Nobody says it anymore
I've heard it explained that "hey" used to be more of an urgent way to get someone's attention, rather than a casual "hello" like it is now, so it sounded rude to some older folks.
I've heard it explained that "hey" used to be more of an urgent way to get someone's attention, rather than a casual "hello" like it is now, so it sounded rude to some older folks.
Teachers in 2023: “NOOO you can’t end your sentences with ‘fr fr nocap skibidi’ those aren’t even real words!”
2033:
Seriously. The "Fr fr no cap" is closer to our generations "Swag yolo". Or the past generations "Tubular"
I think it's a pretty good example of something that totally lost all meaning and got beat into the ground, rather than getting worked into some individual lexicon or accent, and having a specific kind of role.
Totally passing observation on top of that, but I think, it's probably much easier for that to happen to specific references, than for that to happen to actual novel uses of language.
Is it a reference to this https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skibidi_Toilet? Is it used as punctuation like "lol"?
When I was a waiter, there was no shortage of boomers getting genuinely upset with me saying "No problem" as a reply to "thanks".
I prefer to say no problem over you're welcome cuz it always (to me) sounds sarcastic/disingenuous when I say you're welcome
It's like this:
You have a boss. A wrinkled plus-sized brown business jacket of a man whose idea of "cutting costs" is turning the air conditioner off. If he caught on fire, you wouldn't piss on him to put him out. How do you address him? "Good morning Mr. Perkins, how are you doing today?"
You've got a war buddy. You met at boot camp, you served in the same company, he splinted your leg in the field, you're his kids' godfather. You'd kill and die for this man. How do you address him? "Ah god not this fucking asshole again."
Official formal polite language like "Thank you" and "You're welcome" is the pair of nitrile gloves I put on to handle the really noxious shit that comes my way. "w'thanks man" and "no problem" means I'm willing to handle you with my bare skin.
"No problem" also carries the implication that the favor was taken and done without ill will, where "you're welcome" carries one of superiority
Well one would expect it at a five star restaurant, but not your local dive. So… kinda..?
I thought it was every day life politeness, but I am not native. I would rather expect "the pleasure is all mine, sir" at a 3 Michelin stars restaurant.
To me “you are welcome” comes off as taking credit for something minor and expected. No problem does the opposite. I prefer when people say no problem generally over you’re welcome. And that’s why it’s become more common in a day in age where people are expected to be less servile.
Question for the Spanish speakers in the room: Is there even another term equivalent to "you're welcome" other than de nada that people actually use? Not super familiar but Spanish seems like a language where "it's nothing" or "no problem" has almost completely replaced other phrases responding to thanks.
Asked honestly and noting cultural differences that may apply here - could be there's a more formal "you're welcome" Spanish phrase and I've just never heard it. 'Cause, you know, I don't live in a Spanish speaking place.
Ugggggh I went through this with my (boomer) boss for years until she finally accepted it lmao. Then it was, "WORRIES, CaptFeather! WORRIES!" as a joke every time I said it lol
Nobody expects online gaming to be a bastion of proper grammar.
People type in abbreviations when gaming mainly due to lack of time though... Much better to focus on the game than typing more than necessary to convey a simple message in those cases.
I only ever did that when typing via controller. If I had a keyboard I used full sentences but quickly. Sometimes the speed meant lack of proofreading though and weird things have been said.
Absolutely. I could understand it if it was a formal dining place I suppose. But it was a fucking Applebee's in a 20k population town with one other restaurant lmao
Applebees is Sit down McDonalds with better food. If one of your seating option is at the fake wood bar its not fine dining.
A family member of mine briefly worked at Applebee's. Literally everything is microwaved. I happened to get a Fettuccine Alfredo there and have one of the Marie Calendars frozen Fettuccine Alfredo meals (>$2 at the store) in the same week and realized once its plated you literally could not tell the two apart. Same quality, same quantity, but the store bought meal costs 1/5 the price and is somehow ready faster
"No problem" takes "You're welcome" and implies that it was of no inconvenience to you either. But I understand that older generations find it important that service workers be most humbly at their service, and adhere to a strict social etiquette just short of "Yes, m'lord" and "Shall I suck upon your dick, sir?"
"You're welcome" is more appropriate in a professional setting, but if you're getting your jimmies in a rustle over someone saying "No problem" to you instead, you're a bit of an assfuck.
If you are a service worker at a restaurant, then that is literally your job, to serve.
I love it when I order a sandwich at my local banh mi place near my office and you can see the cashier literally eye roll every customer that orders. They can't even look you in the eye...
