Original post: aus.social (Mastodon)
i mean, “habit” is a weird word for it. i’d call it more of a trend. “brain rot” seems like an adequate description.
it comes from streamer culture where streamers would refer to their audience as “chat” because the chat box is the main way for viewers to interact with whoever they are watching.
I guess memes are brain rot. This feels like a get off my lawn comment.
Just because it’s a relatively new meme/saying that derives from streamer culture, doesn’t make it brain rot.
It’s also the most unbiased word for referring to a group in a gender neutral way I’ve seen lol most others have implications of status (gentlepersons, folks), are still technically gendered (guys, not to mention this implies relatively young people too), or overbroad (everybody is well, everybody. Chat implies you’re addressing your community or a small group since they’re the ones who would be talking to you).
Wait “folks” has a status implication? IS NO WORD SIMPLY UNPROBLEMATIC!? IS NOTHING SACRED FROM THIS LINGUISTIC HELL