Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to do someone a wrong.

1971		E.E. Landy Underground Dict. (1972).
1990		(con. c.1970) G. Hasford Phantom Blooper 27: He a fucking pogue lifer the other fucking pogue lifers left behind to shitcan him.
2011		J.J. DeCeglie Drawing Dead [ebook] Some prick trying to shitcan another. Life ruining type stuff.

2. to stop, to abandon a course of action, to toss or throw away; to dismiss from a job.

1961		(con. early 1950s) J. Peacock Valhalla 65: Soon’s I fuck up enough to get shitcanned you’ll take over the company as gunnery sarjint.
1971		E.E. Landy Underground Dict. (1972).
1973		Dly Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, NC) 9 Oct. 6/6: They move on matters such as workers getting shit-canned by the University.
1975		E. Torres Carlito’s Way 138: I wrote it all down, then I shit-canned it.
1979		(con. c.1970) G. Hasford Short Timers (1985) 58: Some poges told me that a colonel shit-canned my story.
1986		C. Hiaasen Tourist Season (1987) 324: ‘What do you say we shitcan the task force?’ the chief said.
1990		(con. early 1950s) J. Ellroy L.A. Confidential 276: The only cases that mattered were case closed and case/cases shitcanned.
1993		T. Jones Pugilist at Rest 26: If I had a more conventional sense of morality I would shitcan those dress blues.
2001		(con. 1964–8) J. Ellroy Cold Six Thousand 100: He shitcanned Barb’s ex. He shitcanned his combo.
2002		Big Green ‘Notes From Sri Lanka’ 1 Dec. at BigGreenHits.com 🌐 So as unemployment tops 6% (which old Jack ‘Perkmeister’ Welch thinks is still pretty low) Dubya shitcans that crank Paul O’Neill (who was reportedly on the point of suggesting that we all turn our W.I.N.—‘Whip Inflation Now’—buttons upside down to read N.I.M—‘No Immediate Miracles’).
2007		L. Redhead Cherry Pie [ebook] [I]t was hard to completely warm to someone whose articles got you shit-canned from your last job.
2009		L. McIlvanney All the Colours 200: I could [...] just drive to the ferry and shitcan the whole job.
2010		J. Ellroy Hilliker Curse 13: She shit-canned my dad before the Hilliker-Ellroy marriage imploded .
2012		E. Kurtz ‘In the Neighborhood’ in ThugLit Dec. [ebook] He’d gotten the shaft at the warehouse, shitcanned without so much as a [...] handshake.
2017		D. Winslow The Force [ebook] [S]ome careless assholes at the Three-Two too lazy to shit-can an old evidence voucher.
2018		C. Hammer Scrublands [ebook] ‘I got shit-canned for that. [...] . My foreign editor was furious, wanted to know why I hadn’t kept it all for the paper’.
2020		D. Winslow ‘The Last Ride’ in Broken 298: ‘We’re not supposed to have this, so read it and shit-can it’.
2020		(con. 1991-94) W. Boyle City of Margins 51: [S]ucker-punching Captain Dunbar [...] and getting shit-canned so majestically.

3. to denigrate.

1974		J. McNeil How Does Your Garden Grow Act III: Give it a go Sam. And anyway, if there was, no need to take it out on him. Just don’t shitcan a bloke gives yer a go, is the point I’m making.
1980		Age (Melbourne) 20 Sept. 21/1: ‘Don’t shit-can me, Geoff, for Christ’s sake’.
1995		Age (Melbourne) 26 Mar. 58/5: ‘I reckon everyone would reckon Bob Dylan [...] I got shitcanned over that’.
1997		J. Birmingham Tasmanian Babes Fiasco (1998) 37: We spent the entire drive shitcanning gambling and gamblers.
2005		M.B. ‘Chopper’ Read Chopper 4 105: Other writers shit-can my books.