Words, usages, and phrases that annoy the shit out of you...

otm

"gentle reminder"

"my son"

"who is she"

"mercury is in retrograde"

"Outlier", which means "it's the 21st Century and weak generalizations are what righteous people use to speak eternal truths."

The periodic reminder people are awful and will rarely even commit to their awfulness enough to actually post their reminders on a regular basis 👎

That post was just an outlier.

no i happily use reminder/gentle reminder to point out THEY HAVE NOT RESPONDED. customers need a boot sometimes.

Ugh, the variation I always hear is "friendly reminder". It's probably not that friendly if you have to point out that it is.

Same deal with "I kindly ask" -- how great-minded of you to recognize your own kindness.

Polite notice is part of this family of expressions.

Haha the Facebook “memories” feature just showed me that 2 years ago today I posted a status that started “quick reminder” oops

"you deserve..."
or
"you deserve to be..."

I guess mostly when it's something good, like happiness or love.

"TURN BACK YOU POXY FULE"

― TEH ONE AN ONLEY DEANN GULBAREY (deangulberry), Tuesday, December 23, 2003 11:35 PM (fourteen years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Seriously, what is going on with the poxy fulishness today?

Setting myself up here, but it really bugs me when you are being argumentative or negative and somebody responds with "I hear you," which is clearly a phrase they have been trained to use to respectfully acknowledge their debate partner without conceding any points while at the same time trying to shut it down.

I like "I hear you" and there is a need for similar expressions bc lots of ppl don't know when they've made their point

"You've made your point" being somehow incomprehensible?

"you deserve..."
or
"you deserve to be..."

Josh, I know what you're saying.

https://static.independent.co.uk/s3fs-public/thumbnails/image/2018/02/22/07/donald-trump-florida-listening-session-cheat-sheet.jpg

"you've made your point" is blunt and unsympathetic

I hear you.

sometimes passive aggression is the only tool left in the box :(

what is this?

"my son"

"who is she"

??

"I hear you" is passive-aggressive and fake sympathetic.

what? no. this is extremely context-dependent. most times i've used it and heard it used it is part of trying to communicate in an empathetic and constructive way. versus "you've made your point" which is almost always hostile and precedes "so shut up" or the equivalent.

"I see your point" is better than either of those 2, no?

p sure any formulation of "i entirely understand but i entirely disagree" can be delivered in asshole and non-asshole fashion, and can be misheard one as the other also

it can be "yes but" or "yes and" as well ofc

Agree to disagree
I hate this as well, for reasons previously stated but also because it's redundant. I mean, do we have any other choice?

let's agree to, to, that i am completely right and you are completely wrong

other choice would be to keep on trying to get the other person to agree with you

Let’s agree to disagree: dick move on the part of someone with more power who can’t justify themselves but can have their way regardless.

“Thanking you” bothers me (when said in person), which is bad of me because the people who say it are usually very nice. It just feels like a commentary on an action rather than a thankyou. But given it tends to come up during retail transactions I’m not sure a sincere ‘thankyou’ is called for.

I know this is me vs USA but I cannot abide grown adults using the terms "poop" and "pooping". It's like excusing yourself from a work meeting because you wanna go wee-wee.

"lets agree to disagree" often just a useful reminder that actual engagement in disagreement is 95% sophomoric performance and lunch is pending

sometimes tho it's a weaselly way to sneak out of an argument that isn't going your way

other phrases that have sometimes proved to be weaselly dick moves:
"you're right, i absolutely agree"
"i love you"
"this treaty means our countries will never go to war"

outright lies vs. rhetorical escape hatches

is there a way to suspend an argument that isn't going to be a rhetorical escape hatch tho? i often use "you're probably right" but inside i'm thinking "except you're totally not and one day i shall crush you"

http://imgur.com/QRMHLq4l.png

"Vacay"--ugh. Like it's not bad enough that you're posting pictures six times a day.

My favorite rhetorical escape hatch is "you could be right about that". So much more submerged than "let's agree to disagree". If you say it with the right tone of voice, your interlocutor will never notice you are not actually in full agreement. Works best with your boss.

"intellectual honesty" the worst people use this.

"i get that" another pretty good one but can easily slip into shades of peremptory condescension so handle with care

(i said that to my boss in a partic frantic roundtable conversation last week and immediately doubted myself)

ach sure nobody should do anything but agree sure

they should probably have to list back a precis of the discussion to ensure they were on message afterwards tbh

i realize i spend a lot of time beating up on "traditional media", but dogged conformance to journalistic style, after it has become abundantly clear that journalistic substance is a dead letter, really does chap my hide. recently i saw the headline "Employee, man brawl inside Chick-Fil-A restaurant in DC". If that's how your style guide tells you to write, you should strongly consider selectively ignoring your style guide.

Headlines are notoriously places where brevity is elevated above grammar and sense.

yeah wtf style guides rule