 "Explained: From GOAT to Gaslighting, words to stop using in 2023")
Do you think Roger Federer is the ‘GOAT’? Are you at an ‘inflection point?’ Is your significant other ‘gaslighting’ you? Perhaps the answer is yes to all of these, but a Michigan university would like you to stop using these terms in 2023. Let’s take a closer look: The Lake Superior State University has since 1976 prepared a list of words that ought to be banished. “The LSSU announces the results of the yearly compendium on 31 December to start the New Year on the right foot, er, tongue,” the website states. It adds it has done so “to uphold, protect, and support excellence in language by encouraging avoidance of words and terms that are overworked, redundant, oxymoronic, clichéd, illogical, nonsensical—and otherwise ineffective, baffling, or irritating.” The university on its website states it has received tens of thousands of nominations – and has selected over 1,000 words thus far to be expelled including “detente,” “surely,” “classic,” “bromance,” and “COVID-19,” plus “wrap my head around,” “user friendly,” “at this point in time,” “not so much,” and “viable alternative.”
Even comedy icon George Carlin submitted an entry “baddaboom, baddabing” in 1994.
The website says this year’s nominations came from a variety of countries including the US, Australia, New Zealand, France, Italy, Portugal, England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, the Netherlands, Belgium, the Czech Republic, India, China, Namibia, South Africa, Nigeria, American Samoa, Malaysia, the British Virgin Islands, Trinidad and Tobago, and Canada. Which words have been banned? The following words have been banned in 2023:
- GOAT This acronym topped the list for ‘overuse, misuse, and uselessness’.
“Applied to everyone and everything from athletes to chicken wings,” an objector declared. “How can anyone or anything be the GOAT, anyway?”
- Inflection point
The university said this is a math term that lost its original meaning since entering the verbal lingua-franca. “Chronic throat-clearing from historians, journalists, scientists, or politicians. Its ubiquity has driven me to an inflection point of throwing soft objects about whenever I hear it,” one person said.
- Quiet quitting
The compilers called the term ‘trendy but inaccurate’.
The university warned it was in consideration for 2024’s Banished Words List for misuse and overuse.
- Gaslighting
The nominators again argued its overuse detracts from its very real real-world concerns. Others claimed misuse, while still others said it was far too obscure a reference for the larger public to understand.
- Moving forward
This made the cut for plain misuse, general overuse and overall uselessness. “Where else would we go?” one wondered, noting that time travel does not exist.
- Amazing
A repeat entry from 2012.
The university called it a “worn-out adjective from people short on vocabulary.”
“Not everything is amazing; and when you think about it, very little is,” a dissenter said. “This glorious word should be reserved for that which is dazzling, moving, or awe-inspiring.”
- Does that make sense?
This was banned on grounds of insecurity and passive aggression, “Why say it, if you must ask? It just doesn’t make sense!” one person enquired.
- Irregardless
Made the list for not really being a word. The university pointed out that ‘regardless’ suffices.
- Absolutely
One banished way back in 1996, but deserving of a repeat nomination given its sins of replacing the ‘yes’.
- It is what it is
An old friend banished in 2008 for overuse, misuse, and uselessness. Dismissed as ‘adding no value’, a verbal crutch, or an ‘excuse not to deal with reality or accept responsibility.”
Plus it’s borderline rude, compilers said.
‘Words matter’ “Words and terms matter. Or at least they should. Especially those that stem from the casual or causal. That’s what nominators near and far noticed, and our contest judges from the LSSU School of Arts and Letters agreed,” said Peter Szatmary, executive director of marketing and communications at Lake State. “They veritably bleated their disapproval about the attempted nonpareil of GOAT because the supposed designation becomes an actual misnomer. The singularity of ‘greatest of all time’ cannot happen, no way, no how. And instead of being selectively administered, it’s readily conferred. Remember Groucho Marx’s line about not wanting to join a club that would accept him as member?” “The nine additional words and terms banished for 2023—from new no-nos ‘inflection point’ at No. 2 and ‘gaslighting’ at No. 4 to repeat offenders ‘amazing’ at No. 6 and ‘It is what it is’ at No. 10—also fall somewhere on the spectrum between specious and tired. They’re empty as balderdash or diluted through oversaturation. Be careful—be more careful—with buzzwords and jargon,” Szatmary added. To nominate a word to be banned in 2024, click here With inputs from agencies Read all the Latest News , Trending News , Cricket News , Bollywood News , India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
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