[trashcan_]

I can really get behind your first bullet. Taking clearly defined medical terminology and exporting to strange contexts just sound like nonsense to anyone that uses those terms with any regularity. Like every time someone uses the term antisocial to refer to someone who doesn't get out much I can't help but wince.

[chalupa-man]

Metaphorical meanings for medical issues are some of the most common metaphors in most languages, and I would be surprised if you aren't using them yourself. Rejecting it seems frankly as bizarre as rejecting metaphor entirely. Are you wincing when you read Shakespeare, Plato, Dante, Dostoevsky, etc, who all use this regularly? You're never been shocked or dumbstruck, never find anything lame or sickening? Never describe anything as crippling, mad, callous, stupid, idiotic, crazy, never get drowned in work?

The metaphorical use of paralysis even predates its modern precise medical usage, having meant more broadly enfeebled before relatively recently taking on its specific motor function related meaning--so that would be the medical field assigning a new clear definition to a term with a 2300+ year metaphorical history.

Anyway, please sign my petition denouncing libraries everywhere for putting all these joke books in the humour section. It is a real hassle for melancholics trying to balance out their bile. Then we're getting onto this Jesus fella for all this fancy double-talk about eye debris, I've had specks in my eye before and cornea scratches are a legitimate problem.

[TulliusCicero]

People using "paralyzed" or "blinded" in a more metaphorical or abstract sense is very common, and has been for some time: paralyzed by indecision, blinded by love (or lust), etc.

This argument that we may only use words literally feels very Drax-like: "Nothing goes over my head. My reflexes are too fast, I would catch it."