S2E15 - The Holy War (the feud over pronunciation of GIF)

0:32 Chris: Maybe we can get a guy named Mike. Just write down what we say. Yeah. And then he can deliver our podcast in the mail. Kayla: Spit in his mouth. Chris: What? Kayla: And then. Don't you want to spit in someone's mouth? Chris: Yeah, like, no, I'm not gonna get political here. Kayla: I just meant because of COVID and we can't even do anything. And what a thrilling experience it would be. Chris: Oh, yeah. It would be like. Kayla: It would be like, face jumping someone's mouth. Or be the receiver. I bet you. Chris: Do. You know that Base jumping is an acronym or the bass part is. Anyway. Kayla: I don't think I knew that about base jumping. I don't remember what it is, but here's my prediction. Here's my prediction. Chris: Okay, go ahead.

1:13 Kayla: And people spitting in each other's mouths is gonna be a huge uptick of that in porn. Huge. Huge. Chris: Oh, give me a break. Kayla: Huge. What? Chris: I don't think so. Kayla: Do you not know? Chris: I know there's, like, coronavirus related porn that's happening. Kayla: It's not necessarily just the coronavirus related porn. It's okay. Did you know. Did you know that there has been a resurgence in the glory hole community because of COVID To the point where, like, New York City public health officials have said, like, go fucking glory holes. Chris: They've actually recommended it. Wow.

1:54 Kayla: Having sex through that's so fascinating. Through a barrier is, like, one of the only. Chris: I wonder if. Kayla: Safe ways to have sex. Chris: Right, right. Kayla: With, like, not somebody that's not, like, your steady partner. Chris: Right, right. I wonder if that's, like, something that happened in the 1918 pandemic as well. Kayla: I'm trying to think about. Because I did a whole bunch of research on this. I'm trying to think. Chris: This is your next topic. Kayla: No, I already did this topic. Chris: Glory holes cult are just weird. Kayla: I did this topic on my other podcast. Okay. I also. This is a confession. You know how I know everything? Chris: I don't want to know about your glory hole. Kayla: No. You know how I just, like, I know everything about everything. I'm really smart. Chris: Do I have to accept that for you to continue talking? Kayla: You know how you can know a lot of things and be a semi intelligent person, and then, like, you realize that an idea you had is just so stupid and irrational?

2:43 Chris: Yeah, that happens sometimes. Kayla: I did nothing. Put two and two together. That glory holes were a big thing in the gay male community. That's where they are. Big. Chris: Wait, you really. Kayla: Yes. Yep. Chris: Didn't put it together as, like, a straight male. I was well aware of that. Kayla: Yeah, I know. And you're talking to, like, a not. Chris: Straight person I know. Kayla: Didn't just. I just never. I just never thought about it. And then I did research on this topic, and I was like, oh, my God, this is amazing. People have. People have private glory holes that, like, oh, I didn't know that they're a privately owned. I think that this is more typical now than, like, you know, back. So unfortunately, the height of glory hold'em got ruined by another pandemic. It was ruined by the AIDS pandemic epidemic. Was it a pandemic or an epidemic?

3:37 Chris: I don't know. I think it was a pandemic because it was worldwide and extended period of time. Kayla: That was another horrible thing that our government handled terribly and killed a lot of people. History repeats itself, and it ruined glory holes, but they're making a resurgence now in this pandemic, but in between. Chris: So it depends on the pandemic. Kayla: It depends on the pandemic. In between that time, there was a rise in, like, privately owned glory holes. Chris: I didn't know that was a thing. Kayla: In people's homes that you let, like, you have sex parties and, like, people come have sex in your lord. Chris: I guess that makes sense. Yeah, but I just never. Glory holes seemed like such a fundamentally, like, public thing to me. Yeah, that's really interesting. Kayla: They've been around since, like, the 17 hundreds at the latest. Like, they've been around for a long time.

4:21 Chris: That makes sense. I wouldn't be surprised if it was longer. Kayla: Yeah. Chris: So anyway, for everyone that's back with us, now that we're done talking about porn. No, man, we're leaving that in here. And. Hold up. Kayla: I was just trying to say I do think that things like spitting in people's mouths is gonna be. Chris: It's going to be sexualized, probably, but, like, everything is. I don't know. I just. Kayla: That's already sexualized. But that's. Chris: If your argument is. If your argument is just, like, some sort of dominance oriented inappropriate, I'm gonna infect you with COVID then I agree with you specifically. Spitting in somebody's mouth. I don't know. Kayla: You know that's a thing already, right?

5:02 Chris: No. Kayla: Yes. I didn't know that's already a thing. Chris: Okay. All right. You're probably right. You know way more than porn about it. Kayla: I know more than porn. I don't know much more than porn. Chris: You know basically way more about porn than I do. Kayla: That's basically my only area of expertise. No. Spitting into your partner's mouth is already a not super uncommon sex act. Chris: I didn't know that. Kayla: Cause it's. It's. It has that, like, dominance aspect and that, like, hardcore intimacy aspect, and it's, like, gross. But if you're doing it in a sexual context, that makes it hot. It's a thing already, right? Chris: Interesting. Kayla: Yeah. Chris: All right, now that we're. We're done with the porn talk, or.

5:42 Kayla: I could keep going forever, should we. Chris: Just do another podcast where we talk about porn or you talk about porn, and I go, oh, I didn't know that. Kayla: Do you have any idea how much I would be into that? Chris: All right, well, when we expand our podcast empire and we do our own little version of, like, radiotopia, then our next podcast will be about the history. Kayla: Sex, and vagaries of. Chris: Yeah. All right, that sounds good. Okay, cool. So, now that we've driven away part of our listener. Oh, was there anything else you wanted to talk about? I feel like there was something you said we needed to say on the show. Kayla: Two things. First, if you listened to our previous episode about the voluntary human extinction movement and you wanted more on the topic, be sure to head over to our Patreon, where we had an in depth discussion.

6:27 Chris: Oh, yeah. Kayla: With our composer. Chris: The way we said we would. Kayla: The way we said we would. We actually did it. It is published on Patreon as bonus content. We had an in depth conversation about a different way to be under the antinatalist umbrella with our composer. Go over there and check it out. Chris: Yeah. The episode was more about the movement and ecology, whereas this discussion was more about, like, the individual ethics and morality. Kayla: Like, the natalism versus antinatalism, like, the existential ethics. Chris: It was super dorky. Try hard, because that's who we are as people. Kayla: The second thing I wanted to talk about was to tell all of our listeners that we just watched. And really great documentary last night called feels good, man. Yes.

7:09 Chris: Actually, I bring that up in the episode. Kayla: Oh. So should you want me to say it? Chris: No, go ahead. Kayla: That was the only other business I had. Chris: Yeah, it was. Oh, there was a third business. I just remembered what it was. So. Feels good, man was a documentary about the Pepe meme. Pepe meme. Which I don't really want to get into it because that's, like, there's a whole documentary about it. So I don't want to spend an hour and a half talking about it. Kayla: And it's so good, but it's a. Chris: Cartoon that some guy drew and got co opted by the alt right Nazis on the Internet. And then he. It's a story of that happening and then him fighting back against that. And then the third thing was. Kayla: And it does coincide with, like, cult like behaviors and groups, so it's not totally out of the realm of us to talk about it, but it was also just really good. Chris: Well, I mean, we talk about a lot of stuff that we don't really. We shouldn't be like Jurassic park and Star Trek and all that shit.

