Words and Phrases That Must Stop in 2016 – IOTW Report

Words and Phrases That Must Stop in 2016

Saturday, 26 December 2015, 18:31 BFH Uncategorized 170

We do it every year, to no avail, but it’s time for that post, once again, where we implore people to stop using certain words and phrases.

I’m going to lead this one off with one that actually sort of names names.

You might recognize a site I love, and I would do anything for them, but for the love of God they have to stop using “BOOM” in post titles. Especially when there’s rarely a legitimate earth-shattering Kaboom in the post.

Now, I fully understand that when readers start listing words, phrases, and wordplay devices that have to end, it will be impossible to end all of them, because not all of them are truly annoying… yet. But, they will be, just like the use of… ellipses in order to emphasize dramatic timing in a written………. idea.

I also understand we will be guilty of lots of what is listed, and that’s okay. It will still help shape our behavior. I don’t think I’ve created a post title with “EPIC” or “AWESOME” in it in many, many years. And I will pay 5000 IOTW bucks to anyone that can find me ever using the phrase “awesome s_ _ _ e.” (I won’t even spell it out in this post. It was cringeworthy the day I first heard it.)

Here are a few more things I’d like to see retired.

Wambulance – Never liked it. Not for a second. People use it to mock other people’s whining. I suggest replacing it. How about, “Lighten up on the wah-wahhhhh pedal, Jimi.”

Okay, not the best, but at least I try new things instead of beating a dead walrus over and over.

Whilst – We’re not British. Stop it. And that includes every other Old English word. Nothing is worse than reading a pretty folksy style of writing from a fairly loose and breezy blogger and they suddenly throw a “thrice” at you. It’s as idiotic as William F. Buckley dropping a “know what I’m sayin’?” in the middle of one of his pieces.

This next word made my list again because, sadly, I’ve seen its use INCREASE!

Veggies – Are we all overweight, yet way too energetic, infomercial actors? Are we too lazy to write out vegetables? Do we think it makes less-than-fun food seem more fun if we put them all in a childish sounding category? I want to know your justification for continually saying “veggies” because when I am murdering you (in my mind) I want you to know how easily your death by wrecking ball to the head could have been avoided had you simply stopped saying it because you thought it sounded “cute.”

Not everything needs to be cute.

That leads us to-

Foodies – This is not only cutesy by half (btw, let’s end “cute by half…” as well as putting “btw” in the middle of a rant. But I digress.   <—- That too, must end.) ((Not the <—— arrow bit, but the “but I digress” part.)) (((And stop doing the multiple parentheses thing to indicate that you’ve interrupted your own thoughts a number of times.))) ((((Okay?)))) it has stupid implications. What is a foodie? You really think you’re in a special category? You’re people who not only need to eat, you enjoy eating? How rare.

I’m a breathie.

‘Murica – This is better than having a liquid, that when eye-dropped on someone’s head, turns purple if they are a douchebag. Why go through that process when just observing them write “‘Murica” does the trick?

“Kill it with fire” needs to be killed with fire.

Selfie – Let’s try not to make up words with “ie” at the end. It’s just adding to the infantilizing of America. Besides, it implies that this is a new phenomenon. It’s not. People have been taking self-portraits since the camera was invented.

And finally, please stop spelling LOSE wrong!!!!

It’s LOSE, not LOOSE.

Writing loose when you mean lose just makes you look like a looser.

 

 

 

 

170 Comments on Words and Phrases That Must Stop in 2016

  2. Like lose and loose, can we also run a symposium on the correct use of “to” and “too”?

    I hate being a grammar cop, but any smart thing that you might be saying is utterly mowed down by mistakes this stupid.

    And hardly a day goes by that I don’t see it.

  4. Here’s another one heading your way, so be ready to be annoyed.

    It’s “same!”

    As in, female #1 says “girlfriend; I just loves me some chocolate FroYo!”

    To which female #2, in concurrence, shouts “Same!!!”

    It will make your fillings vibrate when you hear it.

  13. This may not exactly fit the topic, but . . . Exclamation points (!) are evil. I hate them(!) I especially hate it when writers punctuate nearly everything with a series of multiple exclamation points, getting progressively worse as their writing goes on. “You should have been there! It would have change your life!! Seriously!!!” I also hate that single word sentence: Seriously . . . with or without (!). All I can add is, “Ew” . . . which, come to think of it, should also be abolished(!) Seriously(!!!)

  17. “Folks” Ass hat in chief uses that word as his utility word instead of calling a group he is addressing by their proper name or title.
    It is “cringe worthy” And he needs to be drop kicked.

  20. Something is “very unique”. Either it is unique or it isn’t. Something has been decimated – if you mean pretty well destroyed decimated means one out of ten punished or destroyed.
    Please be careful with whose and who’s.

