Phrases that annoy you the most

[jonysan]

On the subject of dead people. Police when reporting into the media use that blanket softener 'sadly' . The accident victim 'sadly died' . Pity they can't be as patronising with speeding tickets ....the driver sadly received three penalty points.

p.s. sadly I'm autistic, sorry...

[Strangely Brown]

swisstoni said:

Palmela said:

Antony Moxey said:

Those moaning about passed , have a bit of empathy, eh? You may be on some autistic spectrum that prevents you showing a bit of compassion, but if someone you know well s mum just died are you waiting until you see them again and saying I hear your mum died, oh well , then carrying on as normal? Sometimes it s not the better option to be so matter of fact about things.

You can use the correct term in a thoughtful and compassionate way. Saying 'passed' is nonsense.

Lets play this out then;
My wife has just died recently and you are meeting me for the first time since. What do you say to me?

Firstly, I would not presume that you know that I know your wife had died recently. Only if such shared knowledge does exist then I would offer condolences in a polite and sympathetic manner. Outside of that I would not mention it in any way. If, and only if, the bereaved wishes to talk about it would I ever presume to touch the subject.

[swisstoni]

Strangely Brown said:

swisstoni said:

Palmela said:

Antony Moxey said:

Those moaning about passed , have a bit of empathy, eh? You may be on some autistic spectrum that prevents you showing a bit of compassion, but if someone you know well s mum just died are you waiting until you see them again and saying I hear your mum died, oh well , then carrying on as normal? Sometimes it s not the better option to be so matter of fact about things.

You can use the correct term in a thoughtful and compassionate way. Saying 'passed' is nonsense.

Lets play this out then;
My wife has just died recently and you are meeting me for the first time since. What do you say to me?

Firstly, I would not presume that you know that I know your wife had died recently. Only if such shared knowledge does exist then I would offer condolences in a polite and sympathetic manner. Outside of that I would not mention it in any way. If, and only if, the bereaved wishes to talk about it would I ever presume to touch the subject.

I would have thought it obvious that I wouldn't expect a complete stranger to say anything about it.
Unless I was wearing a 'recently bereaved' badge.

[bigpriest]

Antony Moxey said:

Those moaning about passed , have a bit of empathy, eh? You may be on some autistic spectrum that prevents you showing a bit of compassion, but if someone you know well s mum just died are you waiting until you see them again and saying I hear your mum died, oh well , then carrying on as normal? Sometimes it s not the better option to be so matter of fact about things.

Throwing out "autistic spectrum" as an insult when you're discussing people dealing with things and using the correct language

[Antony Moxey]

swisstoni said:

Antony Moxey said:

swisstoni said:

Palmela said:

Antony Moxey said:

Those moaning about passed , have a bit of empathy, eh? You may be on some autistic spectrum that prevents you showing a bit of compassion, but if someone you know well s mum just died are you waiting until you see them again and saying I hear your mum died, oh well , then carrying on as normal? Sometimes it s not the better option to be so matter of fact about things.

You can use the correct term in a thoughtful and compassionate way. Saying 'passed' is nonsense.

Lets play this out then;
My wife has just died recently and you are meeting me for the first time since. What do you say to me?

Hello, nice to meet you. I m Antony, how are you?

Just ignore the issue altogether then. That's one way of dealing with it I suppose.

What issue? I’ve never met you before in my life, how am I supposed to know your wife’s just died? Or are you wanting an answer to a scenario that works for you to prove some irrelevant point?

[donkmeister]

Michael_B said:

loskie said:

We also have one of our so called managers at work (Civil Service) who ends their emails "Kindest".

I have a UK colleague who uses « Best » in a similar manner. Not surprisingly he is also an absolute bellend in most other ways too.

Not so much a phrase, but you've done something I find irritating... People using incorrect punctuation or conventions for the language they are writing in.

If I'm writing a document in French, I'll use guillemets to indicate a quote. I'll write currency as 1€. I'll write month names lower case. I admit I struggle with using a comma as a decimal point but thankfully that seems to be less common now in international usage.

So why are so many ostensibly bilingual people unable to use inverted commas when writing in English, or writing currency as €1? The one peculiarity I approve of is when my continental colleagues use "kiloeuro" and "megaeuro", but I'm not sure if that's common usage or just because they are also science nerds.

[donkmeister]

RichB said:

snuffy said:

loskie said:

"passed" instead of died. It's another annoying Americanism. Why can't people say died or dead? It's in no way offensive.

Passed away is bad enough, but passed is even worse. It's as it people can't bring themselves to utter the word 'died'.
The Queen had passed. Passed what? Her driving test?

I agree, I hate 'passed'.

It's a euphemism. We use them in so many aspects of life to convey meaning without having to explicitly describe personal matters. It allows others to understand the gravity of the situation without needing the details.

You need to cancel an engagement due to spending half the night spraying ste into the toilet. Do you say "I'm suffering from some gastric distress", "I have an upset stomach", "I am ill". OR do you tell them "I've spent half the night spraying ste out my arse"?

When my sister went into labour, my mum told me "your sister found her pink mucus plug had come out of her vagina, so we went to hospital and her cervix is dilated to..." I don't recall how many centimetres as I was about to puke. I think "your sister is in labour" would have been more appropriate.

How often have you heard the phrase "women's things", or "problem with the waterworks"?

