A Top 10 List of Words That Should Be Expunged From Our Vocabulary

Anyone who has read the seminal authoritarian book '1984', may remember the particularly intriguing scene where the main character, Winston Smith, steps placidly onto an elevator as he makes his way towards his state-sponsored job. As he stands, he is enjoined in a conversation with a 'brother', whose occupation is that of removing words from the dictionary- and thus from language altogether. He boasts of that year's significant reduction of words, and waxes dreamily about the day when there will be no need for words at all.

I find this chilling: this work was allegedly started in 1984, and yet my Oxford English Dictionary is still as heavy as it was back then. In my opinion, they're going way too slow. I earnestly look forward to the day when we can only communicate through mime, intrepretive dance, or semaphore. It will be like a big, unending game of charades, with the only difference being that you can't shout out the answer.

In any case, as I feel the process is taking too long, I am humbly submitting the first of MY TOP TEN WORDS THAT SHOULD BE EXPUNGED FROM OUR VOCABULARY. Here is my first selection:

Number 10- EXPUNGE: (transitive verb)

1 : to strike out, obliterate, or mark for deletion 2 : to efface completely : destroy 3 : to eliminate (as a memory) from one's consciousness
Etymology: who cares?

Yeah, this one's gotta go. I'm totally against it. If nothing else, it's just redundant, not to mention archaic (it has Latin roots: do I have to point this out? DEAD LANGUAGE, FOLKS!). Besides, there are too many synonyms to count. Though I'm going to try. Here goes:

- Dump
- Toss out
- Ditch
- Kiss off
- Remove
- Purge (for all the bulimics out there)
- Jettison
- Coagulate (HA! Fooled you! That's not a real synonym)
- Drop that 'ho
- Expel
- Destroy all traces of (like blood stains on the hood of your car from an unwary pedestrian...
but that's just an example. It doesn't mean anything. Really. I found him that way)
- Evict
- Annihilate (Ooh... maybe this one should go, to. WAY too hard to spell)
- Have a one mile radius restraining order placed against you by the object of your affections
- Delete
- Send packing
- 'Luca Brasi sleeps with the fishes'
- Later, Dude

See what I mean? WAY too many options. 'EXPUNGED', you've been targetted.

If you have a word that you'd like to see '___________' from our language, or if you think of other synonyms to the word that no-longer-will-be-used, please leave them in my comment box.