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The one that has always frustrated me is “valid,” which has mutated from a word to acknowledge something’s objective recognition under a well-recognised schema
by CiceroCiceronis 5y ago
The one that has always frustrated me is “valid,” which has mutated from a word to acknowledge something’s objective recognition under a well-recognised schema to one that simply signals that it matches the speaker’s viewpoint.
Not that I have any issue with people believing whatever they want to, but using a word associated with objectivity to lend your inherently subjective statement of opinion a false imprimatur of hard truth is certainly disingenuous.
- joshgrib 5y agoI think what's going on is slightly different and adds value to the conversion - as far as I've seen the speaker is acknowledging an objective truth about something that has historically or otherwise been seen more subjectively. The classic example would probably be people feeling depressed or something and being told that's valid, because often people feel that they shouldn't feel that way. Basically someone saying "hey stop acting like that isn't a true/normal thing because it is". On the flip side I can definitely see how someone would look at that and say "Well I subjectively don't agree with what you think is objective" - I don't really see a way around that. Ultimately we're all subjects and can't access objectivity directly so all communication is going to be subjective to some extent. One person might think it's "valid" to murder someone if it's legal in their situation, while someone else might think that's never a "valid" option, and both could be correct if one is talking about legality and the other is talking about morality