Monday, March 5, 2018

Words And Phrases That Annoy Me

Drug Personality

Ever since Duterte's campaign against drugs began, the media struggled to find words to describe those individuals who came under intense scrutiny for their alleged involvement in drug trafficking. This dumb thing is what they came up with. 

Maybe "alleged drug dealer" was too libelous? The term is stupid because it could mean anything. Does "drug personality" refer  only to peddlers? The word itself could apply to drug users too. They have personalities although nobody cares about them. 

Furthermore, I've read drug personality used for politicians who are protecting drug dealers but don't necessarily sell drugs themselves. That's confusing. "Narco-politician" has more pizzazz. You don't need to be directly involved in drug dealing to be a drug personality? What are the rules on degrees here? No, wait. I remember hearing the term "drug protector" once to describe narco-politicos. Could a pharmacist be considered a drug personality? How about a doctor who writes prescriptions?

Handmade/Hand-crafted

I went to a restaurant recently that boasted of their "handcrafted" food. Am I meant to be impressed? Handcrafted is the word restaurants use when the word "artisan" is considered too intolerably pretentious even for the modern food snob 's standards.

Yeah, yeah, I know they mean that they themselves made the bun they use in their burgers or whatever but does that make it tastier? That's what matters most in the end, right? The local five peso bakeshop on the street corner bakes their bread by hand and you don't see them launching fireworks over it. I see no inherent value in something being handcrafted. All handcrafted means to me is inefficient. 

What image are they trying to conjure? Imagine a dystopian future where Skynet has finally taken over the world. Mindless robots churning out food daily for the helpless population. People smuggling balls of kneaded dough in dark alleys. Heartless automatons serving passable dishes devoid of any love but at a very affordable price. The humanity!

I swear, I saw a restaurant once that proudly advertised serving "handcut" steak. Did the butcher slice the cow with his razor fingers? Maybe he was a robot.

Lodi

It's a new local slang. It's the reverse of the word "idol" or something. It has to do with a game show. Honestly, I don't know what it means. All I know is that the people who use this word should be shot.

Only the Best/ Choice Ingredients

Take any packaged food and read the back of the item. It claims to use only the best and choicest ingredients which is obviously a lie. Are you telling me this bag of chips was made of literally the objectively best potatoes and processed cheese dust on the planet Earth? 

Besides, what idiot company would admit otherwise? What product would say "we use only the most average and mediocre ingredients"? It's like a politician proclaiming he's for clean rivers. Who isn't? Have you heard a politician coming from the Dead Dry Riverbed Party? The claims are meaningless.

Everyday it's an assault.