Banished Words

Posted by James Briggs on January 27, 2002

In Reply to: Banished Words posted by Chris on January 27, 2002

: : : : : : As a medical doctor, 'skin rash' and 'dead body' spring to my mind!

: : : : : Continuing along the medical theme, how about the overused journalistic phrase: "...lost his brave battle with cancer." The Onion, a satirical newspaper, had a headline saying someone, "...Lost His Cowardly Battle with Cancer." Another journalistic cliche, "grim task," referring to cleanup/body recovery after a disaster.

: : : : 1) "Transition" used as a verb. "We are going to transition you to the green team."
: : : : 2) "Reactionary" used in bizarre ways. "Jenny was like really reactionary when I told her I was leaving."
: : : : 3) "Speak to" instead of "respond to" or "address". "Josh can speak to that point"

: : : : We could also like, banish "like", you know?

: : : Why is it so often reported that some celebrity or other gave birth to a baby girl or a baby boy? Any boy or girl who has just been born is a baby.

: : "Going forward, the reports are now due by the 3rd Monday of the first month of every quarter."
: : Going forward?
: : Is this just NY trendzoid speak or has this infected other parts of the planet?

: Please please let's banish "paradigm" and ANYTHING happening either inside or outside some hypothetical box.
: However, the most idiotic statement I can think of is "Raid kills bugs dead". Huh?

: Perhaps we could extend the list to words that happen because people refuse to read, preferring to simply repeat what they hear others say.
: As in "You could of told me" or "in the interm,...".
: Geez.
: C.

Here's another - how about 'free gift'. That one really sticks in my crop!!