7:53 Kayla: Porn. Chris: Pornhood. Yeah. Glory holes. So. So, yeah, it was really interesting. And then the third thing was two episodes, so. Last episode was the voluntary human extinction movement. Two episodes ago, we talked about the Gaia streaming service, and I forgot to mention. I forgot to put this into the episode. But one of the. And I actually haven't seen this ad for a long time now, but one of the ads that was getting thrown at me was, like, this special interview session thing with David Icke, who is. Kayla: Like, do we have time? Chris: He's like the OG. He's like the OG conspiracy theorist. Like, he was around during the, like, geocities Internet, and he's. He's basically like a less angry version of Alex Jones. He's.

8:37 Kayla: He's got all the conspiracy to fame. Like, I think the thing that he is probably the best known for is the Reptilian. Chris: Yeah. Kayla: Conspiracy theory that there are reptilians that have emerged from the center of the earth. We're playing human. Chris: They live in the hollow earth. Kayla: They live in the hollow earth. They come out onto the people land, and they disguise themselves as people, and. Chris: They secretly rule, control us, blah, blah, qanon. Anyway, I just wanted to bring that up as well. So all of that out of the way, are you ready to talk about the actual episode finally? Kayla: Yes. Chris: Okay, great. Kayla: Oh, this is culture. Just weird. Chris: Oh, do we have to say that still? Yeah. Kayla: I'm Kayla. Chris: I'm Chris. Kayla: Go. Chris: Okay, I gotta tell you right up front here, Kayla, today's topic.

9:20 Kayla: I don't like the look on your face. Chris: OMG. Today's topic is easily the most controversial one we've done on the show. Kayla: Okay. This season or ever. Chris: Ever on the show and probably ever will do. Kayla: More controversial than a different league creativity movie. Chris: Well, that's not controversial. That's just bad. Kayla: So you mean, like both sides? Y. Like most both sides. Chris: There's just a lot of controversy surrounding this topic. Okay. I would say this is even more of a minefield than the stuff we have coming down the pipe next few episodes. Kayla: What? Chris: Oh, yeah. Kayla: I don't want. I'm tired. Chris: We're gonna lose probably half our listeners or more. Okay, we might get some hate mail and death threats, like the whole nine yards. Kayla: I'm looking forward to those. I'm a woman on the Internet. I've been there.

10:02 Chris: I apologize in advance. I'm very sorry. But, hey, yolo, right? Kayla: You only live once, which can go both ways. You ought to look out. Chris: And ps, if that's not enough to wet your whistle, then how about this? I have a proposal for a new criterion, maybe to be added to the official cojw. Is it a cult criteria list? I know. WTF? Right? Okay, but before I reveal today's topic. Kayla: No, just tell us what it is. Chris: It's time for the ritual listing of the sources. My sources for this episode's research included exempli Gracia. What? Oh, eg. Sorry. For example, several independent blogs and websites, such as one called olsenhome.com, also read a blog, like a personal page blog for a researcher at the Universite de Montreal and another website whose? Earl. Or I guess the URL, if you prefer.

11:00 Kayla: What? Wait, what? Did you just say Earl? Chris: Yeah, some people say earl. Kayla: Did you just say Earl? Chris: Yeah. Okay, fine. URL. Kayla: Oh, my God. Chris: I can't say right now because it would spoil the topic that I'm about to say in two minutes anyway. Newsweek, the Atlantic, Gizmodo, Stack exchange, Reddit, Wikipedia, obviously, NY Daily News, kin, or CNN, as some people pronounce it. Kayla: I'm sorry. No, I know what you're talking about. I don't want to talk about it anymore. Chris: Pakistan Today, Smithsonian magazine, mentalfloss.com, comma, medium.com, and last but not least, both Webster's and Oxford English dictionaries. All right, so are you ready for me to teach the controversy? Because it is Fubar I'm not doing. So here's my obligatory question to you, Kayla, to start the show.

11:56 Kayla: No, I'm not doing this. I'm. Chris: Don't worry. Kayla: Leaving. Please. Let me get up. Chris: This is an easy one. I just want. All you have to do is take a look at my screen here and tell me the correct way to pronounce this. How do you pronounce that? Kayla: Guife. So, okay. When I am with you, when I am with people I am comfortable with, when I am safely at home, and I know I will not be ridiculed or yelled at, I will say gif if I amongst strangers, if I amongst haters and judges, if I amongst people that I know are going to give me a hard fucking time. That is gif. And I have had to train myself to do this gif because of the society that we live in.

12:48 Chris: Yeah. So I'll say a little bit about that in a second. You will also say it on the podcast, because part of I've been wanting to do this for a little while, but the thing that triggered me to remember, like, oh, I'm gonna do it next episode was you said the word as Gif last episode in the, by the way, acronym vehement episode. Kayla: Oh, did we yell at each other about that culture just here? Chris: No, no. You just. You kind of just said it as, like, in conversation. You said, anyway, take a look at this gif of blah, blah. And in my head, I was like, oh, my God, is she saying jiff on the podcast? Kayla: I don't remember that. Chris: We're just gonna lose our listeners right now. Kayla: Well, that just means I feel so comfortable with our listeners. Chris: Oh, that's true. And I guess, like, everyone that hasn't already hung up the phone at this point, you're probably all people that pronounce Jif after listening to our rant right there. Right.

13:34 Kayla: Here's the thing. Can I just say one thing? Can I say one thing before we do? Chris: You can, but, I mean, it's probably stuff that we're going to talk about. Kayla: I just want to make it clear upfront that I do not care what version of the word a person uses. Chris: We will get to that. Kayla: I do not care. Chris: We will. Kayla: It is important for me to say that right up there. Chris: Absolutely. That's a big part of the discussion today. So anyway, now you see what I mean by controversial, right? Because today, listeners, friends, soon to be enemies on Kajua or maybe kojou or maybe just cojw. We are talking about the eternal holy war between giffers and giffers, those who pronounce the file format spelled g I f as gif in a mighty struggle against those who pronounce it as GiF. Before we get into it, though, I want to baseline explain what the hell we're talking about. For those listeners that haven't been to the Internet, here's how Wikipedia sums it up.

14:34 Kayla: I'm so upset right now. Chris: The graphics interchange format is a bitmap image format. So it's just an image format. That was developed by a team at the online services provider CompuServe, led by the american computer scientist Steve Wilhite on June 15, 1987. It has since come into widespread usage on the world wide web due to its wide support and portability between applications and operating systems. Kayla: Cool. Chris: So that's a good primer on the very basic question of what is it? It's a file format used for sharing images, developed by CompuServe all the way back in 87. It has a bit of an interesting history, which I'll only spend like a few sentences on here and like actual cursory, not like Kayla cursory, where you spend half the podcast on, since the software development history isn't what's in question here, but basically the GiF. And yes, I'll be pronouncing it GIF for mostly the rest of the show, except for when I'm specifically referencing GiF. So if you're a hardcore giffer, then like, sorry, not sorry, but it's been nice having you as a listener.