Then moving to death... How many people have you known to die of cancer? Do you correct the person telling you by saying "ackshally they probably died of multiple organs failure, cancer itself is rarely if ever the direct cause of death"

[bigpriest]

swisstoni said:

Palmela said:

Antony Moxey said:

Those moaning about passed , have a bit of empathy, eh? You may be on some autistic spectrum that prevents you showing a bit of compassion, but if someone you know well s mum just died are you waiting until you see them again and saying I hear your mum died, oh well , then carrying on as normal? Sometimes it s not the better option to be so matter of fact about things.

You can use the correct term in a thoughtful and compassionate way. Saying 'passed' is nonsense.

Lets play this out then;
My wife has just died recently and you are meeting me for the first time since. What do you say to me?

"I'm sorry to hear your wife died"
"I was very sorry to hear of the death of you wife"
"How are you since your wife died?"
"I was delighted to hear of the death of your wife"

Not hard is it?

[Strangely Brown]

donkmeister said:

Then moving to death... How many people have you known to die of cancer? Do you correct the person telling you by saying "ackshally they probably died of multiple organs failure, cancer itself is rarely if ever the direct cause of death"

Providing details as to the cause of death is entirely different from using a normal and correct term for death. Saying that someone has died is in no way disrespectful or insensitive. Were you to go on an provide a full gamut of Pythonesque alternative terms you would probably be on somewhat shaky ground but, IMO, died is perfectly fine.

At least nobody is suggesting going full YouTube and using unalived.

Edited by Strangely Brown on Sunday 10th May 12:22

[loskie]

"Toni. I'm sorry to hear that your wife died old pal. She was a lovely woman. If there's anything I can do to help. Please ask."


That's not without genuine compassion and feeling.


Americanisms like "passed", "thank you for your service" and "I appreciate you" are just so false, said automatically without an ounce of thought.

[Michael_B]

donkmeister said:

So why are so many ostensibly bilingual people unable to use inverted commas when writing in English?

I typed it on quickly my iPhone whose iOS is in (Swiss[1]) French as that’s been my everyday professional and social language for the last 25 years ; I couldn’t be arsed to change « » into " " as it would mean holding the key down each time and selecting from a wider palette of symbols.

Kindest… and Best


[1] France has an AZERTY keyboard, UK has QWERTY, we have QWERTZ and some oddities on the RH side which allow for easier use of French, German and Italian diacritics.

[FlyVintage]

TameRacingDriver said:

"Baby shower"

Name reveal
Sex reveal

[Warhavernet]

bigpriest said:

"I'm sorry to hear your wife died"
"I was very sorry to hear of the death of you wife"
"How are you since your wife died?"
"I was delighted to hear of the death of your wife"

Not hard is it?

One could dispense with the words Died and Death, they are pregnant with finality, I would go with "Sorry for your loss " [ unless the word Loss annoys our PH grumpmuffins ]

[mac96]

Warhavernet said:

bigpriest said:

"I'm sorry to hear your wife died"
"I was very sorry to hear of the death of you wife"
"How are you since your wife died?"
"I was delighted to hear of the death of your wife"

Not hard is it?

One could dispense with the words Died and Death, they are pregnant with finality, I would go with "Sorry for your loss " [ unless the word Loss annoys our PH grumpmuffins ]

That makes a lot of sense; it is the living with whom you are sympathising, not the dead. You can be sorry for someone's loss without knowing the deceased, or even if you are happy they are gone.

[loskie]

loss could suggest that someone was careless with their loved one. Like an old fella forgetting where he parked his car.

Grumpmuffin: It's a thread about phrases that folks find annoying. Like most things it varies from person to person.


Soldiers: Obituary "Killed in action"

"Passed in action" would sound so wrong.

[Strangely Brown]

Warhavernet said:

bigpriest said:

"I'm sorry to hear your wife died"
"I was very sorry to hear of the death of you wife"
"How are you since your wife died?"
"I was delighted to hear of the death of your wife"

Not hard is it?

One could dispense with the words Died and Death, they are pregnant with finality, I would go with "Sorry for your loss " [ unless the word Loss annoys our PH grumpmuffins ]

Unless you know different death is pretty final. Avoiding it with euphemisms is not going to change it.

[RichB]

Warhavernet said:

bigpriest said:

"I'm sorry to hear your wife died"
"I was very sorry to hear of the death of you wife"
"How are you since your wife died?"
"I was delighted to hear of the death of your wife"

Not hard is it?

One could dispense with the words Died and Death, they are pregnant with finality.... <clip>

Yep.

[Doofus]

RichB said:

Warhavernet said:

bigpriest said:

"I'm sorry to hear your wife died"
"I was very sorry to hear of the death of you wife"
"How are you since your wife died?"
"I was delighted to hear of the death of your wife"

Not hard is it?

One could dispense with the words Died and Death, they are pregnant with finality.... <clip>

Yep.

"I'm sorry to hear your wife"
"How are you since your wife?"

Not sure that works, TBH...

[smn159]

"Passed away" meant the process of the spirit leaving the body and going up to heaven.

The intellectual equivalent of telling a 5 year old that their dead hamster has gone to live on a farm

[Palmela]

smn159 said:

The intellectual equivalent of telling a 5 year old that their dead hamster has gone to live on a farm

Hang on, you mean that wasn't true...?