Green’s Dictionary of Slang

excessive, far too much.

1919

Wodehouse Damsel in Distress 35: The money that boy makes is sinful.

1. (orig. US sporting) an enclosure where errant players, e.g. in ice hockey, have to sit for a pre-determined period of time.

1955		Lincs. Standard 1 Oct. 15/5: Young competitors are asked [...] in which sport is the term ‘Sin-Bin’ used?
1962		Coventry Eve. Teleg. 8 June 48/3: The idea of a sin-bin [...] for Rugby League players [...] was rejected.
1975		Manchester Guardian Weekly 26 Apr. 24: There has been some discussion lately about the possibility of introducing a sin bin to football similar to ice hockey, with players being suspended from a game for five or ten minutes instead of being sent off altogether.
1992		M. Coleman Fatty 127: Harrigan sent halfback Des Hasler to the sin bin for repeated scrum-feed infringements.
1997		Guardian 3 Nov. 28/7: Ryan’s temporary dismissal [...] was scarcely in line with the official policy of employing the sin-sin.
2001		Sydney Morn. Herald 26 Mar. 22/6: Hopoate was sent to the sin bin [...] for elbowing Cowboys lock Glenn Morrison.

2. (orig. US) a school to which otherwise uneducable pupils, whose activities have disrupted their original school, are sent as a last resort.

1982		Daily Tel. 25 Feb. 19/5: It often took several months for an infant who has created chaos to be removed to a special school or a ‘sin bin’.
1992		J. Western Passage to Eng. 166: Then one day I was walking home and there was a group of five or six from the other high school nearby, the sin-bin.

3. (Aus.) a van or car used primarily for sex.

1985		B. Robinson Aussie Bull 32: The young man nowadays usually wants ‘a set of wheels’ (preferably a V8 ‘Sin Bin’, fully ‘decked out’) before he meets a girl.
1990		T. Winton Human Torpedo 108: Maybe it was the foam mattress in the back of the Sinbin.
1999		G. Seal Lingo 93: shaggin’ wagon means a motor vehicle, usually a station wagon used for sexual intercourse and also known as a sin bin or fuck truck.
2004		T. Winton ‘Boner McPharlin’s Moll’ in Turning (2005) 254: That kind of car was trouble. It was a sin-bin, a shaggin-wagon, a slut-hut.

(US) a clergyman, thus sin-busting, religious, evangelical.

1908		A. Knapp Well in Desert 124: I reckon I was a little careless in my talk if you happen to be a sin-buster.
1919		Witchita Dly Eagle (KS) 23 Dec. 4/3: ‘You’re the new sin-buster, ain’t you?’.
1920		Queenslander (Brisbane) 27 Mar. 3/5: A sin-shifter was an army chaplain and probably originated from the American cowboy term of sin-buster.
1923		Sinher Gaz. (TX) 23 Aug. 3/3: ‘The sin-buster an’ I had words about you, Joan’.
1941		Times Herald (Port Huron, MI) 1 June 4/4: In 1940 he opposed [...] Dickinson, 81-year-old Republican ‘sin-buster’.
1945		Courier (Waterloo, IA) 4 Nov. 12/4: [of a Salvationist] McKernan is a sin-bustin’ native of Ballymena, Ireland, who has [...] prostitutes, sawindlers, burglars and murderers for friends.
1956		Post-Standard (Syracuse, NY) 13 May 53/3: ‘Death Valley Days’ [film title] — ‘The Sinbuster,’ a young preacher, brings a town to its knees.
1988		Albuquerque Jrnl (NM) 30 June 3/2: A Christian T-shirt with a ‘Sin Buster’ design on the back.

1. (orig. US) any city (or part of a city) seen as a centre of vice and corruption, esp. Las Vegas, Nevada.

1971		B. Short Black and White Baby 79: Danville served as ‘sin city’ for the surrounding area [...] [O]n the outskirts of town were bars where you could drink all night; girls were available, if you knew where to look, and gambling was legalized at one point.
1978		Miami News (FL) 19 Oct. 13/3: [T]he sight-seeing gamblers [...] going to see life in the raw in Sin City.
1998		Odessa American (TX) 17 Nov. 24/2: Sin Vity, Las Vegas — complete with the lights, the shows, the gambling.
2000		S. Maloney Big Ask 1: My son Red was somewhere in Sin City and possibly in danger.
2007		W. Ellis Crooked Little Vein 162: What business do you have in Sin City?
2012		C. Stella Rough Riders 135: ‘Somebody in Vegas.’ ‘Sin City,’ Stewart said, ‘I never been’.
2022		D. Andrew Aussie Sl. 11: ‘Sin City’ Sydney.

2. attrib. use of sense 1.

2004

LasVegas.com 🌐 At Rio, you’re immersed in a bouncy Brazilian carnival atmosphere, surrounded by limitless opportunities to bring your Sin City daydreams to life.

(UK Und.) trousers.

1889

Clarkson & Richardson Police! 321: A pair of trousers ... Bags, leg-covers, sin-hiders.

(orig. US black) a priest.

1929		C.G. Givens ‘Chatter of Guns’ in Sat. Eve. Post 13 Apr.; list extracted in AS VI:2 (1930) 134: sin hound, n. Prison chaplain.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 195/1: Sin-hound. (P) A prison chaplain.

(Aus.) any form of clergyman.

1902		Euroa Advertiser (Vic.) 16 May 3s/4: Of all the sin-shifters now holding daily gospel in and around this afflicted city, evangelist Geil takes the lion’s share of the women’s admiration.
1907		Sun. Times (Perth) 30 June 4/2: Hardly had the sin-shifter tied the knot, when his wife discovered that the work and the £8 a week were wracks of a disordered dream.
1910		Sun. Times (Perth) 12 June 4s/5: There’s a sin-shifter in Perth who would make even a kooka feel gloomy.
1918		Chicago Trib. 13 Mar. 1/1: Big crowds hear him ‘put it across’ at The Tabernacle. Billy Sunday [...] he’s the sin hound.
1919		Aussie (France) XI Feb. 4/1: Of course, the Padre was dressed like a dinkum Digger, and the officer couldn’t judge an Oyster by its overcoat at the best of times. Up jumps the poor old sin-shifter, and grabs everything laying loose.
1921		Advocate (Burnie, Tas.) 11 June 8/5: The pricipal difference between a parson and a property man is that one is a sin-shifter and the other a scene shifter.
1924		(con. WWI) A.G. Pretty Gloss. Sl. [...] in the A.I.F. 1921–1924 (rev. t/s) n.p.: sin-shifter. An Army Chaplain.
1931		Western Mail (Perth) 19 Feb. 2/2: The sin-shifter continued in his best base hospital cheerio phase.
1970		Des Moines Trib. (IA) 31 Mar. 13/2: Down under, the army chaplain is a sin-shifter.

(US Black) alcohol, liquor.

1942

Pittsburgh Courier (PA) 25 July 21/1: Bob Hall took to the tears and sin soup route [when] his ofay chick had given him his walkin’ papers.

see as hell under hell n.

see like hell under hell n.