[iratewizard]

Don't use dictionaries that change the definitions of words for political means. Retard means slow. A retard chamber, for example, contains retardant that is meant to slow the spread of fire.

There is a perpetual movement to take words and shuffle them around as a form of purity spiraling. People who don't want to work build entire careers out of pretending moral outrage. Play their game and you give them power. Next thing you know, the words that were okay to say are verboten and you're the next one crushed under the wheel of progress.

[huimang]

This is a thorough misunderstanding of how dictionaries work. There is no all-powerful movement (composed of people who don’t want to work…?) dictating language changes.

People update usage over time and dictionaries reflect that. It’s extremely common and not just a modern effect.

It’s just a property of human language and it occurs in every language.

[iratewizard]

Your belief stems from a nativity of the power systems and how they operate. Ideological zealots do try to dictate changes all the time. Look at history and understand the reason behind China and the replacement of the four olds. Look at what happened behind the scenes during the replacement of the Russian Tsars. Look at critical theory as a framework for gaining power.

Now understand some simple fundamental realities. Dictionaries have always been expensive and almost never turned a profit in history. They were created as loss leaders for name recognition, passion projects by eccentrics, heavily subsidized by fundraising or (most often) a combination of the three. They are subject to corruption through funding, through people, and through the will of their parent company.

Merriam-Webster should be focusing on language and it's use. Not subtly accusing Kyle Rittenhouse of fake crying during trial. It's corrupted at the personally level at the very least. Not to mention their cozy relationship with Google.

Oxford, like most universities, has had biased hiring policies since my parents were children. Today, it's filled with the out of touch, weak and over-socialized. They have received a mountain of criticism regarding their "woke score" hiring policies, "woke" additions to their dictionary and many other issues.

It's unfortunate that you and others trust such biased sources. Like being "the dictionary" gives it some sort of official authority on the way you can communicate.

[eyelidlessness]

> Don't use dictionaries that change the definitions of words for political means.

I never thought I’d come across a sincere call for banning all dictionaries, but… well I never thought it, it doesn’t make me surprised.

[iratewizard]

There are plenty of dictionaries that don't manipulate you 1984 style. I don't recall calling for any bannings, either.

[huimang]

“There are plenty of dictionaries that don't manipulate you 1984 style.”

Yes, such as every major one.

Dictionaries are prescriptive. People use different words or use them in different ways over time and dictionaries update to reflect that. The only difference is how fast they update.

[iratewizard]

There's a difference between changing a definition to match popular use and changing a definition to support a false narrative.

Dictionaries are extremely expensive to run and rarely turn a profit. Are you surprised the "major ones" will lie straight to your face and intentionally warp your perspective of the world?

[markdown]

> Next thing you know, the words that were okay to say are verboten

So what? There are a hundred words your ancestors used that you never will. How has it changed your life one iota to have never uttered cockalorum, twitter-light, or grumpish?

> There is a perpetual movement to take words and shuffle them around

Yes, this has happened for all time.

[iratewizard]

> Yes, this has happened for all time.

No, that's a modern side effect of critical theory and grievance agitators. Nice try, though.

[i_cannot_hack]

There's some rich irony in trying to deny the existence of pejoration and semantic drift, while claiming your political enemies are out of touch with reality.

Words starting out as factual and neutral, then acquiring a negative connotation, then falling out of use except as insults is literally a tale as old as time.

> The word "idiot" comes from the Greek noun ἰδιώτης idiōtēs 'a private person, individual' (as opposed to the state), 'a private citizen' (as opposed to someone with a political office), 'a common man', 'a person lacking professional skill, layman', later 'unskilled', 'ignorant', derived from the adjective ἴδιος idios 'personal' (not public, not shared). In Latin, idiota was borrowed in the meaning 'uneducated', 'ignorant', 'common',[5] and in Late Latin came to mean 'crude, illiterate, ignorant'. In French, it kept the meaning of 'illiterate', 'ignorant', and added the meaning 'stupid' in the 13th century. In English, it added the meaning 'mentally deficient' in the 14th century.

> The word shit appears to have originally been a euphemism for defecation in Pre-Germanic, as the Proto-Indo-European root *sḱeyd-, from which it was derived, meant 'to cut off'.

> In the 20th century, where the old euphemisms lavatory (a place where one washes) or toilet (a place where one dresses[20]) had grown from widespread usage (e.g., in the United States) to being synonymous with the crude act they sought to deflect, they were sometimes replaced with bathroom (a place where one bathes), washroom (a place where one washes), or restroom (a place where one rests)

[iratewizard]

You're conflating morphology with the cult-like zealotry against the four olds.