10 Banned Words

What do "perfect storm," "random" and "black Friday" have in common? They should all be banned! So say the guardians of the English language, whose day jobs are at Lake Superior State University in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. This group annually takes on the role of word police by collecting a list of words and phrases that we have used so much they have become annoying. The solution? Ban them!

Here are 10 of the banned words and phrases on the 2008 list that were winnowed down from some 2,000 entries:1. Perfect Storm: Overused by the pundits on evening television shows to mean just about any coincidence. It's time for "perfect storm" to get rained out.2. Webinar: A seminar on the Web about any number of topics. Yet another non-word trying to worm its way into the English language due to the Internet.3. Waterboarding: Let's banish "waterboarding" to the beach where it belongs with boogie boards and surfboards.

4. Organic: Overused and misused to describe not only food, but also computer products or human behavior and often used when describing something as "natural."5. Post 9/11: "Our post-9/11 world" is used probably more than AD or BC time references. You'd think the United States didn't have jet fighters, nuclear bombs and secret agents, let alone electricity, pre-9/11.6. Surge: "Surge" has become a reference to a military build-up. Give me the old days, when it referenced storms and electrical power.7. Black Friday: The day after Thanksgiving that retailers use to keep themselves out of the red for the year. This is counter to the start of the Great Depression's use of the term "black Tuesday," which signaled the crash of the stock market that sent the economy into a tailspin.

8. Back in the Day: Back in the day, we used "back in the day" to mean something really historical. Now you hear ridiculous statements such as "Back in the day, people used a BlackBerry without Bluetooth."9. Random: Popular with teenagers in many places. It's over-used and usually out of context, such as: "You are so random!" Random is supposed to mean "by chance." A person isn't random.10. It Is What It Is: It means absolutely nothing and is mostly a cop-out or a way to avoid answering a question that might require genuine thought or insight. It's especially favored by professional athletes.