15:35 Chris: Anyway, the GIF has this particular way of encoding and storing information that allows images to basically be like really tiny in terms of like their size, and very portable, as Wikipedia mentioned. And of course this is the key. It allows it to animate. Kayla: It's a little picture that moves and then it loops around, right? Chris: It's like a tiny looping animation. According to Smithsonian magazine quote, in the late nineties, GIF images were largely phased out, especially since other file formats now did a better job when it came to static pictures. But nobody else could fill that one niche that GIF had cornered animated images. And so even as the Internet evolved beyond early HTML, scrappy old GiF clung on for dear life. Like most digital media, it fills a need, but it also kind of created the need, says Kevin Zeng, who a PhD researcher at the MIT Media lab. We all know how unwieldy texting can be and how much context can be lost, especially emotional context. Once you make it visual, you have a higher bandwidth to convey nuance, end quote. So that's where the GiF comes in, right? That's essentially where we are today with it.

16:45 Chris: Gifs are pretty ubiquitous. They're simple looping and sometimes still images. Images used to communicate some really nuanced statements coupled with emotions and other subtle information across Twitter, Facebook, SMS texts, slack chat, the list goes on. Basically any platform for communication that you can name. And again, ubiquitous because of that context, right? Like they get across, meaning that words just alone don't get. And since gifs have become such a ubiquitous part of everyone's everyday lives, that means we are constantly being put in the position of having to use the word in conversation. And back before 2020, oftentimes that conversation was in person and verbal. I know you probably don't remember in.

17:32 Kayla: Person and verbal, what does that mean? Chris: Yeah, I know. So you need to know how to pronounce it correctly, right? Kayla: I mean, is there a correctly? Why does there have to be a correctly? Chris: Well, here's the thing about the english language. Sometimes there's, like, just a tiny little bit of ambiguity. Kayla: There's a whole fucking song about it. You say tomato, I say tomato. Go fuck yourself. Chris: That's right. That's how it goes. Kayla: Like, that's how it goes. Chris: And I'm not picking on English either, as sort of a feature of spoken human languages. But, you know, the whole, like, actually the. You say, so that. That's your example. You say tomato. Tomato. Example. I say I before e. Example. You know, I before e, except after. Kayla: C. Sounds like an a is a neighbor and way.

18:14 Chris: Oh, I have neighbor and sleigh. Or what about weird? Because that's e before I. It doesn't follow a c or sound like an a. Kayla: No. Chris: What about forfeit? Kayla: English is stupid. Chris: Actually, Merriam Webster even makes this statement about it. The I before e, except after c rule, is highly inconsistent in the english language and should not be considered a solid rule. One question we get asked a lot is why so many english words don't follow the I before e rule. Well, the english language can be inconsistent. This is what makes English such a vibrant and expressive language, but it can also make it a nightmare to learn, end quote. Kayla: I've heard. So I appreciate that I'm calling English a vibrant and expressive language because I've also heard that, like, basically kind of some of that exact reasoning to describe it as, like, dead and soulless. The fact that it, like. Because part of the reason why it is so inconsistent is because we've taken English takes from so many other languages.

19:06 Chris: Right. Kayla: So that, like, the argument is that it's, like, it's just totally a colonial language. So it's, like, dead and doesn't have any of its own soul. I think I see both sides. Yeah, it's interesting that both seem true. Chris: Right, right. There's a lot of words that come from, like, a vast variety of different histories. Right. There's, like, latin words, there's germanic words. There's, you know, there's a lot of different French. Well, French is. French is latinized. Kayla: I'm just saying we take a lot of words from French. Chris: Right? Yes, I guess. Yeah. So that's the thing. It's not only is it latin words, it's, like, latin words. Via France, Spain, Romania, there's greek words. Right. God, damn romance chick flicks. Anyway, so they say it can be a nightmare to learn. I would add to this sometimes a nightmare to expand as well, such as when a new word or acronym gets added to it in the Internet age, such as GIF. So how to know how to pronounce it correctly. We'll get to that.

20:06 Kayla: There is no correctly. Chris: Before we do, though, before we do, I want to briefly mention why we're talking about pronunciations and acronyms on a show, ostensibly about cults or at least weirds. And I think that you kind of already hit on this a little bit. But here's the thing about the GiF. GIF pronunciation debate. People get fucking passionate about this. Kayla: Yeah. And it's like. It's. Honestly, it gets really confrontational and aggressive. And I don't get it. I'm just like, leave me alone. Chris: They get dogmatic, which we will see further in the episode. And I also have had personal experience with this. So, like, I've definitely had that thing where, like, I'll just sort of casually say it in conversation as if I. Kayla: What did he yell at?

20:46 Chris: Yeah. And then somebody would say, wait, a. What? What did you just say? Kayla: Like a gif? Chris: Did you just say gif like an idiot? Kayla: Exactly what I did to you with Earl. Chris: Yeah. Kayla: Except I literally. I was confused. I wasn't, like, saying, you're an idiot, but that. I've gotten that from people who pronounce the word differently for me. And, like, you legit get yelled at and, like, made to feel stupid and dumb. And it's like, I'm just here. Chris: Yeah. And that's happened to me, like, multiple times. Kayla: Yeah. I just want to live my life. Can I live. Chris: I'm sure, caveat. Cause on this show, we wanna make sure that we're looking at all sides. I'm sure there are just as dogmatic giffers out there as there are the giffers that you and I have experienced. Kayla: Well, I've had this exact conversation with people. Like, I'm friends with some giffers, and I will say giffers became really dogmatic and yell at me, and they will say the exact same thing about giffers.

21:33 Chris: Right. So I'm sure that it happens on both sides. Kayla: You know what it is. Chris: And I'm sure that none of our listeners are as dogmatic as the people that I just mentioned. I'm sure all you guys are cool about it. Like, we are. What is it? Kayla: You remember the star bellied sneeches. What do you remember? The star bellied sneeches what are you talking about? The doctor Seuss book about the star bellied sneeches. Chris: I don't think I read that one. Kayla: Some of the sneeches had star bellies and some of the sneeches didn't. And there was this whole thing about what was better, and ultimately, it was like, they're just different. Chris: Mmm. Kayla: And they would fight and stuff. Chris: And what's bad is the fighting, not whether you have a star or not. Yeah, I agree with you, Kayla, and maybe that's the case we're gonna end up presenting here. But as to why we're talking about this on the show, it's those experiences, largely, that inspired me to think of this as a topic for culture. Just weird, because when you get into that level of dogma, you're just kind of like, dude, what the hell? I'm gonna talk about this on my podcast.