  32. American blog commenters have also developed a pervasive disability in discerning plurals, contractions and apostrophes denoting possession.

    Where’s the Smiths’ house?

    You mean John Smith and his wife and children?

    Yes, the Smiths.

    It’s the one with its gate open, hanging loose. I hope they don’t lose their “yard of the month” designation.

    Are they beholden (NOT “beholding”) to someone for that honor?

    No, they just keep their property neat.

  37. The phrase “sort of..” has to go. Immediately. I’m sorry to point it out, since you will now hear every news reader use it. Greta’s the worst. It is more than a word-crutch; it is an essential verbal construct for her.

    Also, the phrase, “speak to”, as in, “Up next, John Doe will speak to the immigration issue”. No, he won’t, because he can’t. He can speak to a person or a group of people, but he cannot speak to an idea or conversation topic.

    John, stop trying. Please.

  38. They’re going to repair and paint their loose gate with that white paint over there. They prefer all things white but they’re not racists. I hope that you’re not angry that I added to your post. Jus’ sayin’…

  42. I’d put Martha McCallum up against Greta for the “sort of” championship. Thankfully, she is not on at an hour that I watch Fox News, anymore. I used to turn off the TV to avoid her “sort of” barrages.

  44. Thank goodness nobody complained about run on sentences, because sometimes it just so happens there is intirely wayyyy to many spelling word Nazis and DONT EVEN GET ME STARTED ON PUNCUATION and just the other day I was really REALLY totally! and completely blown away by something I was reading here on this wonderful auwsome site and after I read something verrry uniqke and funny my whiskey just started coming out my nose on the keyboard and the whole thing was so funny and gross I threw up in my mouth a little.

    I hate *threw up in my mouth a little*

    I love anything with *____*

    Some people have English privilege. I don’t. Deal with it.

    (Deal with it – hate that expression. wait I need another one of theessos here)

  55. And either I have become more sensitive to it over the years, or there is a growing epidemic of verbs-not-matching-subjects disease. A typical line in a typical episode of a TV show sounds something like this, at my house:

    TV character – “There’s too many dogs at this park.”

    Golly G. & Mrs. Willikers, in unison – “There IS?”

    It’s like that pesky little rule of grammar has been completely abandoned. Okay, I’m finished venting.

  66. Speaking of subjects & verbs not matching: one of my pet peeves is using “their” when what is meant is “his.”

    As in “The customer got their wallet out.” I suppose this is in deference to the idiotic “feminists” who can’t fathom that the masculine pronoun is appropriate in cases where the sex of the subject is not specified.

    While we’re at it, I’m sick of “gender” being used when what is meant is “sex.”

    And I’m really sick of “gay” being used to describe a pervert. Gay was a perfectly fine word win my youth. A little girl skipping rope is gay. A queer is not gay.

  70. The term “gay” has always had its darker side. In the Victorian era it was used to describe a promiscuous woman, usually a prostitute.
    Even in the 14th century it could mean “”full of joy, merry; light-hearted, carefree” and also “wanton, lewd, lascivious”. It has been used to describe homosexuals since the 1920’s, but didn’t appear in literature until the late 1940’s.

    Here’s more info:

    http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=gay

    🙂

  73. It’s complicated. No, no it’s not. It’s the truth or it isn’t. It’s right or it’s wrong. But then I’m a black and white kind of person. Not much gray area in life in my view. Or is it grey? 🙂

  74. The younger you are, the more you see things in black and white (or maybe it was the TVs we had back then :). As you age you realize that things aren’t so simple, so clear-cut. That’s when the gray (or grey, if you’re English) areas start to increase. Along with your hair, assuming you still have any.

    🙂

  76. A better suggestion is to pull it out like toilet paper then wrap it two and a half times around his neck folding the tip underneath one of the previous wraps then use a surgical staple to hold it in place

  77. Extremely over used phase millenials love, “Bye, Felicia” and way overdue a hated phase burial.
    It’s a quote from a popular urban film called, Friday’s staring Ice Cube, (look it up for details. Don’t post, I don’t care and I don’t know – you’ve been warned).

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bT90D0GKZRM .
    The longer clip is profanity laced – see YouTube, so I posted just the quote.

  79. Sometimes? More like often! You can have the correct word typed in, and it will replace it with something that is completely wrong for the context. “I’m going to the store after work,” becomes “I’m going to the stove after work.” WHY?

  81. P.S. – Turning off AutoCorrect has been a positive, life-changing decision, for me. I’d rather own my own typos than inadvertently represent a dumb app’s ignorance to the world.

  87. What the hell does “one off” mean? I’m so loosing that one.
    And “awesome sauce”? Ok, that does have to go, but never will I stop using “cool beans”.