If you want people to be happy to be serving you then demand that they are paid more.
Otherwise buy your sandwich without any delusions of grandeur and fuck off.
It’s literally meanings of words strung together being described.
You are welcome = you are welcome to my servitude
No problem = I don’t mind doing this thing for you
Oh you. 🤦♀️
I don't think either phrase is impolite. Good manners are a made up thing. If someone said 'thanks' to me and I said 'tiddle dee dee' I'm not being rude, just a bit weird, nobody's honour has been questioned, I haven't said anything that could be taken as an offence.
And why do people need to pander to you specifically? Cant people be themselves?
Those are narcissistic traits.
only one way to interpret “you’re welcome”
This is just wrong. Tone matters just as much with "you're welcome" as it does with "no problem". Language is fluid like that, and it's completely arbitrary to elevate one of these expressions over the other when both are in common usage.
Also, you're deliberately misrepresenting what "no problem" means, in regards to "that's the only reason you complied". Nobody says it that way, and I don't believe that you think they do.
I personally see "anytime" as a much more appropriate reply to "thank you" than "no problem".
If someone says you’re welcome, you know they are a corporate drone and management wants them to say that to avoid certain people making a scene. Why’s it insincere to say no problem? In the same vein, they only said you’re welcome because they are complying too.
There’s no issues with saying no problem unless you want there to be. Those are cool workplaces.
And so can you’re welcome. So why does it matter which phrase if both can be misconstrued?
Language matters everywhere, who mentioned anything about an office building?
And the only issue is you taking offense, there’s plenty of people who have no issues with no problem, but take offense from you’re welcome. Why is everything about you….?
Maybe they should just die, that way they don't have to face a world they clearly can't deal with.
The implication is that a problem was assumed until "no problem" was stated.
"No problem" is absolutely low key rude.
To me, 'No problem' is just short for something like "oh don't worry about it; it was really no problem at all and I'm happy to help".
Colloquialisms are fun like that.
I feel that kind of interpretation is more region specific. Specifically, West Coast?
The context in which the listener is expected to comprehend communication is important if the speaker hopes for the intended message to actually be communicated.
If the speaker chooses to ignore how the listener is expected to perceive their communication then I'd say that actual communication was never truly their intent... seems more like linguistic masturbation to me.
There is a difference, but it's not one of inherent meaning, it's more or less a generational culture difference.
I'll place this here and pre-emptively say that assisting your understanding was... no problem https://youtu.be/eGnH0KAXhCw?si=sVBI__SCJ3mQkkWo
They’re idiomatic phrases people are supposed to say by custom, divorced from their literal meanings.
They literally don’t (with the possible exception of onomatopoeic words), one of the defining factors of language is that it is arbitrary.
This is an old pattern, language changes. You can react to it however you like, but things have already changed in your lifetime. Wicked or hot, for example,
Your feelings are valid and real. But as a society, the new standard is that there's no difference. If you decide to catch up, it will lead to much fewer hurt emotions.
Just because you're confident in your feelings and opinion doesn't mean that you shouldn't hear it. To never get external validation is a lonely horrible existence.
It was "yo" for me. Any time I used it some old shit would complain. My mom called it n-word speak. Me and my mom don't talk.
I use it daily, mostly out of spite.
In the '90s I had a snap back that I decorated with stick on jewels (beadazzled) and on the back I wrote "YO!" in sparkly silver puffy paint. I thought I was so cool in that hat.
I'm glad that the attitude that if you don't speak "correctly," then you are not worth engaging with is dying out.
Well, on the grammar front, anyway.
I'm glad the "not worth engaging with" attitude is dying out, but I do still think it's important to push for people to communicate accurately and effectively, which includes understanding and following grammatical rules when needed.
Language and vocabulary are essential to how we think and collectively problem-solve.
Yep, I get the "Language is constantly evolving" argument, but if I have to read your sentence three times just to parse it because you were too lazy to press a few keys, I'd consider that disrespectful to whomever is reading your comments
The people who insist on communicating incorrectly are intentionally choosing either to be stupid or to fuck with people.
Either way, I'm still not interested in interacting with them.
This but unironically /s
No seriously, I have no clue what you were talking about but it's very normal for any social group to develop a unique way of language that you have to learn when you want to engage. It's not as if farmers wouldn't use terms lay people don't understand
Everything I said is actually kinda sensible and as a sentence made sense. Obviously it uses too much slang at once and no one would make a sentence purely made of slang like that, but theoretically it's a valid sentence with modern slang.
I'm old as hell. I solely learned this just to mess with the young ones lmao.
