I know that language is a fluid thing – ever changing, adapting itself to the speakers who speak it; but there are certain words which should never be fucked with.
Over the years, numerous words have been diluted to meaninglessness by the repetitious misuse rampant in the vernacular. Like stones knocked and tossed and made jagged, or worn smooth by the moving waters that move them, words have come to have meanings that suit the speakers. They evolve or devolve from the original definitions.
I’m cool with that. Pretty much.
But when you take an exceptional concept such as AWESOME and apply it to everything from tennis shoes to hamburgers, well, I take exception.
Supernovae are AWESOME, the extinctions of species are AWESOME, tsunamis are AWESOME, earthquakes are AWESOME, basically all of nature is AWESOME.
Granted, humankind is also an expression of nature, and its expressions arise out of nature, but while the things that humankind accomplish often achieve the status of REMARKABLE, sometimes MAJESTIC, and even now and then, MAGNIFICENT, these bridges, buildings, dams and power stations never, ever reach the status of AWESOME.
So fuck everyone everywhere who so lightly uses the word AWESOME to describe their new pair of pants, the pasta they ate last night, internet cable hook-up, the dump they took this morning, or anything less than something worthy of the word.
We have to draw the line somewhere. It might as well be here.
**AWESOME:
- Inspiring awe: an awesome thunderstorm.
- Expressing awe: stood in awesome silence before the ancient ruins.
- Slang. Remarkable; outstanding: “a totally awesome arcade game” (Los Angeles Time
As you may infer from the OP, I disavow this third definition.
awe n. - A mixed emotion of reverence, respect, dread, and wonder inspired by authority, genius, great beauty, sublimity, or might: Archaic.
a. The power to inspire dread.
b. Dread.**
Oh, look – something shiny!