  88. Spiral Cut Hams. It’s bull shit. Was at Honey Baked a week or so ago. The wife orders a Spiral cut, the one with the brown sugar crust on it. So I ask/tell the girl behind the counter “Why do you call these spiral cut hams when there not?” Extremely evil look from wife. Counter person replies, It is spiral cut. I tell here no, a spiral cut would be a helix, one uninterrupted cut all the way down. These are parallel radial cuts. At which point I got slugged by wife and asked to leave by management. What ever.

  92. I’m pretty sure he was talking about using it when you don’t communicate in that way in the first place. If you don’t start off talking like William F. Buckley – don’t do it for just one word. It stands out as odd.

    Consistency in writing style.

    Plain language or 3 dollar words. One or the other. Mixing styles doesn’t come across well.

  95. At least I’ve never seen the word BAE used here.

    Add that to the list when it shows up.

    Don’t know why, but when I hear it I don’t care to hear any more from that person.

    I probably eye-roll some at it too.

  96. “Would anyone here hold it against me if I were to rip out Chuck Schumer’s tongue?”

    Not only would I not hold it against you, I will hold him for you while you do it.

    Hey! Maybe I should have used whilst here.

    Nah.

  97. I couldn’t care less about someone saying they could care less.

    Now, another backwardly arranged phrase does bother me a bit.

    “You can’t have your cake and eat it too”.

    Well, of course you can. As a matter of fact, you actually have to have it first in order to eat it. Duh.

    The damn phrase is: “You can’t eat your cake and (still) have it too”.

  102. I can’t believe the phrase ‘cool beans’ is still in partial use.

    Sustainable. (that right there is worthy of a knife to the throat )
    Systemic. (It’s systematic, but even that sounds so 1960s )
    Who we are.

  103. Thank you for post this one Tracy.

    I have a Pavlovian reaction now that makes me want to punch who ever uses that phrase in the mouth.

    I never knew how much I can’t stand it, till I heard someone other than Obama say. I thought it was just my dislike of him.

  107. Golly, a growing number of teachers no longer teach proper English. It is also possible that a growing number of students do not pay attention to lessons in proper English.

  114. “One of the Best.”
    “Near Miss.”
    “Little Small.”
    “Yeah, Sure.”
    “Paradigm Shift.”
    “War on Women.”
    “Social Justice.”
    “Black Li(v)es Matter.”
    “Extremist.”

  125. Probably because spell check knows what your job is like and thinks it very logical to stick your head in the oven after quitting time.

    I thunk I need a new job, to come up with an explanation like that.

  131. Flashback to 1964: My mother and David Hantman’s mother are not speaking because my mother told her that the sign in front of her house reading THE HANTMAN’S was wrong.

  134. We shouldn’t even be using “one off” because it’s British, referring to a event that is expected to happen only one time. E.g., “i’ll let you have tomorrow off, but this is strictly a one-off, so don’t expect this to happen again.”

    Not knowing the difference between e.g. and i.e. makes me wanna lose it too.

  138. A better question would be, “Brad, haven’t you been married long enough to know that the most important words in a married man’s vocabulary are ‘Yes, dear?'”

  150. Wow, tons of responses. I haven’t read them all yet because I wanted to hurry and add my pet peeves. The Preezy might declare marshall law, or it might be a mute point. 😉

  161. Sorry Corona, unless you include the context in which systemic and systematic are used, systemic is not automatically wrong.

    I use systemic pesticides from time to time. They are not systematic. Acephate is a Systemic Soluble Insecticide – It makes the whole plant poisonous to the pest – not like a residual that rests on the plant’s outer surface. So when something like an aphid sucks the plants juices it gets poisoned.

    Systemic refers to something that is spread throughout, system-wide, affecting a group or system, such as a body, economy, market or society as a whole.

    This would be one of those: Is it Marshall or Martial things. Either is correct – depends on the context it is used. Like; Marshall Dillon enacted Martial Law after the riot.

    Systematic is more about procedures/steps.

  162. The ham slices wouldn’t hold together enough to do that even if they weren’t still attached to the bone, which they are. But if you check the next time you get one of the hams, you can see that it is indeed cut in a spiral fashion.

    🙂

  163. “Going forward” is the business buzzword that’s in vogue now, as in “Going forward, we plan to blah, blah”, etc…). It’s used in place of “in the future” or “from now on”, presumably because it’s perceived to sound more positive.

  166. The funniest part was, the petitioner spoke only Albanian and I was working with an interpreter. Court interpreters are required to have master’s degrees in both English and the foreign language. The interpreter couldn’t translate the word because she didn’t know what it meant in English.

    From the Latin abort (“end”) and “facere” (“to make”).

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