But you make that decision based on social status not based on what the person is saying. If your manager wrote emails badly you would put in the effort to understand them. Not trying to pick on you, we all do this. My point it isn't really about correct vs incorrect it is our tolerance for the how much effort we are willing to put in to understand.
That is only because they pay me to read their shit emails.
If it is after hours, I treat them exactly the same as I would every other badly written thing.
Sorry, I missed your comment. I would beg to differ, I would certainly correct my boss if his emails were incomprehensible, absolutely.
Maybe it's living in a more equal society, I dunno. I wouldn't be hauled up on it; he might be a bit pissed off, but couldn't do anything about it
The point of language is to communicate information.
If the information was successfully relayed, the language exchange was successful.
If the person knows you MEAN "hello, I would like two of these items here, thank you good sir. hands cash and cashier says thank you You're welcome. Have a pleasant day, sir" when you SAY "Sup, two please. Thanks man. No problem have a good one." then you have successfully languaged.
So when my wife with a plethora of issues involving word recall says some insane thing because she can't remember the right words, as long as I understand what she means, her language did it's job.
There's got to be movement on both sides to a common understanding. If one side won't budge, then fuck 'em.
I think they are finding that they will be lonely if they want to continue to follow that path.
It should of died out long ago and on the side of academic linguistics did, but on the internet sadly not so much
There's descriptive and there's prescriptive linguistics. The first is the scientific endeavor of finding out and explaining how a language works. The second is the realm of anal politicians from the colonialist era who used language as an oppression tool to suppress local cultures and force the hegemonic culture upon indigenous people to make it easier to dominate, eradicate and subjugate them. Currently regarded as one of the defining elements of Genocides. For examples see, Spanish, French, English, Russian, German, Dutch, Portuguese, Mandarin … well you get the idea.
"Hej," pronounced "hey" is Swedish for "hello." Also "Hej hej" these days if you want to be more casual. It seemed weird to me at first, like "Hej mormor," for "Hello, grandmother," seemed informal, but if I said, "God afton," (good afternoon) my cousins said I sounded like a government issued language tape.
Probably not a super accurate representation of Swedish language, but it always brings a smile to my face to hear Brigitte's "hej hej" and other voicelines in Overwatch
From what I remember Brigitte's voice is quite good, maybe a slight Disney princess tint to the voice, that I find a bit misfiting, but that's about it. Her Swedish however isn't bad at all.
Her Swedish however isn’t bad at all.
Probably because the VA is Swedish. As with all characters in Overwatch they use native speakers. So English is actually their secondary language.
Yeah I know, if I read the IMDB page right she was also the Swedish voice of Kim Possible. Which made me even more confused over the Disney princess tint in her voice, but I might not remember Kim's voice to good, or she managed to not have the tint back then.
In the nineties, i had an old guy respond "'Hey' is the first stage of horse shit.". I still use it to this day.
It could also have been just that - an old joke that everyone liked responding with when they had the chance.
That is how I always perceived it. I can't even imagine someone saying that with a straight face as a correcting rebuke.
It was what passed for a meme back in the 1950s. There was a comic alphabet that was performed as a turn in the music halls. It started off with "A for horses, B for Mutton, C for miles" and so on.
It does, and if there is a recorded version at that date you can bet it had been floating around for longer than that. Reason I said 50's is because that was when my parent's generation were in their young adulthood which if you think about it is where all these catchphrases really set up home in your brain. The other thing, now I think on it, is that it wasn't said as a response to 'Hey' as a greeting it was always said to stop the somewhat Cockney way of indicating you hadn't heard. What they wanted you to say was 'Pardon?' or even 'I beg your pardon?', they didn't like 'What?' all that much and couldn't abide 'Eh?' or 'Ay?' So it it was usually more of that same 'Don't talk to your elders like that' bullshit that all the baby boomers rebelled against.
Same, and I still say it to little kids because it's silly and confuses them for a second. "Hay is for horses. Aren't you glad you're a dog?"
Language evolves and anyone who refuses to accept that is a philistine.
If the person understands what you’ve said, congratulations you just succeeded in communication. Why does everything have to be “proper”? Who decided that? Oh yeah, the old philistines trying to quash “hey”.
Why does that matter? If I can communicate with my friends in half the time, it’s more time to do other stuff.
Don’t be jealous, grab a book and get with the times. You could always join them, you can also keep your old lingo so you can communicate with other older people too. Young kids already flip between the lingos, why can’t you?
Which English…? You just used an acronym/phrase that’s not “proper” English…..