22:26 Kayla: Like, dude, what the hell? Why do you care so much? That's what I wanted to know. It's like, why do you care? Chris: Yeah. For you giffers out there, I realize that you are probably dealing with the exact same thing. We each. I encounter people in our lives that have a certain amount of dogma for a particular side that they're on. Kayla: Those jiffers do not represent me. Chris: They don't represent me either. But I'm sure the giffers would say the people that we've encountered don't represent them. Kayla: That's true. Chris: Right. Anyway, as you and I tend to do once something becomes a topic for the show, I wanted to dig deep and see if I could find any definitive answers to the question. And by the question today, I both mean, are jiffers and or giffers a cult? And also, damn it, which side is correct?

23:07 Kayla: I don't care about that part. Chris: Come on, Kaylee. You know you care a little bit. Kayla: No. Chris: The devil on your shoulder wants to know. Kayla: No. Correct. Chris: So I learned a lot about acronyms in my research for this episode, and I want to start with that before getting into the specific arguments offered forth by the GifR cult. And the gifr cult. First of all, do you think you need, like, a definition of what an acronym is? Kayla: Do I? Yeah, maybe. I think it's just when you make a word out of some letters from a bunch of words. Chris: Yeah, I mean, that's basically it, but. Oh, my friend, if you thought you knew what an acronym was and it was simple, you are quite mistaken.

23:47 Kayla: Nothing is simple. It's. Everything's the coastline. Chris: But let's start with the literal definition. Though. What is an acronym? Here's what OED says. Oh, sorry. That's Oxford English dictionary. The first definition is a group of initial letters used as an abbreviation for a name or expression, each letter or part being pronounced separately initialism. Second definition. Kayla: So, wait, so that means, like ATM, correct. Chris: Okay, exactly. Yeah. Second, a word formed from the initial letters of other words, or occasionally from the initial parts or syllables taken from those words. The whole being pronounced as a single word itself. Kayla: So, like scuba. Chris: So like scuba. Or NATO. So I don't know if you caught that synonym in the first definition at the end of it, and they said initialism. But let's talk about acronyms versus initialisms. What constitutes an acronym versus initialism is its own little bucket of controversy worms to untangle. So we won't go there, but I think the best way I can summarize is this. An initialism is a type of an acronym where you pronounce the letters individually, as you said, like ATM or USA.

24:52 Kayla: Okay. Chris: Right. As opposed to a non initialism acronym like NASA or SCubA, according to the heavily referenced Wikipedia article. Actually, it wouldn't be heavily referenced. The Wikipedia article had a bunch of references that it referenced on the subject. There is criticism of the use of the word acronym when referring to what is technically an initialism. But the original meaning of the word acronym did include initialisms. So it's technically correct to say, like, ATM is an acronym, even though it's, like, a specific type of acronym. Initialism. Kayla: See, I think. Chris: But some people might yell at you. Kayla: In my head, I would pretty much only think of acronyms being things that spell a word. Yeah, I know that. But if you're gonna say think of some acronyms I'm thinking of, you wouldn't think of scuba gif.

25:37 Chris: Well, now you would say base. Right? Now you would say initialism if you wanted to say it. If you wanted to be really clear, say initialism when you're talking about USA. Atmdez, whatever. Because. Kayla: Yeah, we don't say USA. We don't say Adam. Chris: Right. Anyway, we are just getting started. Want to hear a different way to break down acronyms into various types and classifications? Kayla: Yes. Chris: Well, I thought you were going to say no. Oh, so my script says too bad. Kayla: Oh, well, yes. Sorry. Chris: All right, let's go through the types. Kayla: Oh, God, there's too many. I don't want to know as many. Chris: Oh, there's a lot. So the first type is the one we already talked about pronounced as a word containing only initial letters. So that's like scuba. Laser gif. Then there's a type that, well, actually, let me skip down a little bit here in the way they organize it, because the second type would be pronounced only as a string of letters. So VHF. USA. BBC. Right. And that's an initialism. Then there's a type that is pronounced as a word containing a mixture of initial and non initial letters. So that's something like Gestapo, which I can't really pronounce the german words there.

26:48 Kayla: No, I can. What is it? Chris: Ghaim. Stassipolise. Kayla: That sounds good. Chris: So it's like the ge from Giheim and Stapo from Staspolise. Kayla: Right. Chris: I know we have, like, people listening to us from Germany, and I'm really. Kayla: Sorry, just say Cointelpro. Chris: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Or radar, which is radio detection and ranging. Then there's the kind that is pronounced as a combination of spelling out and a word. So like CD ROM. Right. So you say the letters CD, but then you say Rom is a word. Kayla: It's not good. Rom. Chris: Then there's pronounced as a string of letters but with a shortcut. So like aaa.

27:31 Kayla: Oh, shit. Chris: Nobody, except for my grandmother says a. Kayla: A Grammy says aaa. Chris: She says aaa. So it's really cute. Yeah. Or like NAACP. Right. Which is weird because, like, NAACP is actually fewer syllables, but it's harder to say. I know, it's weird. Right? NAACP, it just sounds more. It just flows better as double a. I don't know why. So then there's one where they actually incorporate. There's a type where they actually incorporate the shortcut into the name. So the company three M was originally actually three M's, and then they just shortened it to the number three and. Kayla: The letter M. What's three m?

28:11 Chris: Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing company. And yes, that's the company that makes your post it notes. Kayla: What? Yeah, three m. I've never looked at the post it note package, apparently. Chris: Okay, well, that's them. Or like, if you've heard of e three, the electronic entertainment expo. It's abbreviated as e. It doesn't. It's nothing. Kayla: Eee. Chris: It's e. And then the number three. Then we start getting into the really cool ones. These are some of my favorites. So the multi layered acronyms, my favorite of which, actually, none of these are really things I think people would know, except for my favorite, which is aim. Aim stands for AOL instant messenger. Kayla: Oh, shit. Chris: Where AOL stands for America online.

28:52 Kayla: Oh, my God. That's so good. Chris: Yeah. Then there's recursive acronyms. Kayla: Ooh, what's that. Chris: So the only one I could find here that maybe people would know. There's a software thing called GNU. Like GNU. And it stands for GNU's not Unix. Kayla: We talked about that maybe a little tiny bit in the cicada episode. Chris: Oh, did we? Maybe about. Kayla: I think we had a conversation. Chris: Is it pronounced GNU or new? Holy shit. Kayla: It was like, is it GNU or new? We had that conversation in Cicada. Chris: Well, my favorite example here is for anybody that happens to listen to the show that also watches Steven universe. There's a toy in the Steven universe called guys, and it stands for guys under your supervision. And I just giggle every single time.

29:43 Kayla: I think about that. Chris: So that's one of my favorites. Kayla: Can I ask you a question? Chris: Yes. Kayla: Where does vehement fall in this? Have you, did you. Chris: I thought about that. I think vehement is to Gestapo. No, because. Gestapo. Kayla: Because they don't. They take the. Chris: Yeah, they take the m and the t from movement. And also the t's at the end. I don't know. Yeah, I think it's more like Gestapo or radar. I don't know. Kayla: Yeah, that's what we'll classify it as. Chris: And we are the final word. Then there's pseudo acronyms, which aren't really acronyms. They're actually what's called grammar grams, grammagrams, which is an adorable name, but a.

