It disturbs me how “hip and cool” people nowadays say things that don’t even make sense and yet, they’ve become such a common part of everyday conversation, we don’t even recognise their stupidity anymore. We plug them into lingual exchanges because everyone is doing it and everyone knows if enough people do it for an adequate amount of time, it becomes almost natural and soon enough, alternative options just don’t seem to do the situation justice. Here are a few examples:

  1. Not even funny
    What exactly does it mean when someone makes a statement similar to “I hate orange juice so much, it’s not even funny”? Was it funny to begin with? When did this change? Why did it change? Why was I not aware of its comedic status?
  2. I know, right?
    If I were to surgically replace the words in “I know, right?” with other words that mean the same thing, I would get something like “I understand, do you agree?” Is it a question? Because even if it is a rhetorical one that may not need an answer, what is it suggesting? That you know? But how am I supposed to know if you know? And why are you asking me for reassurance?
  3. Chill
    What about this sentence makes it grammatically correct: “I am so chill right now.”? How exactly one can be chill when “chill” is a verb? Just because Jason Mraz thinks it can be used as an adjective, that doesn’t make it okay. Please use a suitable alternative like “relaxed” or “happy” or whatever it is you’re feeling, just don’t use a verb like “chill” because if we keep doing that, the earlier statement is equivalent to saying “I am so squash right now.”

But maybe I am just an old fart who doesn’t know how to “get with the times”, forever stuck in the olden days when grammar actually made sense. I suppose I should just stick to knitting and sipping tea in the rocking chair I so lovingly placed by the window of my retirement home room all those years ago. *Knits.

Advertisement