{"id":48944,"date":"2020-01-07T06:00:30","date_gmt":"2020-01-07T11:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/?p=48944"},"modified":"2020-01-05T21:57:55","modified_gmt":"2020-01-06T02:57:55","slug":"entitled-to-an-explanation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/?p=48944","title":{"rendered":"Entitled to an Explanation"},"content":{"rendered":"

A couple of weeks ago we ended up discussing the term “entitled”<\/a> in the comments. This was part of a side discussion regarding “entitled gamers”. Someone noted that entitled seems to be its own opposite. As in:<\/p>\n

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  1. This fender bender is covered by your auto insurance, therefore you’re entitled to money from the insurance company. (You really do deserve the money.)<\/li>\n
  2. You’re an entitled gamer because you’re demanding the developer add additional features that were never promised. (You’re confusing something you want with something you deserve.)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    So which is it? Does entitled mean you deserve something, or does it mean you’re acting like you deserve something when you don’t? The answer, of course, is “it depends”, because language is obnoxiously fluid and there’s nothing to stop people from bending words until our language is confused.<\/p>\n

    I find the mutation of “entitled” to be interesting because I saw it happen during my lifetime. I saw the usage of the word slip subtly over the years. Each individual evolutionary step made sense, but at the end we’d ruined a word.<\/p>\n

    <\/p>\n

    This process is nothing new, of course. Mental Floss has a list of 25 words that are their own opposites<\/a>. I’d be very surprised if those were the only words with this problem. Some of the examples are:<\/p>\n