30:23 Kayla: Grammar gram is got my grandma bat grams. Chris: So that's something like Iou, right? So IOU is the letters IOU, but it represents each. The sound of each letter actually represents. Kayla: IoU, the whole word, right. Chris: Or canine. The letter K, the number nine for a canine unit is the word canine. And there's a lot of grammar grams that go around. For example, internet speak, involves grammar grams frequently. So the letters c u. Like c u later. Right. And those are technically not acronyms anyway. That's probably like way too much information since I guess I could have just said like, well, Jif is one of those types, like NASA, where you pronounce it as a word.

31:12 Kayla: I. Chris: But I don't know, I thought all of those different types of acronyms to me anyway, are fascinating. There's a few I left out too. But let's move on to the history of acronyms. Kayla: Okay? Why is there a history? Chris: There's a history of everything. And I like history, so we're gonna talk about the history. God damn it. Kayla: I'm just saying why is there a history? Chris: Why? I don't know. Because humans existed in the past. Kayla: But, like, why is there a history. Chris: It's just words, Kayla, just a minute ago, were talking about words that come from Latin and whatnot. Kayla: Boring. Chris: You're boring. How long, Kayla? Do you think acronyms have been around. Kayla: Since as long as recorded language?

31:53 Chris: I don't think that there's solid evidence for that, but I think it's probably true. But what we do know is that, at least in English, from what I could gather, they haven't been around too long. It's only really been in the last hundred years or so that we've even had a word for acronym. So prior to that, there were acronyms, but they really gained in popularity in the 20th century thanks to things like corporate America, the rise of specialized fields with their own jargon, and especially the military. Kayla: And because we just gotta go faster, right? Gotta go fast. Chris: And that's why a lot of older supposed acronyms actually aren't. And that's not to say there weren't acronyms before this. It's just they really saw a rise in usage in the 20th century. So, for example, so's doesn't actually mean save our ship.

32:41 Kayla: That meant save our souls. Chris: So there's two things that people usually attribute it to. Save our ship or save our souls. It didn't actually originally mean that. So the original so's signal was chosen specifically because of how easy it was to distinguish three dots followed by three dashes followed by three dots in war scale. Kayla: Beep, beep, beep. Chris: Right. Kayla: That's what it sounds like. Chris: Right, exactly. And that was. Kayla: Be proud of that. Chris: Of all of the combinations of letters they could come up with to be, like, the most distinctive, that was it. So they chose that for, like, the emergency code. Kayla: Do you want to know how I know the so's code? Chris: I don't know. Doesn't everybody? Kayla: It's a little recursive. There's a specific reason why I know it.

33:23 Chris: Okay. Kayla: Because it is a plot point in the classic David Fincher film panic room, in which the main characters don't remember their names, but it is Jodie Foster and Kristen Stewart. Chris: Kristen Stewart's in that. Kayla: Kristen Stewart's the daughter. Chris: Oh, my God. Kayla: Yeah. And she is like, let's shine this little flashlight out the hole, and we'll see if somebody will find it. Chris: Was it a glory hole? Kayla: It was a glory hole in the panic room. And the reason she knew what the so's code was. It's from a little. Chris: Cause she was a sailor. Kayla: It's from a little film, just a little indie feature by Mister James Cameron titled Titanic.

34:03 Chris: Yeah. Kayla: I saw panic room before I saw Titanic. Chris: Wow. Kayla: Yeah. Chris: You're. You're avant garde film watcher over here. Kayla: I so am. Chris: Yeah. Kayla: Yeah. David Fincher's so avant garde. Chris: So claiming that save our ship, save our souls is a expansion of so's is an example of what's called false or folk etymology, and it's a special case. The folk etymology thing is a special case of what's called a backronym. Kayla: Bacchronym. It's almost as good as grammagram, but not. Chris: I love bacronym. See, I told you there were more types. Right? So a backronym is when the word comes first and then an acronym is made up for it. So oftentimes this is intentional or, like, humorous or something, but sometimes it comes up in the form of folk etymology, like so's.

34:47 Kayla: Right. Chris: Another example would be like adidas, the athletic, where brand name Adidas is named after the company founder, Adolph Adi Dassler, but it's falsely believed by some to be an acronym for all day I dream about sport. Kayla: What? Ew. Who thinks that's a dumb thing to think? Chris: Sorry, Adidas fans. Kayla: Ew. All day I dream about sport. Chris: Yeah, I know. That's pretty cool. Kayla: Okay, like, what's wrong with you? Chris: Any Adidas fans out there that think that? I apologize. Kayla: Sorry. Chris: Unless you're also a Gifford today. This is a judgy topic, Kayla. It's impossible to get around. Kayla: All day I dream about sport.

35:29 Chris: Then, of course, who could forget that one kid in middle school who told me that fuck expanded to for use of carnal knowledge? Kayla: Bitch. No, it is fornicate under consent of the king. Chris: Yeah, that's the bigger one. Yeah. And actually, there's, like, a whole cottage industry around the different, like, folk etymology. Backronyms for fuck, as you might imagine. Kayla: Yeah, I was really disillusioned when I learned that was all fake. Chris: I know, I know. But outside of English, acronyms actually go back pretty damn far in history. For example, the latin words Romans used to refer to their own empire were acronyms to SPQR. Kayla: I've seen that. Chris: Yeah. You have a book with that on it. Yeah, it's still used on. I have a book that's called SPQR, and you can still see SPQR on manhole covers in Rome today. And it stands for Senatus Populusqua Romanus.

36:18 Kayla: That sounded very confident. Chris: Most certainly mispronounced that. But anyway, that's exactly how we would say USA Today as an acronym for United States of America. The other thing that, oh, I actually didn't have this in my script, but I want to mention it. You will also see things get acronymized, turned into acronyms in the ancient times, unlike coins. So what you find is actually things end up getting acronyms made for them when they appear a lot on methods of communication that have little space. So things like Twitter, texting, whatever, drive the creation of acronyms. Coins drive the creation of acronyms.

36:59 Kayla: Do you talk at all about pamphlets, newspapers, the hyper specific usage of acronyms in certain subreddits? No, because that's an interesting thing. And like, this happens in, like, a lot of different forums. Chris: I don't really talk about the jargon bit, but there's a whole bit. Kayla: I just want to say this, then this happens a lot in specific forums, specifically like mommy forums. But if you go on Reddit forums like, am I the asshole or just no mother in law or just no significant other, the things that get acronymized on there, it's like, so hyper specific that it's like it's almost difficult to read some of the posts.

