“Seriously” THE WORD. It’s not hard. There isn’t a “need” so much as a discipline and normal fucking intelligence.
this post was submitted on 09 May 2026
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That literally makes no sense.
it's widely accepted that the word "literally" can be used to add emphasis
You found the root cause.
The solution is vicious heckling of idiots who misuse it - treat them like a middle-school drop-out - until they fix their behavior. Do the same for people who pluralize mass nouns as well: trainings, supports (not used like struts), emails.
Then they'll just make THAT one mean "not really literally", too.
-- Frost
Why? In which situations would this be actually ambiguous and, in that set, in which situations would the disambiguation actually be necessary for some real reason?
I Absolutely agree. It's Totally absurd, we Really need a new word.
I propose "dictionarily".
I'm against a new word, but I like this word
I think we just need to be cutting off the fingers of dictionary editors one by one until they turn it back the way it should be.
By making them add the u’s back in?
People just put extra emphasis or say literally literally
The word you're looking for is "literally."
Yeah, literally
Wait until you find out where the word very comes from.
Verily the veritas may surprise you.
Edit: and literally does not even literally mean “opposite of figuratively” — it literally means “by the letter” — as in literature — as any literate person knows.
I may be a little amused by it, but not verily surprised.
Its a very bemusing experience ;)
I am nonplussed.
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Best that I can do is, "non-figuratively." As in, "The power of the hurricane winds non-figuratively blew me away."
That non-figuratively rolls right off the tongue :D
I'm fine with descriptivism on theory, but it sure seems wrong in the cases where the word changes meaning due to people misunderstanding/misusing the word. That's not a a word gaining a new meaning, it's losing meaning.
The other one I need a replacement for is "begs the question" since so many people have misused that one too.
Words that mean “in fact” have been turning into “for emphasis” for literally a really very long time.
Edit: really means “in reality”, and very means “in truth”.
Trying to proscribe a particular usage is a doomed effort. You may as well literally command the tides to turn back. You're really tilting at windmills. It's seriously like mocking a clown. It's exponentially harder than...
no, wait, we can still save "exponentially"! It doesn't just mean a lot! It has important properties that differentiate it from linear or polynomial systems that make predicting outcomes-
small, linguistic drowning noises
EDIT: small, linguistic surfacing noises
I thought of another one, rational used to just mean "possible to express as a ratio" before it got co-opted by the academic-industrial complex-
smaller, somehow more pathetic linguistic drowning noises
rational used to just mean "possible to express as a ratio before it got co-opted by the academic-industrial complex- "
Hmmm.... when you say "academic" do you mean the Academy of ancient Greece? Because I'm guessing that's around when that mix-up first happened.
Now that I think about it I'm less sure that it was such a mistake. A rational number is one that can be expressed as a fraction, so the full number is expressible (vs irrational numbers which can only be approximated or represented as symbols, like PI. I think). If an idea is "rational", then the whole idea (all the antecedents and the conclusion) is expressible in a logical system, whereas an "irrational" idea can't be expressed as a logical structure. I think "rational" as a shorthand for "has a finite logical definition" is pretty reasonable.
I just looked it up, and according to wikipedia I have it backwards, the number groups were named "rational" and "irrational" according to whether they were sayable or unsayable, which makes sense. Though one of the references in that section is just to... a guy on stackexchange paraphrasing what he read in the OED, so not sure I'm buying that page 100%. More research is needed.
Thanks for the support, fellow windmill tilter.
In truth, I just came to accept that change is inevitable. Now I got my phonetic floaties, my reading goggles, and a literal (middle english definition) inner tube, and I just see where the current takes me.
All we can do is use the word correctly, and maybe, if you feel like it, correct other's use of it.
We've nearly lost "envy", and hundreds of other words due to people using words incorrectly. But, as we all know, language is as alive as the people who use it, and it changes right along with us.
A more interesting story, to me, is the discovery that we're all talking less and less:
Psychologists discovered that, since 2005, the average person has spoken less each year than the year before, by approximately 338 fewer words per day.
I've been using "genuinely" more and more in place of "literally" when I want to be, well, literal.
If we come up with something in this thread, I'll be here to corrupt its meaning by misusing it.
Why? Does fungus need a reason to give you jock itch?
"widely accepted"
Yeah, no. People who use it incorrectly simply don't understand language or meaning. Just because there's a lot of people who misuse the word doesn't mean it's widely accepted. A lot of people believe in a god, doesn't make it true.
i have a vague idea (that i can't prove) that people have started using 'objectively' for this purpose. i also think this is hastening objectively towards the same fate as literally. there is objectively nothing that can be done about this
I've been liking "explicitly"
The word “unironically” also seems to be serving a similar function
Yes, that's why it bothers me that word "literally" is used for emphasis. I don't care how long it's been used that way, it robs the word of utility. The whole point of the word was to clarify that you mean literally when your words might otherwise be interpreted as figurative. Shit like this is why I'm unsure if people around me understand that I'm not exaggerating about the Untied States becoming a legitimate dictatorship committing holocaust level atrocities. I don't know how to communicate when I mean something literally and be sure people understand that I mean it literally and am not exaggerating
The word has been enshitified.
"Like actually literally, for realz"
"Exactly". "Truly". "Literally, in the traditional sense not the post modern sense where it means emphatically or figuratively"
Sometimes the best way to show something as real is to say it plainly.
"They literally flew to Boston"
"They seriously flew to Boston"
"They actually flew to Boston"
Vs
"They flew to Boston"
The word is "acshully"
it’s widely accepted that the word “literally” can be used to add emphasis.
NO, the word literally used figuratively to "add emphasis" is only used by ignorants that want to use words without knowing the meaning. we need to stop this.
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Literally literally
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