Shoot

Which does make me wonder where that expression comes from: "Shoot McGroot"? A shortened version of it, just "shoot," was apparently in common circulation in the 1960s, but it wasn't about just randomly shooting people. It was about shooting a certain person who was blamed for everything, a sort of scapegoat you might say, McGroot. Is there a need to pin the blame on someone? Well, the solution is to just "Shoot McGroot"! That apparently solves everything although not really. It is just a joke from more ancient times than I can recall. We children were just the little parrots echoing the joke from an earlier age. McGroot himself might not think it very funny, however, to have everyeone's garbage dumped on him, certainly.