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Hipster, butt-chugging and Kony: The world's worst words, literally

 

Laura Davis
Wednesday 19 December 2012 13:06 GMT
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13. Mock croc 'Oxford English Dictionary', £55, Aspinal of London
13. Mock croc 'Oxford English Dictionary', £55, Aspinal of London

You know those words that literally, like, annoy you?

The Atlantic Wire has kindly put together a list of the world's worst words and phrases - with explanations as to why exactly we find them so annoying.

Todd Akin's rather offensive creation of "legitimate rape" has made the list, as he actually thought women were able to reject sperm if their body knew it was rape.

"Ugh" is up there, which is a "Guttural sound to denote unpleasant emotion". The frustration lies here with making sounds instead of using real words: "Can't we muster legitimate words for human expression?"

They feel the word "curvy" has fallen into a kind of "overused meaninglessness, which says more about editors and writers being a wee bit lazy and less about the word itself".

And the overused "literally" and "really!?" continue to agitate, as they scatter over the English language like Hundreds and Thousands.

Any other words IV readers find incredibly annoying?

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