# excessive use of 'need'
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [September 1, 2018, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613 "2018-09-01T17:15:55Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@shinnen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shinnen)
#### Post date: [September 1, 2018, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/1 "2018-09-01T17:15:55Z")
Hi all,
I’m very sensitive to words, how they’re used, and in particular what they says about our values.
For quite some time now I’ve been noticing the excessive use of the word ‘need’.
It seems common these days to use it in place where: want, should, ought to, would be wise to, advise, etc. would be more honest.
It’s not uncommon for people to use words for purposes other than simply conveying information, but I find this adulteration particularly troublesome; and the reason is that it indicates a movement away from the acceptance of emotions and opinion as legitimate motivations for action or inaction; and seems to move us away from our humanity. The other reason I find it troublesome is that it’s often pure deception. Maslow would roll over in his grave.
… john
---
### Author:  [@Llama\_Llogophile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Llama_Llogophile)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/2 "2018-09-02T00:09:40Z")
If I say, “I need to go to the bathroom”, but I could actually wait another thirty minutes before wetting my pants, does that make me dishonest and move us away from our humanity? Or is it perhaps a common and appropriate use of the word in accepted vernacular?
While I take your point, there are times “need” really means “want”, it’s usually a conversation one has with a five-year old. It’s also possible you are troubled by these instances in discussions of public policy, and we can certainly find examples there of purposeful blurring of wants and needs.
Having given you those two benefits of the doubt, your OP is a bit vague, ironically florid in its verbiage and it’s unclear why you find this issue so troubling.
---
### Author:  [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/3 "2018-09-02T02:41:09Z")
Unless someone is talking about food and water you could always argue they don’t really “need” anything.
---
### Author:  [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/4 "2018-09-02T02:47:57Z")
> [@Llama\_Llogophile](#):
>
> Having given you those two benefits of the doubt, your OP is a bit vague
I think we need some specific examples.
---
### Author:  [@shinnen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shinnen)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/5 "2018-09-02T03:12:14Z")
Yes, of course the lines are blurry. It just seems to me that people use need often as a means of justifying what they want, rather than something they need.
---
### Author:  [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/6 "2018-09-02T04:17:19Z")
Maybe not quite what you’re looking for, but whenever someone posts something they want on facebook, saying little more than “Need this”, all I can think is ‘no, you want it’ or rather ‘no, you want everyone to know that you want it’, followed by ‘the picture you posted is from a link to it at Amazon/Thinkgeek/Target, just go buy it, it’s like ten dollars’.
I also think people use the word “lie” far too casually. For example, if you ask someone what time it is and they say “It’s 10:15, wait I lied, it’s 11:15” or even if a one person said 10:15 and another chimed in saying 'she’s lying it’s 11:15".
While that doesn’t quite blur the line between lying and being mistaken/incorrect, it does take some of the punch away from the word when someone is actually lying, on purpose, with bad intent.
ETA, and the excessive, incorrect, sarcastic use of the word “literally” has changed the accepted definition such that literally literally means figuratively.
---
### Author:  [@shinnen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shinnen)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/7 "2018-09-02T12:20:21Z")
Hi Joey,
Yes, good points. I hadn’t really thought about the the ‘lie’ example.
… john
---
### Author:  [@shinnen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shinnen)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/8 "2018-09-02T12:37:50Z")
Hi Thudlow,
I think you’re request is an example of what I mean, perhaps not a good one though.I would state your request something like, “I’d like (want) specific examples.”
But to your point. When people say, "you need to … " one can usually put ’ you should …’ or 'you’d be well advised to … ’ or ‘I want you to …’ or ‘you’d better …’ or 'I’m telliing you to … ’ My point is that the word need is very often intended to add weight to the speakers argument, need being more acceptable a reason than want. Again, I see it as a means of making one’s statement more important. Most people consider ‘a need’ more acceptable than ‘a want’.
… john
---
### Author:  [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/9 "2018-09-02T12:55:24Z")
This use of need makes perfect sense. The understood missing clause is “. . . in order to [fill in the blank] . . . “ where the blank could be almost anything and is situationally dependent.
i.e.
I’m going to need some specific examples . . . before I can respond meaningfully.
But you’re right that the use of “need” emphasizes the wants of the person making the request.
---
### Author:  [@shinnen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shinnen)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/10 "2018-09-02T13:05:22Z")
> [@Eonwe](#):
>
> This use of need makes perfect sense. The understood missing clause is “. . . in order to [fill in the blank] . . . “ where the blank could be almost anything and is situationally dependent.
