Every year Lake Superior University releases their list of words that should be banned from the English language. A lot of them are buzz or slang words from the previous year that have been overused in music, smeared across social media, and used by parents attempting to be hip. Here are the words, and whether or not I think they fall in to the Make Them Stop! category:

  • Wheelhouse - Have people been using wheelhouse far too often, or do the people at Lake Superior University think we need to update the phrase "in your wheelhouse" to "up your address"?
  • Wrap Your Head Around - Cliche? Sure. Not sure if it needs to be banned.
  • Collusion - I'll give the team at LSSU that; we sure heard enough of that word in 2018.
  • -OTUS acronyms like POTUS, FLOTUS, SCOTUS, etc. - I don't think anyone really started using "POTUS" until Rob Lowe's character got a text message in the first episode of West Wing that used that acronym. President, First Lady, and Supreme Court seem to work just fine.
  • Ghosting - This is a term used for when someone you were casually dating or chatting with suddenly stops returning your texts. Garfunkel and Oates have a better term for that behavior:
  • Grapple - Is this word so overused that we should ban it?
  • Optics - Optics, huh? Not floss, LSSU? You're all done with optics, but not floss...
  • Thought Leader - First time I'm hearing this one, last time I want to ever.
  • Yeet - The first time I heard someone use this seriously I thought, "Get off my lawn." I am get off my lawn years old, though.
  • Most Important Election of Our Time - Okay. Maybe that's not a word, but I see their point. For weeks leading up to the November election you could NOT get away from that phrase.

Are we missing any? Any words that you think LSSU should retire next year?

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