37:40 Chris: Yeah, it's very jargonistic because it's just. Kayla: Like last week, DH and I took so to the lo and went to the. And you're just like, oh, my God, what is. Chris: What are you talking about? Yeah, so staying in antiquity, what does it mean when you see a little fish in the back of someone's car? Kayla: Henry? What? Chris: Doesn't it close? Kayla: It doesn't. Chris: No, it doesn't. Kayla: Wait, I'm sorry, what? Chris: Hold on. The inry bit. Kayla: What? Chris: You're close. Because you can thank greek speaking early Christians for that. And a lot of early Christians in Rome were greek speaking. The first letters in the greek words meaning Jesus Christ, God's son savior acronym out to spell fish in Greek.

38:24 Kayla: I thought that's what inry was. No, I'm sorry. Chris: Speaking of Jesus, Catholics and other christian crucifix enthusiasts might recognize the letters in ri Inry displayed above the crucified Jesus, which is an acronym that roughly translates in Latin to Jesus the Nazarene king of the Jews. Kayla: I thought that Inry and the fish were the same thing. Chris: They are not. Kayla: This is just like when I found out about glory holes. Chris: That being said, jesus Christ, God's son savior, and Jesus the Nazarene king of the Jews. I mean, like, it still has his name there. Kayla: Freaking titles. Does there need to be? Chris: Well, so Jesus Christ, God's son savior is more of something that Christians would use because it's like, yay, Jesus is awesome.

39:07 Kayla: Gotcha. Chris: Whereas Inry is. Was like a. Essentially like a slur that the Romans were putting on his. Yeah, it was. It was like a sarcasm almost. It was like, look at this guy that said he was king of the Jews, and now he's dead. Like, that's what Henry is. Kayla: I think they shouldn't have been so meand. Chris: They were pretty mean to him. Kayla: He was, like, cool. Chris: Yeah, he was. He probably, like, toked and everything. Kayla: Well, he definitely did. But also, I'm just like, he was a nice guy. Leave him alone. Chris: Yeah. And, oh, speaking of Jews, there is a popular, although to my knowledge, historically unsubstantiated claim that the yiddish letters on the Dreidel are an acronym standing for a great miracle happened there. Any judaic scholars listening, please correct me if I'm wrong here on that being conjecture versus fact. But I thought that was interesting.

39:52 Kayla: It is interesting. Chris: Again, history of acronyms may not help us too much to settle the GiF versus GiF argument, but, hey, you never know. We like to be thorough here on Cojw. Kayla: Well, and if all else fails, the next time you start, you're getting yelled at by the opposite speaking person. Just start throwing history of. Chris: Yeah, yeah. Just be like, do you know what the letters on the Dreidel mean until. Kayla: They leave you alone. Chris: Yeah, exactly. Before we move on to that, to the various weapons each side of this pronunciation war deploy against each other, I want to mention two more things that I found in my research that I really loved. First is the concept of the anachronym, which basically means an acronym that people have started to forget is actually an acronym.

40:37 Kayla: Oh, yes. Chris: So examples of this are things like Scuba, which is an acronym for self contained underwater breathing apparatus, or laser light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation or even radar. Radio detection and ranging. Right. Like, those get used as words so much now that we sort of have just kind of, like, forgotten that they were ever acronyms. Kayla: It's similar to the usage of, like, the replacing of a word with, like, a brand name. Yeah, it's like kleenex. Chris: Yeah, exactly. And so those are called anachronyms. And by the way, don't confuse an acronym spelled with a c and an acronym spelled with a ch, because those are completely different. Kayla: That's too much for me.

41:18 Chris: And an acronym with a c h. So that's like a n a c h r o n y M has nothing to do with acronyms. Rather, it refers to words that are used in anachronistic way, such as calling aluminum foil, tin foil, which used to contain tin, but now doesn't it? Or saying dialing a telephone number, although rotary phones are now functionally extinct. Or golf clubs being called woods and irons, even though clubs are now made from, like, crazy carbon composites or whatever, instead of wood and iron. Kayla: Is dialing a phone number? Chris: No, dialing is like, a dial. Refers to, like, a rotary thing. Kayla: I just thought it was. You were dialing just by poking around.

41:58 Chris: I know that's how much of an acronym is. Kayla: I used to. My grandma used to have one of these phones. I used to know how to use it and I didn't know. Chris: Remember like, how tvs used to say, don't touch that dial? It's because they were like, a rotary thing. A dial is like a round thing. Kayla: Well, this is dialing the phone exactly. Poking the numbers. Chris: Exactly. And there's other examples, like, chalk isn't actually made of chalk anymore. And pencil lead isn't made of lead, so on and so forth. Kayla: But those aren't acronyms. Chris: Those are unacronyms with a ch. Kayla: Okay. Someone should change that. Chris: Anyway, if you're still with me, that's good. Because my last but not least is my favorite acronym thing that I learned while doing this research.

42:38 Kayla: And it's not guys under your supervision, which is called. Chris: No, it was that. It's maybe tied with that. It's called RAS syndrome. The RAS and RAS syndrome stands for redundant acronym syndrome. Kayla: Oh, yeah, that's the best. Chris: Which replies. Kayla: ATM machine. Chris: Yeah, exactly. When people use redundant words when using acronyms. Like ATM machine, which expands out to automated teller machine. Kayla: I like it. Chris: LCD display, liquid crystal display. Or one that I come across in my work a lot. Key KPI's, which are key performance indicators. And the reason, of course, that's my favorite is because the term RAS syndrome is self referential, which. Oh, yeah, that's enough to get me. That's how you win me over.

43:22 Kayla: I think the reason why I like that one a lot is because growing up and being a little shithead, like. Chris: Being like, you're a shithead now I'm. Kayla: Less of a shithead, but just, like, thinking in my head, like, you shouldn't think you can, like, shut the fuck up. Stupid little Kayla. Now, I have, like, gone on a journey from, like, going to now. I think it's cute and sweet and it makes fucking sense. And also, like, it's that ship of theseus thing. ATM at this point, doesn't necessarily stand for ATM machine. Like automated teller machine. It stands. Chris: How was that shape of theses? Kayla: Because it's like, I just. I can't. It made sense in my head. I'm saying the word started as an acronym for automated teller machine, and now it's something else. It just means ATM. Like ATM is just the name of it. We're not thinking automated teller machine. So you say ATM machine. The ATM is the name of the thing, but you're saying it's the ATM machine.

44:15 Chris: Okay, but kayla, what if we're like. I don't like saying ATM machine. Let's turn it an acronym. Let's call it ATMM. Kayla: That's cute. I. Chris: And then people start calling them ATMms and then ATM machine. We need to call it an ATMm machine. In a thousand years, we're going to have ATM machines. Kayla: That's fine. Chris: It's terrible. Kayla: I don't think that would happen. Chris: That's the future that you want? Kayla: No, I want the future where everyone stops having babies. Chris: That's last episode. All right. Do you feel like you know everything you ever wanted to know about acronyms and then some? Kayla: No, I actually want. I want. I'm going to Wikipedia this later. Chris: Yeah, well, it's really cool. There is more. Obviously, I'm not just, like, reading Wikipedia verbatim, at least. Kayla: I just want to go look up a bunch of things that I didn't know were acronyms.

