Rant: ‘Holics And Other English Blunders

So, I have a gripe with some words that are used in a colloquial sense. I have many, in fact. I’m letting it all out right now, I think, as long as I can remember them all. If I can’t then I’ll add more later. Ha!

First off, is the various ‘holics that exist. ‘Holic comes from the word alcohol, to describe an alcoholic. Why, then, do people call themselves various ‘holics when they deem themselves to have an addiction to anything? One can be a chocoholic. Or a videogameoholic. Or a blogoholic. Now, I don’t know about you, but I have never heard of chocohol, or videogameohol, or blogohol. And, despite all of this, someone with asthma is not called an asthmaholic. They are called asthmatic. Therein lies the truth. A choloholic, if looked at logically, and considering all suffixes properly, would be called a chocolatic. Videogameatic makes more sense, too. Even blogatic makes more sense. That’s my first gripe.

Second, the word realtor. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but in recent years, lazy people have started pronouncing it ‘rilitaur’ or ‘riliter’. That’s not how it’s pronounced! It’s realtor! Like its root word, realty! Not rility! I’ve even seen realty commercials use the new lazy and improper pronunciation. It’s real-tor, numbskull!

I also don’t know why a lot of a’s have become an’s. It used to be that someone would be a heroic person. Now they are an heroic person. Is it because someone would be an honorable person rather than a honorable person? How about paying attention to silent letters, people? No, we generally don’t follow a vowel sound with a vowel sound, just like we generally don’t follow a consonant sound with a consonant sound. That means that, in proper english, it would be A hellish evening with AN herbal remedy. In modern english, it is AN hellish evening with AN herbal remedy.

I actually had a discussion about this with someone from work. Brian was absolutely sure that one could get away with saying, ‘I’m going to go fry a egg’. Yes, you can get away with it. I tested it, and it proves true. But does that make it right? Many of you reading this may not have even noticed the grave error there. Again, in most cases, you simply do not follow one sound with a like sound.

English is going down the tubes.