John Q. Public (and several similar names; see the Variations section below) is a generic name and placeholder name, especially in American English, to denote a hypothetical member of society, deemed a "common man", who is presumed to represent the randomly selected "man on the street". The equivalent term in British English is Joe Public. Variations There are various similar terms for the average Joe, including John Q. Citizen and John Q. Taxpayer, or Jane Q. Public, Jane Q. Citizen, and Jane Q. Taxpayer for a woman. The name John Doe is used in a similar manner. The term Tom, Dick, and Harry is often used to denote multiple hypothetical persons. An equivalent term is Joe Public which is used in the United Kingdom. Roughly equivalent are the names Joe Blow, Joe Six-pack, and the nowadays rather less popular Joe Doakes and Joe Shmoe, the last of which implies a lower-class citizen (from the Yiddish שמאָ schmo: simpleton, or possibly Hebrew שמו sh'mo: (what's)-his-name). On a higher plane, the Talmudic generic place-marker name Plony (which can be translated to Mr. X. or Anonymous) is used as a reference in any case which is applicable to anyone – Sanhedrin 43a provides an example. Usage In the United States, the term John Q. Public is used by law enforcement officers to refer to an individual with no criminal bent, as opposed to terms like perp (short for perpetrator) or skell to qualify unsavory individuals. 2008 Republican Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin infamously referred to "Joe Sixpack and Hockey moms" during a debate. Presidential candidate John McCain referenced a similar symbol, this time represented by an actual person, saying that Senator Obama's tax plan would hurt Joe the Plumber's bottom line. A fifteen-minute debate on this issue ensued, with both candidates speaking directly to "Joe". History John, Quisquam and "The Public" first appears in the formation of the United States as a nation where English and German were being discussed as the official language of the new United States in the later 1700s. Many new Americans of Lutheran German heritage also spoke Latin and used the term "quisquam" with a gender neutral meaning of "anyone" where, in English, John was the generic male term for a person. The term John Q. Public was the name of a character created by Vaughn Shoemaker, an editorial cartoonist for the Chicago Daily News, in 1922. Jim