this post was submitted on 30 Aug 2023
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Yes yes, language changes over time. I've heard that mantra for decades and I know it. That doesn't mean there aren't language changes that aren't grating when they become fashionable (and hopefully temporary).

For me, "morals" being used as a crude catch-all application of "morality," "ethics," "integrity" or related concepts bothers me. Sentence example: "Maybe if society had morals there wouldn't be so many minorities in prison." lmayo us-foreign-policy

An even more annoying otherwise-fluent-speaker modification I see is when "conscious" is used to mean "consciousness" and "conscience" interchangeably. Sentence example: "Single mothers on welfare that steal baby formula have no conscious." It sounds like they're saying the shoplifter is not mentally aware of their own actions, not that they're lacking sufficient "morals" to let their baby starve for the sake of Rules-Based Order(tm).

There's others, but those two come up enough recently, with sufficient newness, for me to bring them up here. Some old classic language quirks are so established and entrenched that even though I hate them, bringing them up would likely invite some hatemail and maybe some mystery alt accounts also sending hatemail after that. You know, because they "could care less(sic)" about what I think. janet-wink

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Using "whilst" where "while" would work fine. Feels like the grammatical equivalent of plastic cutlery spray-painted chrome

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It sounds smarter, cromulently. reddit-logo

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

so-true I'm just like a fancy British guy fr

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

That means they can say the c--t word because it's just chummy friendly slang even when they're using it to talk about feeeeeeemales that enrage them like Anita Sarkeesian! galaxy-brain

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

Still weird to me how British people would use "whilst," but don't use "gotten." I suppose they would feel the same for USians since "gotten" was already considered old-fashioned before being picked up by USians again.