a thoughtful web.
Good ideas and conversation. No ads, no tracking.   Login or Take a Tour!
comment by user-inactivated
user-inactivated  ·  2149 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: PSA: The hubwheel is not a "like" button.

Pedantry is never useless. There are layers important to distinguish to every aspect. Sometimes, it's less necessary than whatever else you might have in mind.

This time, it isn't. Thank you for reminding us.





goobster  ·  2148 days ago  ·  link  ·  

At some point, American English decided to move "pedantry" from the "Purely Descriptive" column, over to the "Offensive" column.

I was not informed of this change.

kleinbl00  ·  2148 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Pretty sure that one's been pejorative since Erasmus.

_refugee_  ·  2148 days ago  ·  link  ·  

How do you feel about notoriety because I feel like people who use it to mean fame are fucking idiots

kleinbl00  ·  2148 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Tricky one, isn't it? If you frame yourself as an antihero, notoriety is fame. When Elliott Ness referred to Capone's notoriety, he was arguing that Capone was an infamously bad dude. But if you viewed Elliott Ness as the bad guy, notoriety is dope. I mean-

But I also think that the meaning was diluted a long, long time ago because

_refugee_  ·  2147 days ago  ·  link  ·  

i mean juicy over hypnotize erry day 'bl00

user-inactivated  ·  2148 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Depends on your perspective.

I try to be very precise with my speech. I value it. Not being precise makes me cringe. I can see the layers of meaning that, for me, need to be distinguished and operated upon separately.

Most people don't see it that way, which is how you get "pedantic" as an insult. I really don't know it is that makes such high precision to be so distressing. I wish I did. My only theory is that higher-level precision is overexposure to most people, in the same way too much light hurts our eyes - but I have no clue how close that is to reality.

cgod  ·  2148 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I checked the definition in multiple dictionaries. In some you would be hard pressed to glean a negative connotation others cast it in a pretty deragatory light. My sense before looking it up was pretty negative which seems to be the general consensus.

cgod  ·  2148 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Maybe something is being lost in translation here but Peandantic isn't something one usually says in a complementary manner.

user-inactivated  ·  2149 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I'm not sure I'd say that pedantry is never useless