as for me, I am still suck on "creatives" which I have a visceral negative reaction to, but, it's more complicated now, in terms of who uses it and is it an indicator of cultural snobbery to hate it?
― sarahell, Wednesday, June 14, 2023 8:02 AM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink
it feels like a cousin to "vinyls" in some ways but i think it's worse, because i guess vinyls also sounds like some i can haz cheezburger type word, whereas "creatives" makes me think of someone just saying, "i'm spitballing here but what if we diversify and employ some creatives to hash out some ideas. i realize this might be a little above my pay grade so let's table it for now and circle back later...."
― omar little, Friday, 23 June 2023 16:35 (ten months ago) link
yeah ... like there is an exploitative context to "creatives" ... whereas vinyls (which I agree is related) is just annoying in its aesthetic way
― sarahell, Friday, 23 June 2023 17:04 (ten months ago) link
i put "vinyls" in the same annoying but harmless and there are so many other things to be legit annoyed by category as "bonkers" and "kiddo"
― sarahell, Friday, 23 June 2023 17:06 (ten months ago) link
"creatives" sounds like variety/hollywood reporter speak that made its way into the mainstream, casually used like some in-the-know bit of lingo. maybe that's why i don't like "showrunners" either idk.
also i think for me, working in the "entertainment industry", it does speak to the exploitation a bit, we're getting deeper here but i don't know anyone who emigrated to los angeles w/me or around the same time who wasn't inspired directly by the kind of work that's simply not produced anymore, and i know vv few who work in the wings of the industry they wanted to. they got swallowed up elsewhere, most happily, few begrudgingly. it all feels like a cheap slurry of empty disposable content now, instantly forgotten, in all areas of tv and film media. so when i hear "creatives" it kind of makes me think of idk jc chandor or chloe zhao getting sucked up into the marvel industrial complex, and makes me actually like guys like George Lucas more lol because at least when he was making his deeply flawed prequel films a couple decades back, it was all his weird singular vision, not smoothed over into a dull anonymous product aiming to please everyone at once.
― omar little, Friday, 23 June 2023 17:19 (ten months ago) link
that's all probably for another thread of course.
not sure if THIS is for this thread either but i hate the thing where people will explain things in a column or on twitter where it's this frenetic thing! They put exclamation points here! We all see it all the time! Brief sentences like this! And that's fine! It's what people write like now! I think they're all on drugs!
― omar little, Friday, 23 June 2023 17:21 (ten months ago) link
it all feels like a cheap slurry of empty disposable content now, instantly forgotten,
yeah, exactly.
― sarahell, Friday, 23 June 2023 17:47 (ten months ago) link
'creatives' is even worse when people call themselves that... it's a made-up, bullshit capitalist term, for gods sake don't adopt it yourself
― Andy the Grasshopper, Friday, 23 June 2023 17:56 (ten months ago) link
Or the 'creative class' is even more bullshit
one of the salient features of capitalism is that ensures each and every one of us will consume our full measure of humiliation in return for the opportunity to eat, including referring to oneself as a "creative" in order to prove one's capacity for self-abasement
― more difficult than I look (Aimless), Friday, 23 June 2023 18:05 (ten months ago) link
who decides what each of our "full measures" are though? Like, there definitely is not equality in that ... some people have to endure way more humiliation than others. So by saying "full measure" it kinda erases the existence of the inequality of society.
― sarahell, Friday, 23 June 2023 18:19 (ten months ago) link
some people have to endure way more humiliation than others
Hot Dog on a Stick to thread
https://img.franchising.com/art/articles/6607_plate.jpg
― Andy the Grasshopper, Friday, 23 June 2023 18:37 (ten months ago) link
I don't know whether it's just me but I have lost all tolerance for dog-speak this month.
Not a phrase, but I really despise the 'things that just make sense' TikTok hand motion.
― Hello I'm shitty gatsworth (aldo), Friday, 23 June 2023 19:36 (ten months ago) link
― sarahell, Friday, June 23, 2023 1:19 PM (four hours ago) bookmarkflaglink
honestly this is a stretch
― budo jeru, Friday, 23 June 2023 22:56 (ten months ago) link
I am fine with "vinyls" because imo it makes sense for "vinyl" to transition from an uncountable noun (How much vinyl do you have? Lots of vinyl!) to a countable noun (I bought five vinyls at the record store). Previously we would have used the word "record" for the items you bought at the store, and we still can, but since that word can also refer to the album in all its tangible and intangible forms, there's a gap there for a specific countable noun meaning "a vinyl record," and the word "vinyl/vinyls" has come in to fill that gap.