44:56 Chris: Yeah, yeah, there's. There's. I had a section for that, but I cut it for time. There's things like. Yeah, we said, like base jumping. Yeah, things like that. Anyway, good, because that means we've set the stage now to start the fighting. All right, so first things first. Why don't we just settle this right here and ask the dictionary? Kayla: What dictionary? Chris: Well, I did that, and sadly, that's far from definitive. Both Webster's and OED, which. That's Oxford English Dictionary. Remember, list both pronunciations as being correct, and various other less well known dictionaries are either split on the matter or also list both. Kayla: And I'll also say this about dictionaries.

45:37 Chris: They're a tool of oppression. Kayla: They are a tool of oppression. Chris: Yeah. Well, be that as it may, the dictionaries cant help us decide. So what hope do we have? Lets find out. As mentioned earlier in the show, the reason where were at? Where were at with the whole GiF versus Gif Armageddon is because its a new part of the english lexicon, relatively speaking, and it happens to occupy this weird space where there isnt really like a solid rule to guide us, but there are a lot of words to guide us and the pronunciation of all of these said words is extremely far from definitive. Oh, what's that? I hear all the giffers saying there is a rule. Well, that brings me to argument number one.

46:21 Kayla: I'm sorry, I'm just, I'm having a hard time because I'm just thinking about all of the ways in which giffers are wrong. Chris: We're gonna come across as way too biased on this episode. Kayla: Yeah, I'm trying. Chris: Just remember, there are dogmatic jiffers out there that have annoyed giffer that non dogmatic gifrs the same way that we have. Kayla: What does CD ROM stand for? Chris: CD read only memory. Kayla: What is cd stand for? Chris: Compact disc. Kayla: Oh. So shouldn't it be key drom sorry. Chris: Anyway, so hardcore giffers will say there is a rule. Argument number one, the most ubiquitous argument you hear when you get into this debate, and that's the assertion by the giffer side that it's obvious that it should be pronounced GiF because the word G stands for graphical, which is a hard g sound. You don't say draphics interchange format, do you? Checkmate jiffers. Conveniently for the fact that I chose this as the first argument to present. It also happens to be the easiest to dismiss to the point where when I was doing my research for this topic, it kind of made me wonder what sort of, like, I don't know, motivated reasoning the Gift camp must be deploying to not be able to think of counterexamples to this supposed rule. Which, in case it wasn't clear, this isn't an actual pronunciation rule. There aren't any.

47:40 Kayla: Right. Chris: There's no pronunciation rule for acronyms. It doesn't exist. Anytime someone uses this argument in favor of GIF, they're making up said rule. And if you don't believe me, let's talk about some examples. Kayla: Yes, please. Chris: Kayla, can you say these two acronym words for me right now? Kayla: Scuba and laser. Chris: That's right. And I'd wager that pretty much everyone pronounces them that way. Even in the GiF camp or the GiF camp, I'm pretty sure everybody pronounces them as scuba and laser. However, if were to follow the made up pronounce it like the starting letters rule, then we'd have to pronounce self contained underwater breathing apparatus as scabba. And we'd have to pronounce light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation. As, like, last year, I think last year. So it'd be lassir and scuba scabba.

48:34 Kayla: Don't want to say that. Neither of those roll off the tongue. Chris: Oh, and I have another one, please. And this one hits pretty close to home because you might call it a cousin of the GiF. Or Gif. Pronounce this one for me, please. Kayla: Jpeg. Chris: Jpeg. So again, for our listeners who are less tech savvy, the reason I said JPEG is a cousin of the GiF is that they are both image formats, extremely ubiquitous ones. Here is what JPEG stands for. Joint photographics Experts group. Boom. Which is the name of the group that created the format. So if we follow that this is just the pronunciation rule, then we all need to start pronouncing JPEG as JFEG.

49:16 Kayla: I'm not doing that. Chris: So checkmate. Giffords, then, right? Kayla: I can't wait to pull out JPEG in the future. Chris: Well, not so fast. Kayla: No, I want to be right. Chris: Oh, what happened to oh, either side is right? I don't even care. Kayla: I want to be. Okay. Chris: Am I, am I. Am I Instagram? Am I bringing out the tribalist? Kayla: Like, no, I. Again, I do not care what you use. I do care when somebody starts coming at me. Chris: Yeah, totally. I don't give a fuck. Kayla: But if somebody's coming at me, I want to flip you on your ass. Chris: Yeah. And what people usually come at you with, at least in that direction from the giffer camp, is saying you have to say GiF because Gif graphical, but.

50:02 Kayla: Not actually the screaming it. And I've been screamed at, and that. Chris: Is actually the weakest argument. I haven't been screamed at, but I have been talked down to. Kayla: I've been voice raised. Chris: That's. That's fucked up. All right, so like I said, not so fast on that. Checkmate. First of all this means is that giffers can't demand the pronunciation. Be hard g. Based on some rule, it doesn't mean that it ought to be pronounced with a soft g. One of the analyses I read gets around this with the demand for consistency. That is, if you say hard G Jif, then to be consistent, you must also say JFeG instead of JPEG. But all I think this proves is that there is no consistency. And I think there's a little dogmaticness there on behalf of that Gifr. So what's next, then, in the chain of arguments? Well, once you go a bit deeper down the rabbit hole, I'm sorry, it's.

50:54 Kayla: Really stupid to say. If you say Gif, you must say jfegdeh. Chris: Well, to be consistent is what he said. Kayla: No, but even that, it's like, okay, but the p plays a different role in both of those things. Chris: That's probably what a giffer would say. Kayla: The p in photograph only is pronounced like that because it's ph. Chris: Right? Kayla: So unless you're throwing that h in there in JPEG, just saying. Chris: Right. But then you could counter that and say, well, then why isn't a joint podographics instead of joint photographics or at least joint pohotographics? Kayla: I just think if it looks like JPeg, say JPeg.

51:35 Chris: Right? Well, that's, yeah, but that's why that rule doesn't hold water. Kayla: Yeah. Chris: So what's up next? If you go a little bit deeper down the rabbit hole, you start running into, I would say, more intelligent and well armed fighters in this battle. One such combatant maintains a webpage called how to really pronounce jif.com, or sorry, how to really pronounce gif.com. Because he is a dyed in the wool giffer and he comes prepared. He even acknowledges up front that the whole, you have to pronounce it like the abbreviated words argument is invalid for the reasons that I just talked about. Then he goes on to tell us that quote, every word that starts with g, then a vowel, then an f, is pronounced with a hard g. For example, gaff, gift, guffaw. And most one syllable words that start with g have a hard gab, gad, gag, gal, gam, gap, gas.

52:29 Chris: And he lists like 30 more after that. And then he talks about the most powerful weapon in the giffer's arsenal, at least from my perspective. And that is the lexical neighbor argument, although he doesn't use that term. The lexical neighbor argument is basically this. When confronted with a new word or acronym or something we're supposed to say out loud, human brains tend to, like, mentally catalog the words that they already know how to pronounce and then pick something that they feel is closest and use that word as a guide. According to Giffords, the closest lexical neighbor to the acronym g I f is the word g I f t, because it's only off by one letter, t. That makes sense. So to them, it makes the most logical sense to pronounce gif like gift minus the t, hence gif.

