Erudite People Of The World, Unite!
I need to rant, okay? Just a little. Here goes.
When used properly, “hack” is a
solid, substantial word. It's a strong word that traces its origins
back to the thirteenth-century Middle English word hakken. When
used as a transitive verb, it means “to cut or sever with
repeated irregular or unskillful blows.” As an intransitive verb,
it means “to make chopping strokes or blows.”
Now, the word “hack” is nothing if
not versatile. If one is annoyed or aggravated, one is said to be
“hacked” or “hacked off.” If you can't cope or achieve in a
particular situation, it is said you can't “hack it.” Maybe you
have a “hacking” cough. You can be a “hack” or a “hacker”
at golf. One of London's Hackney carriages can be called a “hack,”
which is also what you call a motorcycle with a sidecar attached. In
the masonry trade, “hack” refers to a row of stacked unfired
bricks, while in the sports world a “hack” can be a horse, a
training method for falcons, or a piece of equipment used in curling.
There are, of course, political “hacks.” And you may come across
the occasional “hack” writer, derived from the word "hackneyed," meaning "commonplace, trite, stale, or banal." There was even a TV show called
“Hack.”
But the word got a big boost when it
gained popularity in the cyber-geek world, where “hack” means to
break into a computer. Suddenly, “hacker” and “hack into”
became everyday expressions, and that's okay. But, unfortunately, the emergence of this iteration of “hack” also led the word to become an annoying, idiotic, and absolutely execrable buzzword.
Back around 2004, some hipster journalist
covering a tech conference in California used the term “life hack”
to describe certain shortcuts employed by IT professionals. How and
why he came up with that expression I have no earthly idea. But he
did and somebody liked it.
Now, that probably wouldn't have been
so bad if it had remained confined to computer geekdom. But it
didn't. Some nameless clown somewhere decided to shorten “life
hack” or “lifehack” to just “hack” and utilize it in place
of much better words. Bloggers especially became fond of the word and
in the blink of an electronic eye, “hacks” were everywhere. And then the mainstream entertainment media took up the word and the race was truly on. Cooking “hacks,” cleaning “hacks,” study “hacks,” workout
“hacks,” organizing “hacks,” etc., etc., ad infinitum, ad
nauseum. All of a sudden, every piece of useful information was
a “hack.” Descriptors like “tip”, “trick,” “hint,”
“skill,” “idea,” or “shortcut” virtually disappeared in
favor of the shiny new word of the day.
Well, I'm here to tell you I can't hack
the trend anymore. I am supremely hacked off about it and if I had my
way, I'd hack into the lexicon of every hack who uses the word “hack”
in that manner and hack it from existence. There's nothing whatsoever
wrong with a cooking shortcut, a study hint, a cleaning tip, a
workout trick, or an organizing idea. To a normal person of average
intelligence, these are perfectly clear and understandable terms that
do not need to be replaced by cutesy-tootsey mediaspeak, slang, and
jargon. You got me, hipster and millennial hack writers? You hear me,
vapid and vacuous morning news show hosts? I want a “tip” or a
“trick,” not something that sounds like what my cat does with a
hairball. Go buy a damn thesaurus and stop using “hack” to
describe anything useful and informative. It's annoying as all
billy-hell to those of us who possess vocabularies of words made up
of more than one syllable, and, far from making you sound hip,
trendy, and cool, it bespeaks an air of stupidity and sophomoric
solecism.
Erudite people of the world, unite! Join with me and together we'll hack away at this aberrant usage of a perfectly good and serviceable word.
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