• JubilantJaguar@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    Yes, your point is that “hunger” should be interpreted very loosely, meaning in a sort of addiction-psychology way.

    I think that’s a sophisticated re-rendering, and that most ordinary folks do associate the word “hunger” with famine, with starving, with terrible deprivation. Which is a real situation in a handful of desperate places in the world. I don’t think we should be conflating these two problems. One of them is far more urgent than the other.

    I see this as just another instance of disingenuously sensationalist language and I would prefer people used the correct terms for what they are in fact talking about.

    For the underlying substance, I agree with you and all the other censorious downvoters. I am just concerned about vocabulary and manipulation.

      • JubilantJaguar@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        So if “malnourished” is better, as you imply, let’s use that instead. The issue is not hunger by any non-academic definition of the word.

        You’ve made your case. Mine is that this is a clear example of sensationalist lexical inflation. Like calling everyone right of center a Nazi, it is intended to provoke engagement and emotion rather than to describe a fact.