Friday, April 27, 2012

FML, or FWP? OMG, WTF!?

 FML is an acronym for "fuck my life." Most of you know this. What most of you assholes don't know, is how to use it properly. Here's the thing: If you're in a bind, and you're tight on money because you've over-extended yourself, that's a FWP (first world problem), NOT a FML. "The battery on my phone died, and now I won't be home all weekend" is NOT a FML moment. it's a FWP moment. maybe a WTF (what the fuck) moment. If your charger is fucked up, or the electric went out, you could even, in certain circumstances, use my own adaptation, WTFF (What the fucking fuck). That would be acceptable, but not FML. Your life isn't fucked because you've been slightly inconvenienced, it's just an inconvenience. At that, it's one that an innumerable amount of people worldwide would give their right arm for.

So stop it.

Just.

Fucking.

Stop.

The drama is unnecessary. The acronym is so overused and so full of bullshit that it almost instantly triggers my bitchslap reflex. So, here's a handy guide for all you drama queens:

  • FWP (First World Problem)
    • Your paycheck has been delayed.
    • Your mom won't let you go play with your friend because your friend is a troublemaker.
    • You have a curfew.
    • Your car won't start.
    • You don't like Facebook's Timeline format.
 None of the aforementioned scenarios warrant a "fuck my life." Seriously, call the fucking waaaaahhhhmbulance, okay. Enough is enough. Wait for the fucking check, suck it up and listen to your mom before you make her a grandmom, be in when you're supposed to be in, get yourself a Chilton manual and figure out what's wrong with your car (you can even find that shit on Google, for fuck's sake), and if you're so self absorbed that you actually see Facebook's timeline more than your news feed, you've got bigger problems. Stop sniveling about stupid shit. These are all first world problems, and none of them are worthy of you giving up on life, now knock it the fuck off! While some of the above situations might be worthy of an "OMG" or even a "WTF," they are not fucking life altering. Get a grip.

 For contrast, here are a few actual "FML" moments:

  • You're heart transplant has been cancelled.
  • The fucking Holocaust.
  • Slavery.
  • Apartheid.
  • Monkeys are flying out your ass at record speeds, and you are out of bananas. 
 Do you see the difference? All the above situations are life altering, some even life ending. these are not first world problems, these are definitely "OMG, WTF, FML: moments. So please, for the love of humanity, and your own self-respect, PLEASE fucking think, okay? Here's a cheat sheet:

  • For FML
    • Is this going to seriously hamper your life for the foreseeable future?
    • Are you about to die?
    • Are you in imminent danger of dying?
    • Are you Japanese, and is it August of 1945?
    • Are you on a slow boat from Africa to something those white guys keep calling "The New World?"
 If the answer to all of these, and any comparable situation is "no." Please, for fuck's sake, DON'T use "FML." It isn't fucking appropriate. The world doesn't revolve around your ability to get reception on your iPhone, so fuck off.


10 comments:

  1. Okay, I agree. Mostly. Fuck my life has become distressingly over-used in the past couple of years. Hell, "text talk" acronyms, in general, have become distressingly over-used. At this stage, the expression, "fuck my life" is about where the word "love" is. I love my spouse and I love coffee -- the latter infinitely more than the former. Given enough time, the aforementioned expression will reach the status that the word "ignorant" suffers from now. To this day, I frequently find myself morally honor bound to inform people that I am NOT ignorant -- I am just rude. Or, when it is a teenage girl I am enlightening, I must first force my brain to interpret precisely what they mean by the single syllable of "ig".

    However, some of the first-world problems that people ascribe the "fuck my life" outlook to happen precisely BECAUSE we live in a first world nation, and due to that, can cause substantially more problems. If someone is living paycheck to paycheck, and their check is late, they could encounter some problems. However, in first world nations, it is more socially acceptable to say, "fuck my life" and wait for the pretty colored paper to come through in order to by food than it is to simply go out and hunt/gather your food without worrying about permits, seasons, private property and so on. So in many third world nations, that would be a moot point. Of course, I would, largely, prefer first world problems to third world ones.

    Then there are the first world problems, whereby an individual is negatively effected by the life of someone else and utters, "fuck my life"; i.e., a friend dying of an overdose. Yet even in that situation, "fuck their (the deceased) life would be more apropos.

    So, while I, personally, seldom type or say, "fuck my life," in the spirit of your post I will endeavor to use (and spread) the phrase, "first world problem" instead -- with due credit to your blog.

