Oxford Dictionaries embarked on what they thought would be a fun-filled crowd-sourcing romp on Thursday. The dictionary publisher playfully invited users from around the world to submit their least favorite word.
What are the world’s most hated words? Add yours at the #OneWordMap: https://t.co/WqBygU0OCO pic.twitter.com/AR2fDfisLc
— Oxford Languages (@OxLanguages) August 25, 2016
At first all seemed well.
When submissions opened, the commonly loathed “moist” took the lead in the U.K., U.S., and Australia. “Moist” was soon replaced by “Brexit” which made it to first place in the UK. “British” came in third.
But things soon took an ugly turn.
Within hours, a blog post on the Oxford Dictionaries website indicated that the #OneWordMap had been shut down.
Oxford Dictionaries
While Oxford Dictionaries gave no examples of the “misuse” cited in their post, The Guardian notes that examples on Twitter indicate that many users were using politically loaded words such as “Israel,” “Iran,” and “Islam.”
But when we searched Twitter, we found plenty of earnest—not hateful—responses to the hashtag #OneWordMap.
Hitherto #OneWordMap
— Hilarious Shizzles (@SalisuSiba1) August 26, 2016
#OneWordMap Closure
— One day at a time🎄🦅‼️ 🫏😂🇺🇸🇺🇦 💙 🟧🏳️🌈🌻 (@ladymindful) August 26, 2016
https://twitter.com/SilverFoxRose/status/769080885710843904
Seep. #OneWordMap https://t.co/VHg0KZpJRe
— Juanita Montoya-Silva (@zestygal) August 26, 2016
Although, to be fair, it seems none of them were garnering many likes or RTs. And so it appears, when you ask people to vote for what they dislike, a whole lot of them favor frothing hatred over a small annoyance.
Who woulda thought?
H/T The Guardian
