Jan 5, 2016 4 min read

Every Jan. 1 brings resolutions. We’ll stop swearing. We’ll lose weight. We’ll stop making new year resolutions.

Following suit, each New Year’s Day since 1976, Lake Superior State University (LSSU) in Michigan has released a “banished words list.” LSSU Public Relations Director W.T. “Bill” Rabe began the practice as a way to bring attention to the school, which was often thought of as a poor relation to Michigan College of Mining and Technology, with which LSSU was affiliated from 1946 to 1970.

The initial entry in Rabe’s 1976 “List of Words Banished from the Queen’s English for Mis-Use, Over-Use and General Uselessness” was the phrase “at this point in time.”

“Why not say ‘now,’ or ‘today’?” Rabe queried, calling the phrase “typical Delay-by-Elongation, giving subject at press conference time to think up plausible lie.” His example: “At this point in time we are, err, mmmmm, unaware of the allegation that the Earth is round.” – Queen Isabella.

LSSU accepts nominations for the list from anyone who decries the ongoing, torturous death of the English language. Others phrases banned since 1976 include “the exact same,” “thinking outside the box,” “always consistent” and “foreign imports.”

The 2016 list includes:

• “So,” when used at the start of an answer to any question. Q: “Where did you get those cool socks?” A: “So, I’m walking down the street when this FedEx van filled with socks overturns …”

• “Secret Sauce” – Nominated by Bill Evans of Clinton, Miss. “It has become too frequent in business discussions. I am tired of it,” said Evans, who apparently is unaware that, just last year, the Oxford English Dictionary added “awesomesauce” to its online edition.

• “Manspreading” – Used to describe the practice of a man’s placing his legs far apart to take up more than one seat on a bus or subway. Word is that the GOP says the Founding Fathers intended manspreading to be among the inalienable rights included in the Constitution, but couldn’t make it to the podium because Benjamin Franklin was blocking the aisle with his knees.

As a writer, I long have been bothered by bogus phrases and words that enter the vernacular through overuse and eventually become entrenched like troops in France during World War I. “Completely destroyed” and “first annual” are two of these.

Yet, despite the best efforts of English teachers and news editors over the years, they still slip into news reports. Look, folks, I suppose something can be “partially destroyed,” but when it finally exists only in a form that rules out reassembly, it is simply “destroyed.”

And while we’re on the subject, let’s limit the use of “destroyed” to concrete objects. You may think that the Steelers “destroyed” the Brownies on Sunday, but at the end of the game, Cleveland’s team was still intact. However, I will concede that it is entirely possible that Roethlisberger, et al, destroyed the career of Browns coach Mike Pettine, who was fired after the loss.

And using “first annual” to describe an inaugural event implies that the event will continue the next year, although no one can say with certainty that it will. Remember: The only time it’s OK to say “first annual” is when you have just planted the initial petunia, sweet pea or begonia of the year.

Because it wasn’t on this year’s LSSU list, I would like to nominate for 2017 “the view from 30,000 feet,” a phrase that really should be used only by those who have climbed or flown to a height of 6 miles to describe how the world looked below – not by sniveling junior executives trying to impress superiors with their supposed panoramic insight into a business situation.

LSSU beat me to the punch in 1988 by banning the use of “literally” in the wrong context. For example, “I laughed so hard, my head literally exploded!”

In which case, of course, it would have been completely destroyed.