My roomie and I were just griping about this.
The misuse of the phrase per se also annoys me to no end, particularly since it’s usually misspelled. Whenever I grade a paper with a sentence like, “I am not a typical girl per say, because I also like sports,” I want to clutch said paper to my bosom and weep.
I didn’t say they necessarily intend that, I’m just saying that’s where the phrase seems to come from, and it’s now absorbed that meaning.
Ah, OK. This makes more sense.
For all my ire towards prescriptivism, I’m right there with you. Generalization of meaning is irritating as hell.
The pumpkins grow on trees one that came up here a while ago is another one I find amazing. 
Oh, here’s one: ever come across the belief that no, or very few, rivers flow north?
Yes; these people have apparently never seen a map of Russia (or Canada).
Or, for that matter, the Nile.
You know what they say about da Nile…
“Inflammable means flammable? What a country!” - Dr. Nick Rivera.
I often have to bite my lip when I hear urban legends repeated, depending on the company. Most people don’t want to hear you tell them that they are wrong in this matter, even if they happen to believe you via a snopes link.
Is that really what the term “the immaculate conception” means!? Why on earth do Catholics believe that Mary was somehow born without sin? That’s as extra-biblical as the rapture.
I always assumed it meant the magical conception of Jesus.
/hijack
Woo, welcome back VCO3. It has been a boring month in the pit without you
/end hijack
I am not getting something here. Is there any way you can elaborate on this? I don’t understand debating “is a word” v. “is not a word”. How is this possible? 
You’ve never witnessed a conversation like the following?:
“Yeah, I think John’s plan sounds funner than Mark’s”.
" ‘Funner’? That’s not even a word!"
“Huh? How can ‘funner’ not be a word?”
“I mean, I don’t think it’s a word, I don’t think it’s in the dictionary or anything. People say it and all, but it’s not a real word.”
“You’re being silly.”
“You’re being ignorant.”
Ad nauseum.
“No direct or categorical and stringent proof of the dogma can be brought forward from Scripture. But the first scriptural passage which contains the promise of the redemption, mentions also the Mother of the Redeemer. The sentence against the first parents was accompanied by the Earliest Gospel (Proto-evangelium), which put enmity between the serpent and the woman: “and I will put enmity between thee and the woman and her seed; she (he) shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in wait for her (his) heel” (Genesis 3:15).” More here, including Proof from Reason “There is an incongruity in the supposition that the flesh, from which the flesh of the Son of God was to be formed, should ever have belonged to one who was the slave of that arch-enemy, whose power He came on earth to destroy.”
I remember the pineapple thread (where I had my ignorance fought…pineapple plants, who knew?) But I don’t recall a pumpkin one.
Another one: 20/200 is legally blind.
It’s not; 20/200 in the better eye with correction is legally blind. If it’s correctable, it’s just myopia.
(I’m about 20/800, corrected to 20/15. That sure as heck doesn’t make me “blind”.)
Aren’t you being a little hard on people? If they’re misusing it then they probably don’t know that they don’t know.
I guess I meant that if you hear the term and have the idea that it refers to something religious and you don’t for sure know what that religious thing is, err on the side of not using it. Maybe an analgous would be “schizophrenic” which doesn’t mean split or multiple personality, even though people often use it that way. Realize it’s a psych term and be sure it means what you think it means.
:smack: pineapples of course, pumpkins grow under water.
I’m not trying to be argumentative, but none of that stuff is in the Bible. I knew Catholicism involved a lot of extra-biblical stuff that was declared by councils and so on, but I didn’t realize it was so extreme!