― Lily Dale, Friday, 23 June 2023 23:20 (ten months ago) link
"LP" comes to mind
― assert (matttkkkk), Saturday, 24 June 2023 02:52 (ten months ago) link
Platter
― immodesty blaise (jimbeaux), Saturday, 24 June 2023 02:57 (ten months ago) link
When I was but a wee person I remember a "record album" by Bing Crosby that my parents had. It was a set of 78 rpm records, each record had its own sleeve and all the sleeves were bound together between two heavy covers, rather like a hardbound book or a photograph album. The "LP record album" on a single vinyl platter was a huge leap ahead in terms of convenience of play and easy storage.
― more difficult than I look (Aimless), Saturday, 24 June 2023 03:08 (ten months ago) link
and birthed a new art medium of course
― assert (matttkkkk), Saturday, 24 June 2023 06:49 (ten months ago) link
the "vinyls" thing is a European thing I think? Like there are places (Germany maybe?) where it's actually a correct usage?
― Tracer Hand, Saturday, 24 June 2023 09:37 (ten months ago) link
It's what my friends in France say, for sure. LP doesn't seem quite as universally useful to me since it refers only to a specific type of record.
Basically, this seems like standard evolution of language to me, and it doesn't bother me when language evolves to get clearer. What bugs me is when language evolves to get vague or misleading - like when people start writing "may" instead of "might," leading to sentences like "The plane may have skidded off the runway" when what they mean is that the plane didn't skid off the runway.
― Lily Dale, Saturday, 24 June 2023 11:22 (ten months ago) link
I’m sure there are old German gits going “Schallplatten! They’re called SCHALLPLATTEN!! Bloody kids…”
― Tim, Saturday, 24 June 2023 11:25 (ten months ago) link
Verdammte kinder!
― Renaissance of the Celtic Trumpet (Tom D.), Saturday, 24 June 2023 11:52 (ten months ago) link
Auf das Geld
― Tim, Saturday, 24 June 2023 12:13 (ten months ago) link
"Vinilos" in Mexico also
― Josefa, Saturday, 24 June 2023 13:10 (ten months ago) link
Now that I think about it, it's the countries where you have a word like discos or disques that could mean records or CDs where a word like vinyls is especially useful to make the distinction
― Josefa, Saturday, 24 June 2023 13:26 (ten months ago) link
CDs are records, I'm firm on this point.
― Alba, Saturday, 24 June 2023 14:41 (ten months ago) link
Agreed, the music on a cd was, generally, recorded in a recording studio. A record producer and recording engineer were most likely involved, and probably a record company. Someone probably pressed a button that said "record."
― pomplamoose and circumstance (Ye Mad Puffin), Saturday, 24 June 2023 14:46 (ten months ago) link
like when people start writing "may" instead of "might," leading to sentences like "The plane may have skidded off the runway" when what they mean is that the plane didn't skid off the runway.This usage doesn't really bother me, and it's usually clear from context, but my favourite example is "a seat belt may have saved Princess Diana's life".
― ledge, Saturday, 24 June 2023 14:48 (ten months ago) link
i have to say the runway example offered strikes me as at least as confusing the other way
theres twenty better ways of saying it that "may have" but "might have" is 19th on that list imo
― Ár an broc a mhic (darraghmac), Saturday, 24 June 2023 16:16 (ten months ago) link
vinyls is definitely an American English thing too, I hear it constantly from the under-30 set. it's origin is likely just the not-unusual process of a mass noun being used as a count noun. for example, my dad would never tell me that there are beers in the fridge, but my friends do.
― the absence of bikes (f. hazel), Saturday, 24 June 2023 16:53 (ten months ago) link
same for waters in the fridgeas usual f hazel is otm
― Piggy Lepton (La Lechera), Saturday, 24 June 2023 16:57 (ten months ago) link
i think an important part of the "vinyls" thing is the fact that collecting records has an important community function and also touches on aspects of preserving / passing on musical heritage. and so there's a dynamic of learning from the elders and getting initiated into the lingo and terminology.
"disco é cultura", right?
― budo jeru, Saturday, 24 June 2023 18:17 (ten months ago) link
xxxp Neither "may have" nor "might have" sounds right in that context. "Could have" seems much better to me.
― immodesty blaise (jimbeaux), Saturday, 24 June 2023 19:36 (ten months ago) link
May have = it's still a possibility.
Might have / could have = speculation, with subtly varying degrees of uncertainty depending on the speaker. I am not sure I use them interchangeably, but I would need to listen to myself in a thousand contexts to know.
But "may have" is definitely wrong for Diana's seat belt. Hitler or Elvis MAY HAVE faked their deaths? That implies the possibility that they're living happily together in Bolivia.
Option one: "Diana may have been saved by a seat belt." = we don't know that one didn't. Possibly her death and funeral were a sham and she escaped unharmed, to get away from the spotlight. She is happily retired from working at a day care center in Brisbane, and she has a nice garden.
Option two: "Diana could have been saved by a seat belt." = this is more like, "had she been wearing one, she could have survived, but we don't know for sure."