>
> i.e.
> I’m going to need some specific examples . . . before I can respond meaningfully.
>
> But you’re right that the use of “need” emphasizes the wants of the person making the request.
Yes, alright.
… john
---
### Author:  [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/11 "2018-09-02T13:47:41Z")
> [@Richard\_Pearse](#):
>
> Unless someone is talking about food and water you could always argue they don’t really “need” anything.
Tell that to a diabetic who “needs” exogenous insulin.
---
### Author:  [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/12 "2018-09-02T15:16:20Z")
The word “[want](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/want)” used to mean “lack,” and as such was more-or-less a synonym for “need.” It hasn’t entirely lost that meaning, but nowadays the more common meaning is “desire.” This thread has me wondering how the meaning of “want” changed, and whether it involved the kind of “adulteration” or “deception” the OP associates with “need.”
---
### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/13 "2018-09-02T15:42:54Z")
There’s a fantasy novel by Barry Longyear called “The God Box”, about a man who is given a magic box that can give you anything; the catch is that it always gives you what you truly _need_\*\*\*\*\*, not what you want. The novel follows the sometimes hilarious, sometimes appalling consequences\*\*\*\*\*\* of this.
> [@](#):
>
> \*\*\*\*\*“Need? Who determines these needs?”
> “The gods, Your Eminence”
> “By what lights? What one needs for what?”
> “I know not, Your Eminence. The gods have lights of their own.”
> [@](#):
>
> \*\*\*\*\*\*“I have seen everything from love and diamonds to death and insanity come from the box.”
---
### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/14 "2018-09-02T15:47:12Z")
It’s sort of like the (ultimately) non-evil version of the Three Wishes trope.
---
### Author:  [@Channing\_Idaho\_Banks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Channing_Idaho_Banks)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/15 "2018-09-02T16:23:18Z")
Substitute “may i please” for “need.” If it works, use the former.
---
### Author:  [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/16 "2018-09-02T16:36:37Z")
The use of “need” that I find most objectionable is when someone who is against something, say social media, says something along the lines of “Social media needs to go away”. _You_ might want them to, but your want does not create _their_ need.
---
### Author:  [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/17 "2018-09-02T17:56:12Z")
> [@E-DUB](#):
>
> The use of “need” that I find most objectionable is when someone who is against something, say social media, says something along the lines of “Social media needs to go away”. _You_ might want them to, but your want does not create _their_ need.
Once again, that is a “Need in order to” construction.
“Social media needs to go away in order for people to have civil conversations again.”
You can argue that (and go for it if you want, I am using it as an example, not as something that I agree with), but “want” in that usage wouldn’t make any sense.
---
### Author:  [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/18 "2018-09-02T18:13:30Z")
Am I sitting through some useless corporate training? A few years ago, it seems everyone in my company had to go through some silly training about ‘positive language.’ Don’t say, “You need to fill out this form…” Ugh, what a waste of time. I don’t deal with customers and I take delight in using the forbidden phrase of ‘No problem.’
---
### Author:  [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/19 "2018-09-02T18:17:13Z")
> [@shinnen](#):
>
> Hi all,
> I’m very sensitive to words, how they’re used, and in particular what they says about our values.
> For quite some time now I’ve been noticing the excessive use of the word ‘need’.
> It seems common these days to use it in place where: want, should, ought to, would be wise to, advise, etc. would be more honest.
> It’s not uncommon for people to use words for purposes other than simply conveying information, but I find this adulteration particularly troublesome; and the reason is that it indicates a movement away from the acceptance of emotions and opinion as legitimate motivations for action or inaction; and seems to move us away from our humanity. The other reason I find it troublesome is that it’s often pure deception. Maslow would roll over in his grave.
> … john
This is the last thing I need.
---
### Author:  [@shinnen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shinnen)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2018, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613/20 "2018-09-02T23:50:19Z")
> [@Lumpy](#):
>
> There’s a fantasy novel by Barry Longyear called “The God Box”, about a man who is given a magic box that can give you anything; the catch is that it always gives you what you truly _need_\*\*\*\*\*, not what you want. The novel follows the sometimes hilarious, sometimes appalling consequences\*\*\*\*\*\* of this.
Yes, it sounds like an episode of The Twilight Zone.
… john
[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/excessive-use-of-need/820613.md?page=2)