The Word “Like

Guest Written by:  Lizzle Bizzle

Like why do white people hate their fellow whitemen who happen to insert what they deem an annoying useless little lexeme into their speech like every two seconds? Yes, white people hate LIKE-users who they mistakenly think are white teenage girls from California’s San Fernando Valley. Ever since Frank Zappa’s Valley Girl stormed the airwaves, like has been blamed on White California teenage girls, and White people in general, making most White people hate LIKE users simply because it makes us look bad. The general idea in society is that White people, especially young ones, even more especially girls, can’t utter a sentence without inputting a few likes here and there. And these culprits, this White English-language-bastardizing force continues to fill the air with meaningless extra sounds and are unable to actually form a coherent thought without inserting a few likes in there to buy themselves time. These LIKE-users are unwlling to commit to any of their words for fear of retribution if they are wrong or for fear of being challenged so they hedge their speech with like this and like that to cover their asses. If a white person walks down the street and hears a teenage kid or WORSE, an adult White person saying like all the time, they might get the urge to pop a cap in their a**. Here’s how the conversation might go….

“Like, why are you saying like all the time. People are like going to think all us white people are ditzy Clueless imbeciles. So like stop making us look bad and like stop saying like before I rip out your tongue, you poor excuse for a white person.” Bang!

Funnily enough, there some solid linguistic research on like that white people might want to know, perhaps it’ll help them come to love this little lexeme. Or deflate some of the stereotypes of like they’re blamed for.

1) Like doesn’t merely fill the air with meaningless sounds. It serves a purpose; in fact, it serves multiple purposes:
a) It’s a more sophisticated alternative to ‘say’ ,

E.g. She was like, “Oh my God, Becky, look at her butt, it is sooo big. She looks like one of those rap guys girlfriends”

AND it can do stuff say can’t like introduce a pantomime or some non-word type of noise.

E.g. I was like “(insert disgusted looking facial expression here)”

b) It’s replacing about as an Approximator.

E.g. “Can you believe he wore like three shades of pink in the same outfit and sucked on a pink Flinstone’s push-up at the same time?”

c) It’s another way of pausing besides a silent pause, a you know, or a well:

E.g. “Like, you should just go to hell.”

2) Like is not just for White people, it’s not even really from California. It was common in both the U.K. and New York’s Beat Culture (Kerouac was a like user) before finding its current place as stereotype for California ditzy white teenage girls. They use like in Canadia, they use it in India, Mexicans use it, Black people use it. Its for Gentiles and for Jews. Shit, like might just be the way to build bridges, cross color lines, achieve world peace.

3) Both males and females use LIKE and not necessarily women more than men.

4) People who use LIKE are considered more friendly than those who don’t.

5) Like isn’t going anywhere so get used to it. As we said, it’s taking the place of ‘about’ and it is the preferred way of starting a quote. In one study, it was the third most frequent word!

So White people, reliniquish your hatred of this little multifunctional gem of a word and instead spread the truth, LIKE isn’t sexist, racist, or classist. Like is for everyone!