53:14 Kayla: That all makes sense. And that's great and fine. Chris: QEd giffers win then, right? Kayla: No, there's no win because we're making shit up here. Chris: First of all, we'll get to that. Kayla: We're making shit up. Chris: Second, Kayla, just a second ago, you were all like, I want to be right. So let's keep going down that path before we just. Kayla: Just hold on to that thought, saying that if there are people that want to pronounce it gif, that's fine. If there are people that want to pronounce it Jif, that's also fine. Because at the end of the day, we all fucking know what we're talking about. It does not cause confusion. So maybe everybody should be cool or shut the fuck up.

53:55 Chris: Well, let's. We will get to that. So if we think that this lexical neighbor argument is really powerful and giffers win. Not so fast there, skippy. Gift isn't the only lexical neighbor to gif, and it's not even the closest. I think it's actually tied for closest. Kayla: Oh, geez. Chris: Gift gets cherry picked because of how close it is. But what about a nice gin and tonic? G I n is only one letter and one sound away from Gif. So perhaps jiffers are just alcoholics, and giffers are just used to giving gifs. Kayla: Maybe it's just if you like gin and tonics, you say gif.

54:36 Chris: That's. That's kind of what I'm suggesting. For the record, how to really pronounce gif.com. Guy dismisses gin because it comes from the dutch word for juniper berries, from which gin is produced. Kayla: You don't get to do that because all of those other words he said come from other languages too. Sorry. Chris: Exactly. I have absolutely no idea why this makes it dismissible, other than a hefty dose of motivated reasoning. Kayla: Yeah, it's a cult. Chris: Anyway, outside of Jin, Jiff has plenty of lexical neighbors that sport both hard and soft g's. So this lexical neighbor argument, while based on the logical premise that new words should be pronounced how people naturally assume they should, based on analogy to old words, it doesn't hold water for giffers because some of them cherry pick these old words in which to analogize. That would also not hold water for me if I said, well, it's like gin, because you could just say, well, it's like gift. Anyway, as well armed as this guy comes in arguing his pronunciation case, at the same time, this guy also provides a lot of ammunition to the cult argument.

55:41 Kayla: Oh. Chris: Why? Well, I mean. Okay, so first we just mentioned the motivated reasoning and dismissing counterexamples to the case, such as jinn but also, I say, look at the name of the website, how to really pronounce gifden. In other words, I am right and outsiders are wrong. Kayla: Gross. Chris: And it doesn't stop there. Listen to the language he uses to present his case. The word gift is the closest word to gif, and it has a hard g to pronounce gif. Just say gift without the t. What does he mean by closest here? Kayla: That's so arbitrary. Chris: It's no closer letter wise than Jin, which he dismisses. So what does he actually mean? Kayla: That means this is what I think.

56:22 Chris: Why is it the correct pronunciation? It's the most natural, logical way to pronounce it. That's why when everyone comes across the word for the first time, they use. Kayla: A hard g. But, okay, but then can he explain to me why I say Jeff? Chris: Yeah. So everyone, like, did he take a survey? Because I'm pretty sure that there's at least two counterexamples who are talking right now. It's like a very presumptuous statement and a little bit judgy, like, the most natural, logical way to pronounce it. Sounds like you're arguing starting from the premise that you're already right. Kayla: Yes. It's like when Michaela Peterson goes like, this is how people eat, right? No, it's not. Chris: This is healthy because it's healthy. Kayla: Yeah. Chris: Right. Are there any valid arguments for pronouncing it Jif? No. There are some websites out there like this one. And then he links to it that try to convince people to use a soft g, but they rely solely on the way Steve Wilhite says it. So Steve Wilhite is, you might have recalled, is the creator of the GiF, which we'll talk about in a second. But notice two things here. One is like this definitive no to his own straw man question, if there are any valid arguments for soft g. And two, the straw man that the only proper argument in favor of GIF is the creator argument, which isn't the only argument in favor of it.

57:35 Kayla: And finally, question. Chris: Yes. Kayla: What is the tone of this website? Is he dead serious or is he being a little jokey? Chris: I think the tone of this website strikes me as similar to the tone of the whole argument, which is like, it's really kind of hard to say. Kayla: It's like. Chris: Like, some people are like, this is funny. But it's also, like, some people, like, get really intense about it, so I can't really tell. Kayla: Yeah. Chris: You know, like, I personally think that it's fun and funny. Kayla: I don't think I. Chris: But I've also been yelled at by it. So I'm like, I don't know. Are you serious? Yeah, it's like, it's weird. So that's bottom line. I really am not sure. There's sometimes I can tell, I think, when people are being funny. Anyway, finally, now you can go forth and freely pronounce gif with a hard g as you naturally would, because you have every right to do so. If you feel compelled to honor the pronunciation given by the gif's creator out of some sense of obligation, that's perfectly fine, too. Just don't give those of us who pronounce it correctly a hard time smiley face.

58:37 Kayla: I've never given a gift for a. Chris: Hard time personally, so naturally would is, again, very presumptuous. Right. And those who pronounce it correctly is also pretty dogmatic. Kayla: Also, like, don't give us a hard time. Well, don't give other people a hard time. You're giving people a hard time. Chris: Well, we might, again, we might be talking past each other here. Kayla: No, he is giving people a hard time by saying there's no valid argument. Like, well, then don't give me a hard time. I'll give you a hard time if you give me a hard time. Chris: But it sounds like maybe he has been given hard times in the past if he's citing that. All right. By the way, if yourself are a giffer, this guy sells t shirts on his website, so you should go check it out. Howtoreallypronouncegiff.com.

59:21 Kayla: But do know that if you wear one of these t shirts, you kind of makes you a d bag for it. Chris: Okay, so where are we now? We can't rely on the first letters of the word to guide us. There are multiple lexical neighbors to gif that pull us in both directions. So, as I promised a second ago, let's talk a little bit about Steve Wilhite, the creator of the format, because that is a significant battlefield in this war. In the GiF debate, the following story was a proverbial shot heard round the world. Steve won a lifetime achievement award from the Webbys, which is an Internet software dev awards show thing, back in 2013. At this point, he was well aware of this ongoing debate surrounding the pronunciation of his creation, and he used his five words. So in the Webbys, you are only allowed exactly five words for your acceptance speech to say, it's pronounced Jif, not gif, end quote. Boom, case closed now. Right?

1:00:26 Kayla: But even that, like, okay, that's what I always go to in my head is knowing this. And also, it's just like, it's not definitive just because he says so. Chris: Well, it's funny you say that. A bunch of the articles I read that were pro gif on the basis of this statement. Kayla: I mean, I understand that. And the creator deserves to have, like, a say in how their thing is pronounced. And also, what the. Who fucking cares? Just say what you want. Chris: So anyway, this is when everyone packed up and went home and the entire world started pronouncing it as Gif. