‘GOAT’ tops school’s list of banished words for 2023

by Addy Bink and Nexstar Media Wire - 01/01/23 5:10 PM ET

(NEXSTAR) – Moving forward, irregardless of how you may feel about it, the judges of a Michigan university’s annual list would like you to quietly quit using some words and phrases, including “GOAT” and “amazing,” among others. Does that make sense?

Annually, since 1976, Lake Superior State University has released a list of words and phrases to be banished for the new year. More than 1,000 everyday terms have been banished – some more than once.

School officials explained the process to Nexstar’s WJMN last year. Anyone can submit a word or term they’d like to see banned. Then, the school’s English department decides which words will be banished.

Words and terms banned in 2022 included “no worries,” “you’re on mute,” and, topping out the list, “wait, what?”

After reviewing more than 1,500 submissions, the judges at Lake Superior State University found their GOAT to ban – GOAT, an acronym for ‘Greatest of All Time.’

“The many nominators didn’t have to be physicists or grammarians to determine the literal impossibility and technical vagueness of this wannabe superlative. Yet it’s bestowed on everyone from Olympic gold medalists to ‘Jeopardy!’ champions, as one muckraker playfully deplored. Meanwhile, other naysayers remarked on social media posts that brandish a photo of, for instance, multiple cricket players or soccer stars with a caption about several GOATs in one frame,” the school explained in a press release. Judges went on to call it “an indiscriminate flaunt.”

After GOAT was “inflection point,” which received its banishment for losing its original meaning as a mathematical term. “Moving forward,” landing at No. 5 on the list, was also banished because, as one person noted, “Where else would we go?”

Three of this year’s entries – “absolutely,” “amazing,” and “it is what it is” – have been banned before but were repeated this year for their reported overuse.

“Quiet quitting” and “gaslighting” were selected for their inaccuracy and overuse and misuse, respectively.

Quiet quitting, used to describe someone who does the minimum amount of work at their job, even has the potential to be banished again in 2024 for “ongoing misuse and overuse,” Lake Superior State University writes. Instead, judges recommend “normal job performance.”

“Does that make sense?” was listed because, as judges explain, you should “always make sense.” Those that submitted the term referred to it as “filler, insecurity, and passive aggression.”

Coming in at No. 8 was “irregardless.” Why? It isn’t even a word.

Here are the 10 words and terms that have been banished for 2023: