Some slang terms have got to go
I went to a sports shop not too long ago to look at some snowboards with a friend. My friend was interested in checking out potential snowboards to buy. While there, a salesman tended to us and answered my friend's questions. When talking to the salesman, who was Asian, I noticed he spoke to us with street lingo like 'The Burton Custom is off the hook" and "Your ride'll be dope with this". and "Don't get that, it's wack".
This brings me to one question, has our society become so illiterate that kids nowadays feel the need to replace perfectly useable English terms with slang?
I know quite a bit of slang and what they mean. Of course, I never bother using them because, well, I don't like slang. One particular slang word bugs the fuck outta me is the word 'Buck'. 'Buck' is the slang word used to refer to the number '100'. For instance, if you have yourself a number like '134', people have been known to say 'A buck thirty-four'. They use it for any numbers that are over a hundred.
Another instance, someone drives over a hundred and twenty miles per hour as "Driving faster than a buck twenty".
Now, I ask you this, why the fuck do people use the word 'buck'? This word is stupid. Sure, the 'hundred' comes from the buck that refers to one dollar bill. Anyway, it doesn't make sense why people use the word 'buck'. It's not like using 'buck' saves you on saying an extra syllable. Actually, it makes you say an extra syllable. When you see the number '156', you usually say 'one fifty-six', right? You don't say 'one hundred fifty-six' or 'one hundred and fifty-six'. The point I'm getting at is when you see a number like '180', you will say 'one eighty' instead of 'one hundred eighty' or 'a hundred eighty'. Now, the thing that doesn't make sense is that when you use slang for a number like '180', they say 'a buck eighty'. People don't say 'buck eighty', they say 'a buck eighty'. Right there, you're using an extra syllable.
Why do people use slang? It's NOT to be more articulate. Okay, slang does give conversations a sense of color, a sense of brilliance. 'Yo, man, that's off the hook' does sound kinda cool the way it's said. However, there's one problem. When you hear 'off the hook', you think generally means something that's 'great' or 'amazing' or 'wild', right? Oddly enough, 'off the hook' already means something entirely different. Have people already forgotten that it's used to represent 'not liable for' or 'won't get in trouble for'? For example, "I did the dishes so I'm off the hook"
That doesn't make sense, using a saying that now has an entirely different meaning. Why not use the word 'smurf' instead? You know the animated show 'Smurfs', right? The word 'smurf' on there had many meanings. "Holy smuf!" "That was really smurf" "I smurfed the smurf today" If we use 'off the hook', which has different meanings, we should start using the word 'smurf' while we're at it.
Slang seems to be used to give more color to a conversation. I dunno about you, but I favor talking to someone who don't use slang word than someone that does. Really. Why do people say 'off the hook' anyway? Isn't using the world 'wild' just as good? Heck, it sounds more articulate, at least from my point of view. Not only do you not hafta say one less syllable, but there's also a better chance someone knows what the world 'wild' means instead of 'off the hook'.
What I find really funny about slang is how people have so incorporated it into their way of speaking that they don't even know how to articulate it to someone who doesn't know it. I had a friend who used slang all the time. He was hardcore into street lingo. I started getting annoyed at his constant use of slang and street lingo in every goddamn sentence that I pretended to be ignorant of his slang words and asked him "What does 'off the hook mean'?". Funnily enough, he could not come up with a way to articulate its meaning into something I can understand. I called him an idiot for that. Granted, maybe he thought I was the idiot for not knowing what 'off the hook' means but I don't really care since my opinion is what matters in such a situation.
I think there are some slangs that are just pathetic. Any word that is converted to 'izzle' is asinine. Something like 'Fer shizzle ma nizzle', which basically translate to 'For sure, my nigga', is stupid. I dunno about you guys, but I think the whole 'izzle' lingo thing is stupid. Anyone that using those 'izzle' slangs should 'Shuttizzle the Fuckizzle Uppizzle'. See how stupid that looks? Okay, maybe I wrote it wrong. Maybe that's not the right way to use those 'izzle' slangs correctly. You know what? I don't care. I think it's stupid. Here we have fucknuts out there wanting to sound cool by coming up with their own words, words that don't exist. If that's the case, wouldn't Nell (From the movie with same name) be the coolest girl on the planet? She used nothing but words not found in the English library?
You know what word should be incorporated into the English language or used as a slang? The word 'lol'. Everyone that uses computers and check out forums and irc channels and newsgroups know what that means. For all of you not in the know, it means 'Laughing Out Loud'. It would be very useful for writing too, especially to describe a person's reaction to something amusing. It can help writers express a person laughing at something in three easy letters.
Here's a funny thing I found out: Didja know
that if your ring finger is a lot longer than your index finger, it means you're
gay?
But I digress. Granted, maybe I don't like slang because I simply don't like something I don't understand. Then again, if that's the case, then I shouldn't like women since I don't understand shit about 'em. I just think slang like 'buck' and 'off the hook' and anything with the use of 'izzle' have got to go. There are lots of slang terms that have got to go, more than I care to list, but those particular slangs I've pointed out are more annoying than others. And before you people start flaming me for not knowing the difference between slang and lingo, I figure that I should let you know that I don't care. Slang and lingo, while different in their own respect, are very much alike in my eyes.
Back to the statement about your ring finger and being gay. If 'lol' existed in the English dictionary, I'll be loling right now since I'm sure every one of you that read that line actually stopped to look at your hand even though that statement's made up.
Anyway, some slang terms have got to go