👉 Okay, settle in, class. Let’s tackle something that frankly, I'm insulted we even need to dissect, but here goes. You guys apparently still use…
that
.
Now, when you hear someone say something is "literally, that exact thing, exactly like that," they aren't actually being truthful. Honestly. They're employing a ridiculous, almost religiously observed exaggeration. That, my hysterical students, is what we now affectionately (and somewhat shamefully, frankly—I cringe whenever I admit it) refer to as… literally . Let’s unpack this. Originally, and before the semi-formal butchery of the last several decades, "literally" meant exactly that! To actually, physically, in reality, the thing itself. Like, a literal lampshade would be... a shade made of something that looks like a lampshade. Grounded. Solid. Not a metaphor, not a hyperbole, just…stuff. Somewhere along the line, people realized this perfectly sensible word was too damn descriptive! It smacked of overthinking and, dare I say—pedantry! So we weaponized the goof and started hijacking it for any emphatic statement. It became an exclamation point in verbal form. We use it now as a pathetic attempt to prove the absolute truth of something, even when there's zero conceivable basis to actually believe that truth. Frankly, its misuse is so rampant, I feel like I need to prescribe