Also, is “proper” before Shakespeare? Invented lots of words, why are those acceptable, but not newer stuff?
Honestly it seems like most people have assumed that the way things are now is how they'll always be. I'm not sure why everyone seems to think this but I've noticed it everywhere with almost everyone.
There's this sense that everyone seems dug in and rooted and acting like their entire world isn't subject to change on a whim.
It's really fuckin weird.
Right…. so it’s acceptable for you to do it? But not other people? Can a young kid not decide you’re not worth their time and communicate their own way…?
What is proper English? Where is the line? You just thought it was acceptable to use a modern acronym. It’s hypocritcal to claim you speak proper English, than end it with that.
You just sounded like a third grader yourself. I understood you fine, theres nothing wrong with that, if it makes things easier and smoother, all the better for people.
And we don't give a fuck about you thinking we sound like a fifth grader.
Your existence is meaningless and has no influence on the world, let alone our lives, fr fr no cap.
someone on reddit got pissed at me for not writing a 'coherent' comment, ie because i didn't use enough capital letters. so anachronistic, don't you know the style now old man?
It does seem to come from narcissism. It’s a two way street, we need to know how to communicate old school and talk to our elders, but weren’t they also raised to look something up in a dictionary? They don’t want to learn, so no it’s on you to do it so you can talk to me.
I’m 34 I’m gonna struggle with keeping up with my kids lingo haha.
Many don’t agree with words that have been accepted into Oxford or other dictionaries. So the sarcasm falls flat.
..or it makes you bad at communicating, which is the entire purpose of your comment, and language in general.
Maybe you shouldn't ride on such high linguistic horses?
Wow, it must suck being such a ass to everyone all the time. Can’t imagine how people who have to deal with you routinely can manage.
Also, the kids they were telling off in the early nineties are pushing fifty now and won't take any shit from an octogenarian.
My grandfather used to say that, but it was more of in a dad joke way rather than a 'you shouldn't say that' way.
Exactly. I thought it was just a silly joke to open up conversation.
In Germany we have something similar. Our word for Hey, "Hai" actually has two meanings. Obviously it means "Hey" but also "Shark"
So it was common to respond with either "Where" or the more famous "Fish"
If you went for Fish it turned into a silly game of trying to compound the word as much as possible in responses to each other. Usually going like "Hey" "Fish" "Fin" "Soup". Sharkfish fin soup
I remember my mom getting uptight over the word "sucks", as in "that sucks" or "it really sucked". Literally everyone was saying it, there was no way I could help it lol
Core memory unlocked.
Mom used to get angry about me saying something sucks. She explained why it made her angry, and how it referenced a terrible and no-good sex act. I was about 16 at the time, and had already experienced this horrible, no good thing that nobody should do and just felt sorry for dad.
My 3 year old daughter has started saying "Hey!" Right before sharing a brilliant idea like "let's have ice cream for breakfast!" So I've started cutting her off with "Hay is for horses" and she just ignores me
A few years ago a very boomer gen-xer tried this on me and got very enraged when I would say "hey" instead of "hello {his name}". At one point even threatened me.
I believe it. I have seen them melt down over the tinest thing. You can shorten my name, like pretty much every first name, and one of the old shits I used to work with would scream and yell about it.
They’re saying the Gen X’er was acting like a Boomer. Which a lot of the older ones kind of are, from what I’ve noticed. They’re almost like “Boomer-lite” in their entitlement and other nasty attitudes.
I would argue it’s the zoomers and millennials that fit that description better than boomers or gen X.
I don't know man, I've never seen a zoomer yell at a cashier at a big store chain about the prices being too high or them not having something in stock. Boomers on the other hand, I have a number of times. Boomers are also the only people I've ever seen get called entitled by not only older generations, but also yonger ones too. Seriously, google "me generation" and see what pops up.
In 2005 'Hello there - General Kenobi!' became the acceptable greeting amongst teenagers and old timers. Lets bring it back.
I fought in the hey/hay wars in my early childhood. Weost many good soldiers, but their sacrifice was not in vain.
My old man used to say (in a sing-song voice):
Hay is for horses
Sometimes cows
Chickens would eat it
But they don't know how
Not once did someone say that to me in a corrective or condescending way. It was always a playful joke.
In elementary school we used to say "hay is for horses, and cows like you!".
My grandpa would do this to me when I was a kid, but it was never in like a rude way. It was just one of the funny ways we would mess with each other.
In my language, "Hi!" sounds like "Shark!", so sometimes I have to suppress the urge to say "is a fish", because Gen Xs I knew used to say it all the time.