• samus12345@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    It is hyperbole, but the problem is that it’s using a word that was supposed to specify that something was not hyperbole as hyperbole, rendering it useless.

    • ReallyActuallyFrankenstein@lemmynsfw.com
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      1 year ago

      the problem is that it’s using a word that was supposed to specify that something was not hyperbole as hyperbole, rendering it useless.

      … Or… Because it’s a word specifically meant to indicate it is not hyperbolic, using it in that way is literally the superlative hyperbole.

      • samus12345@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        At the cost of the word’s intended use, unfortunately. RIP literally. It literally died.

        • Classy@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          Now you have to hit literally in the chest with an adrenaline shot to bring lividity into its decaying body.

          quite literally

          actually literally

          • samus12345@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            A good point, I haven’t seen “quite literally” used to mean “figuratively.” Perhaps there’s some usefulness to be had yet.

      • samus12345@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Yes, but its use to mean its opposite didn’t become widespread until the past decade or so.

        • ImFresh3x@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          Incorrect. People have been using it the way you are complaining about for hundreds of years. It’s a new phenomenon that people complain about it being used the way you disapprove of. I’d attribute the recent complaints to lack of literary exposure and anti intellectualism in recent years.

    • ricecake@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      Except some of the earliest uses of the word “literally” that didn’t pertain to letters and glyps we in the form of hyperbole.
      Literal as factual and literal as exaggeration both about the same age and precedent, and have been used long enough that it’s just part of the English language at this point.
      May as well complain about how “discreet” and “indiscreet” are opposites, but “flammable” and “inflammable” are the same.

      https://people.sc.fsu.edu/~jburkardt/fun/wordplay/autoanto.html

      English is a language of contradictions and massively confusing syntax. News at 11.