2 ms·

I would argue they are bad/incorrect/invalid if they dilute the meaning or abuse its gravity for effect.

• pas 4y ago
  If done for effect yes, but if someone said "I reorganized my plates in the kitchen cabinet during the weekend to feed my OCD" ... and their kitchen was pretty okay before, then I'd say that it's a pretty valid sentence. Is it the same thing that prevents people from leaving their house, because they get stuck at the door checking whether they really locked it? No, of course, but it's also not a thing with absolutely no commonality. I sometimes get stuck deciding how to re-organize things, try it this way, or maybe next month I try it that way ... then eventually but relatively quickly I get upset about it and then accept this imperfection of the world, and that's it. Is it OCD? No, and I don't use the term, but it's more OCD-like than what probably ~80-90% of the population does. And yes, of course it used to be that the clinical term was used for only the ~1% extreme end of the spectrum. (But then useful terms spread and now their use is more common and broader, and yes, it absolutely makes it less precise, dilutes their original meaning, etc. But "so ist das Leben", that's language for ya.) And, in general, words' gravity is very context dependent. Cursing is almost like a requirement in some situations in the military, while it's absolutely forbidden in others. Or misusing religious words in a very religious setting, etc.