Green’s Dictionary of Slang

to not care in the slightest.

1918		E. Wilson ‘Death of a Soldier’ in A Prelude (1967) 193: I wouldun give a good goddam fer the Arcade!
1927		W. Edge Main Stem 193: I dunno an’ I don’t give a good god damn.
1931		E.M. Berry ‘Sawmill Divertissements’ in Botkin Folk-Say 218: I don’t give a good goddurn if she’s a half sister to John Paul Gospel.
1934		E. Caldwell Tobacco Road (1958) 29: If he does know it, he don’t give a good goddam now.
1938		E. Hemingway letter 31 Jan. in Baker Sel. Letters (1981) 463: Don’t know whether it will ever be produced and don’t really give a good goddamn about that.
1946		J. Evans Halo in Blood (1988) 86: I don’t give a greased goddam who gets hurt.
1949		R. Chandler Little Sister 74: Sometimes I do not give a good goddamn.
1959		A. Anderson ‘Schooldays in North Carolina’ in Lover Man 120: I wouldn’t like it worth a good god damn, that’s how I feel.
1965		H. Rhodes Chosen Few (1966) 84: I don’t give a good goddamn whether you have fucked him or not.
1965		C.D. Bryan P.S. Wilkinson 82: I don’t give a good goddamn what you think.
1970		E. Thompson Garden of Sand (1981) 67: I don’t give a good doggone if they mail him parcel post if it brings us good business.
1974		V.E. Smith Jones Men 196: I don’t give a good Goddamn bout it.
1989		A. Vachss Hard Candy (1990) 12: I don’t give a good goddam about another collar.
1996		(con. 1949) G. Pelecanos Big Blowdown (1999) 292: ‘You just don’t give a good goddam, right?’.
2016		T. Robinson Rough Trade [ebook] He didn’t give a good goddam who went.