LOL
Cyberspace is filled with all these little abbreviations for things. LOL,
OMG, WTF, LMFAO and so on. LOL for example stands for ‘laugh out loud’.
I suppose for the sake of time and typing that all these shortening of
phrases are ok for use in cyberspace, slowly however they have crept into
our society with text messages on cell phones, and finally into our spoken
language. Yes, there are people (not just teenagers) who say “LOL” or cry
“WTF” when something doesn’t go their way. I’ve heard people well into
their thirties using such phrases.
Have we strayed that far from the ‘King’s English’, that we have now
created our own language based around cyberspace short forms? Well, the
answer goes much deeper than that. Chaucer, by today’s standards is
barely legible.. and for purists of the English language, Chaucer is as
pure as it gets. Things have evolved.
The English language is slowly morphing is into abbreviations and witty
catch phrases. Just as our language evolved from old English, we are now
progressing to a new weird t9 type language filled with groupings of
letters that are more symbolistic of an action rather than a description.
So, our language is evolving. Slowly but surely new terms and words get
added to the dictionaries and encyclopedia’s. If “double double” can be
added to an encyclopedia, then why not “LOL”? We aren’t far off.
Do I like where our language is headed? no. I think that “LOL” and all
his buddies are ridiculous, but here I am on the Internet blogging away,
caught up in the hurricane that is the world wide web… so whether I like
it or not I am connected to this language revolution.
This might be last time that somebody writes this online, but….. I’m
laughing out loud.
March 25th, 2008 at 10:19 am
Why are you so surprised that people in their thirties can actually use terms such as lol? I’m over fifty, and I sometimes do as well. Can only the very young be considered cool in your opinion?
March 25th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
Hi Rick, I think your missing the point… I’m not surprised that adults use these short terms at all, it was a simple observation that LOL has filtered into every part of our society.. adults and youth alike.
I don’t think that anyone can be considered cool based on the language they do or don’t use. I’d rather decide if someone is ‘cool’ based on what they are saying, not how they are saying it.
March 26th, 2008 at 7:31 am
Hey Kris,
Cool is not in what you say. Cool is what you don’t need to say. Sort of like Margaret Thatcher once said: “Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren’t.” That’s cool!
The sad part is that some people need to over do the minimalist verbage in order to think they are cool, and in effect make themselves less cool. And the fact that older folks use these abbreviations and other phonetic concoctions is not at all surprising. What really surprises me is that the younger folk accept and adopt them and use them freely. Remember that “WTF”, or better known as Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, has been around for so long that there were admonitions against it’s use back in WW I. SNAFU, and all it’s siblings have kind of fallen to the side as the shorter more polite terms have taken the lead, but they are by no means new. What they are is new again. Dictionaries have ignored them for years. Double Double is legit as it is still two “words”!
The funny part is that the generation that spawned these short forms needed to out of a legitimate need to communicate more within a reduced bandwidth environment. Today there is more bandwidth available to a cell phone than there ever was to my first computer, let alone the Telex or teletype message machines that came before them. Those that you are commenting on, those ‘well into their thirties’, are the generation that never needed to use them in short clipped urgent conversations. They are pretenders, and thus less cool.
I agree with you fully about those that say LOL in a “real conversation” (with a real person across a table), or for those that text message the person across the table (except to illicitly tell them how you envision their seduction going without advertising to the masses), they have bigger problems. Arguably “less cool” kinds of problems.
I’d like to see everyone take a tour of the Military Communications Museum in Kingston and talk to the vets about what it really meant to communicate with a need for speed. To see what they had to use in order to do that. To see the conditions they had to endure to do it too. The youth today have no idea what a quick efficient little message could really mean to someone’s day.
Cheers
March 31st, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Finally!! I agree with what you say B.K. All these little short forms drive me nuts. I have to sit there and try and think what they stand for if I’m not sure. And I’m 24!! So not “cool.” But, I can’t say that I don’t use short forms ever. yea, its true. I get lazy. But, kids today are getting that much dumber shall I say. I have a 13 year old sister, and when I read some of her sloppy writing I wonder, what are they teaching kids today?? That’s a whole other blog tho. (oops). Anyways, had to get that off my chest. Rock on buddy.
March 31st, 2008 at 8:36 pm
Kris, you’ve hit the nail on the head. LOL is stupid, and overused as is all the other short forms… but as you say, it is the evolution of our languague love it or hate it!
April 3rd, 2008 at 1:50 pm
i have to admit, its pretty lame when you hear someone actually say “LOL”
we’ve become desensitized to the point where short forms and phrases are replacing real emotion.
one the flip side, Kris, soon “good morning k-rock listeners, here’s some pearl jam for your listening pleasure” will no doubt become “gm k-r l’s, sum pj 4u! bffl!”
ah well, at least it wasn’t binary that caught on…
April 25th, 2008 at 7:20 am
Stupid is Stupid Brad. LOL is yet another way to express emotion craig think about it. When you have heard someone say LOL were they not indeed laughing out loud when they said it? How are they replacing emotion. We use small quick phrases each and everyday to say something fast and easy. Take the military and Government for instance are they stupid? WAIT! let me rephrase that. The Miltary and Government has been shortening entire department and title names into abbreviations such as this forever, to simplify and to give more information in a shorter burst of conversation or communication. The idea that we are replacing emotion is ludacris, when we are indeed trying to tell how we are feeling in a written conversation…lol…I am indeed rotflmao….You people talk before you think….try thinking before you talk, you’ll sound smarter.
April 25th, 2008 at 7:22 am
P.S. fear not the english language will not be so easily simplified….besides if half the people out there don’t know how to speak it already, is it really so bad if we do?