“omg kys… ily ttyl”
Break that down into real words.
Oh my God, kill yourself! Okay, I love
you. Talk to you later.

Break it down even further. First, we can look at the way the speaker casually suggests that the reader commit suicide. Then, we can look at how they immediately thereafter tell the reader that they love them. And finally, we can reflect upon our own reactions to reading that sentence. No one’s shocked. It’s just a casual exchange between friends, one that all of us have probably had at some point.

Yeah, they said to “Kill yourself,” but they don’t really mean that. And sure, they said “I love you” after, but they don’t
really mean that either. We’ve taken powerful language and almost completely stripped it of its meaning.

It’s not just those two phrases either. Every- thing, from “I love you”, “you suck”,”I hate you” and everything in between has been modified from its true meaning to something far simpler and far less extreme than was originally intended to. The words no longer mean anything. Their meanings have been reduced to a simple connotation.

I remember the first time I ever heard someone say to me, “I hate you”. I was in sixth grade and one of my friends was joking around with me after I snatched some of her chips at lunch. She didn’t mean anything by it, but the comment stuck with me and I have it carried along with me until this day.

Now, of course, I’ve gotten used to it. My friend steals my phone to take a silly picture — “omg i literally hate you”.

My friend takes a bite of my food when I’m not looking — “Go away, you’re literally so annoying”.

My friend asks me a question when I’m in the middle of my history notes — “kys omg literally go away I hate u”. I’ve become so desensitized to these words the way that they are just thrown around that. I forget they have meanings attached to them at all.

I only find myself reflecting on how painful words can be when I’m the one they’re being used against.

You only realize that words hurt when you are the one who’s getting hurt, and it’s impossible to understand how big of an impact words have when you’re the one using them.