I wouldn't fink (1920s+)

[origin unknown; perhaps fr Pink, ''a Pinkerton agent engaged in strike-breaking,'' or fr German Fink, ''finch,'' a university students' term for a student who did not join in dueling and drinking societies; first sense said to have been used during the Homestead Strike of 1892; fifth noun sense was unaccountably revived in the early 1960s]