    But I don't anticipate FML being completely eradicated from my lexicon. For example: when I explaining to a friend (who my husband later messed around with) that my husband was having sex with my boy-friends ex-girlfriend, while I was having sex with my boyfriends best friend. While it obviously qualified as a WTF? moment, it was also, technically still a FML moment and deserved to be noted as such. The pertinent difference being that I was able to identify it, not as, "Fuck my life. :-( ," but as, "Fuck: My life!"

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you, thank you, thank you, and yikes, but hey, punctuation is everything!I'd never advocate eradication of any word / phrase from the English language... providing, of course, they actually are words. "Ig" doesn't count, and I can't believe people still use that. That's an example of a word I'm trying to get to actually become a word: Linguicide. Now, if only Oxford would get on board with that...

      Delete
  2. Being a writer, I am even fonder of Linguicide than I am of FWP. So: Proceed with caution -- WARNING!!!! FLAMING IDEALIST ALERT!!!!

    1. Have you tried submitting it?
    2. Oxford, it is not, but -- this: http://www.ehow.com/how_6388698_submit-new-word-dictionary.html
    3. Oxford, it is, so -- this: http://oxforddictionaries.com/words/how-do-you-decide-whether-a-new-word-should-be-included-in-an-oxford-dictionary?region=us
    4. Spread it around. The more people who use it, the better of a chance it will have. Also, then it won't come into conflict with the "real word" prerequisite of the first link, or with the "not a word you made up" stipulation of the second link.
    5.Take heart, part 1: "Ain't" is now listed in Oxford, albeit as "informal" and "does not form part of standard English. And if "ain't" ain't linguistic homicide, I don't know what is. (Yes, kids, that's an example of the pot calling the bud green.)
    6. Take heart, part 2: Invented words and their diabolical creators -- chortle (Carroll), elves (Tolkien -- elFS was around before, but it also meant a quite different critter than what most fantasy refers to today), and, grok (Heinlein -- *shooting lust in the general direction of his literary legacy*)
    7. Take heart, part 3: Text talk and the persistence of the shortening to(read raping) "Ig". I rest my case.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Uh, question: Did my reply get deleted due to moderation, or due to a glitch? If it's a glitch, I'll re-post, if it's a mod thing, I won't.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Absolutely a glitch. I've disabled all moderation as a metaphorical rolling out of the welcome mat.

      Delete
    2. Yay!! I am welcome (even if a mat smacks of white picket fences, which I am fatally allergic to). Thanks for clarifying. My original reply, to your reply, to my reply, to your post:

      Being a writer, I am even fonder of Linguicide than I am of FWP. So: Proceed with caution -- WARNING!!!! FLAMING IDEALIST ALERT!!!!

      1. Have you tried submitting it?
      2. Oxford, it is not, but -- this: http://www.ehow.com/how_6388698_submit-new-word-dictionary.html
      3. Oxford, it is, so -- this: http://oxforddictionaries.com/words/how-do-you-decide-whether-a-new-word-should-be-included-in-an-oxford-dictionary?region=us
      4. Spread it around. The more people who use it, the better of a chance it will have. Also, then it won't come into conflict with the "real word" prerequisite of the first link, or with the "not a word you made up" stipulation of the second link.
      5.Take heart, part 1: "Ain't" is now listed in Oxford, albeit as "informal" and "does not form part of standard English. And if "ain't" ain't linguistic homicide, I don't know what is. (Yes, kids, that's an example of the pot calling the bud green.)
      6. Take heart, part 2: Invented words and their diabolical creators -- chortle (Carroll), elves (Tolkien -- elFS was around before, but it also meant a quite different critter than what most fantasy refers to today), and, grok (Heinlein -- *shooting lust in the general direction of his literary legacy*)
      7. Take heart, part 3: text talk and the persistence of the shortening to(read raping) "Ig". I rest my case.

      Delete
  4. Hmmm. Yeah, this doesn't seem to be working. I just tried two more times to re-post it. All three times, it showed it as posted afterwards, but then it disappeared when I refreshed the page. It also never showed up on Bete's PC, even when it was visible on mine. But the query post took. And it didn't give me a character limit error. Cogitating... let's see if this takes...

    ReplyDelete
  5. Okay, this is now twilight zone material... your website can't decide whether it wants to post what I say ten thousand times... or not at all. I can understand not believing in a God, but are you sure you don't believe in Gremlins?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Absolutely explainable through conventional means. I've been getting slammed with "anonymous" comments today, and blogger took it upon itself to call in the spam guards. I clicked all the checkboxes and published, then as I read and saw there were repeats, I deleted duplicates.

      Delete