Option three: "Diana might have been saved by a seat belt." = somewhere in between. You COULD interpret this as a speculation like option one, but that's a stretch. I would be more likely to interpret it like option two, where it means something like, "in an alternate universe where she was wearing a seat belt, there's a chance she would have survived."
― pomplamoose and circumstance (Ye Mad Puffin), Saturday, 24 June 2023 22:06 (ten months ago) link
i think you sound very certain there about how those very specific meanings are to be derived and i just dont, i suppose, have that confidence in the specifics there
― Ár an broc a mhic (darraghmac), Saturday, 24 June 2023 23:52 (ten months ago) link
Elvis and Diana are living happily together in Bolivia.
― immodesty blaise (jimbeaux), Saturday, 24 June 2023 23:59 (ten months ago) link
the may be but they might not be
― Ár an broc a mhic (darraghmac), Sunday, 25 June 2023 00:03 (ten months ago) link
They could have been.
― immodesty blaise (jimbeaux), Sunday, 25 June 2023 00:05 (ten months ago) link
The correct usage is clearly "Diana might coulda lived if she wore a seat belt"
― the absence of bikes (f. hazel), Sunday, 25 June 2023 01:05 (ten months ago) link
I reckon
― immodesty blaise (jimbeaux), Sunday, 25 June 2023 02:00 (ten months ago) link
people who couldn't find on a map until yesterday
― anvil, Sunday, 25 June 2023 12:44 (ten months ago) link
darragh I am simply speaking about how I interpret these phrases in my own dialect and within my own speech community. Yes I have studied linguistics a tad and have a degree in English/philosophy but that's not relevant because I am really just trying to answer the question that was asked.
So:
I may have had sex with your mom: I am not definitively saying whether it happened or didn't, but there is a possibility that it happened. To be honest, we were both pretty drunk.
I could have had sex with your mom: I had the opportunity. But this phrasing tends to indicate that I had the opportunity and declined.
I might have had sex with your mom: who knows? We were both pretty drunk.
― pomplamoose and circumstance (Ye Mad Puffin), Sunday, 25 June 2023 20:48 (ten months ago) link
I would add that the third sentence, as you pointed out in your earlier comment, can also mean something more like this:
If, at some point in the past, something had gone differently, I might have had sex with your mom. This is a purely hypothetical past-tense scenario, and it's clear from context that I did not have sex with your mom.
That's the one that tends to get confusing when you replace it with "may."
― Lily Dale, Sunday, 25 June 2023 21:42 (ten months ago) link
hey all let's get off moms.
cause
― sad Mings of dynasty (Neanderthal), Sunday, 25 June 2023 21:43 (ten months ago) link
depending on inflection and delivery and context, "might" functions a number of possible ways i would have said, and surely even a basic imagining of a sitcom-apologetic-hilarious morning after confession "i might have had sex with your mom" illustrates how it very much can mean that it has probably happened.
i know that this is a hilarious american thing btw but in this actual context my mother died under sudden and traumatic circumstances while i was in my early twenties so if the annoyance at my quibbling here is such that this is the example you really want to keep going with, fair enough, but if we could move it to anything else that works too
― Ár an broc a mhic (darraghmac), Sunday, 25 June 2023 22:19 (ten months ago) link
I'm sorry, darraghmac, please consider my comment withdrawn.
― Lily Dale, Sunday, 25 June 2023 22:26 (ten months ago) link
genuinely fine and that stands for all, i know it's no harm meant
i suppose you could say that i might have mentioned it sooner
― Ár an broc a mhic (darraghmac), Sunday, 25 June 2023 22:34 (ten months ago) link
Sorry dmac, I wish it were clearer that I was not referring to any specific actual mother (nor, for that matter, any specific actual Princess of Wales).
The chosen examples need not, and should not, cloud the grammar discussion.
So if it helps, feel free to substitute something like "boil the pasta" or "mulch the garden" or "toast the bread" or "assemble the Lego figurines" or whatever uncontroversial analogy you think will help move the discussion forward in a productive manner.
― pomplamoose and circumstance (Ye Mad Puffin), Sunday, 25 June 2023 23:09 (ten months ago) link
its harder to sell a hilarious sitcom apology reading of admitting you boiled the pasta, ill grant u that
― Ár an broc a mhic (darraghmac), Sunday, 25 June 2023 23:19 (ten months ago) link
We're unlikely to get too much consensus here, because (aside from different English dialects using them differently) modals have some inherent semantic ambiguity, because they deal with intention, permission, desire, hypotheticals, etc. They also have past tense forms that don't express action in the past, are used as polite forms, and other unusual stuff.
We're hyperliterate so we (in vain) attempt to make syntax work entirely free of context, while language was forged during human evolution by context-dependent usage. What makes language amazing is that it manages to maintain both ambiguity and clarity as ideals. Modals are a good example of this.
― the absence of bikes (f. hazel), Monday, 26 June 2023 00:58 (ten months ago) link