Decimated. You keep using that word. It does not mean what you think it means.

[Mochudubh]

I know Trump's an idiot and there are far more serious concerns in the world at the moment but this had me shouting at the telly.

We've beaten and completely decimated Iran. They are decimated, both militarily and economically and in every other way.”

So Iran is 90% sound then. Idiot.

It's a very slippy slope.

(Use of slippy instead of slippery... aargh!)

I apologise. You're completely right.

I would only concede this if Trump were a Roman general - and Julius Caesar he ain’t!

I stand by my pedantry! 😉

It’ll be loose to mean lose first.

I agree entirely. He also said he "would be bringing Iran BACK to the Stone Age" suggesting that the USA was already there and Iran would be joining them.What amazes me more though is that while the King of the UK has stripped his brother Andrew of all rank, titles and privileges because of the latter's association with convicted paedophile, sex slave trafficker and our useless PM has been forced to oust Mandelson from his offices (but still much further to go) for much the same reason, some stupid Americans are allowing Trump to ruin global economies, including their own, while he wages war to divert attention from his own associations with Epstein.

We so need a shocked reaction emoji 😮

For goodness sakes let no-one explain the original meaning of ‘decimate’ to Trump. He might just think it’s a good idea for instilling discipline within his Empire.

Or a brought/bought mash up.

Now I am looking even harder for that 😮 emoji.

The trouble with the message in that chart is that it seems to see the end result of evolved use of a word as a natural and valid development of language.

That used to be more true than it is now though imo. Now, due to the internet, original meanings are lost faster, and replacement meanings are being intentionally injected. We now have quite a lot of thought cancelling uses of words as explained in 1984.

In this case of ‘decimated’, possibly, Trump is more correct than he realises and Iran’s powers are 90% remaining!

It's deci: 10th (from Latin decimus).

Please read my username as 'person E' in this instance.

'(Should) of' is already in various dictionaries. Thankfully it is designated 'uneducated speech', 'incorrect usage' and 'never right'.

Glad to hear that (the designation, not that it's in the dictionary in the first place).

In many cases though it should. Language doesn't so much as evolve as degrade. This may be an exception, and decimate can usefully suggest operationally devastating without completely obliterating an entity's capability. However in other cases we have lost meaning and nuance. For example, literally, acronym and factoid. For the last two, we have now lost the specific meaning of a term for which there is no alternative.

The more general meaning of the word with regards to greatly reducing, damaging etc something has been in the dictionary for a very long time. I don’t think he’s using it incorrectly meaning wise, given his tendency for hyperbole. He’s doing his usual exaggeration (aka lying) for dramatic effect. But it’s factually inaccurate for him to say that they’ve decimated anything because they haven’t. The meaning related to the Roman practice is the original one but it isn’t the case anymore that it is the only correct meaning.

@CautiousLurker2 , I think this is a case of trying to be clever, when it’s not really. Sorry. You aren't sorry.

The Orange one's use of it is a good example of why the 'language evolves' excuse weakens the language.

Yes. I was sorry that my reply might have caused offence to the person I was replying to as I was concerned it might be taken personally rather than as an intellectual difference of opinion.

But no, I am absolutely not sorry that language is an organic, adaptive communication form. As cultures and concepts change, as understandings of the world deepen, as sensibilities change around social and political issues… so, too, should language be open to evolution. Will never apologise for that. Though, in this case, the meaning of the word in question has been pretty static since the 1660s.

I also still think the Oxford comma is necessary, though. Along with other grammatical rules.

And I also think it’s rude to imply that someone is lying and that you know what they are thinking and feeling better than they do. But that’s just me.

I'm as pedantic as any other pedant, but I think we need to accept that the original meaning of "decimate" has been expanded.

I wasn't implying you were lying, @CautiousLurker2; I was implying that you were using it in a sarcastic way.

You are coming across as rude.

Oxford commas are fine but they are optional. I don't use them unless they aid clarity.

I thought it meant to break something into ten parts, not reduce it by one tenth?

This thread has made me so happy. Thank you @Mochudubh

You're wrong though. If the meaning has changed then it's changed. It no longer only means one in ten.

The context is that it is being used now, in the present, to mean what it means now, in the present.

I hate to defend Trump but in this particular case he's not wrong 😅

We don't have to like it.
It had a specific meaning and now it doesn't.

Do you think Shakespeare's English was a degraded version of Chaucer's? Or did you mean language no longer evolves, but instead degrades? And for that matter, evolving is a neutral description meaning change. Degrading is a value judgement, so the obvious question is: says who? And why should we accept their tastes as the rules? Why are you in a position to say what should happen to language?

What happens happens, which is all I'm saying: decimated no longer just means split into ten, or one tenth destroyed, or whatever the fuck was its original meaning. Whether you like it or not is another matter, on which I obviously have no opinion.

That said, there are many words that have only survived in common usage through evolution. "Fortified"? Words that don't retain meaning in a changing world stop being used altogether, which would be fatal for the language altogether if it was actually possible to conduct the experiment.

Btw this is all in the spirit of curious pedantry, I'm not trying to be a dickhead!!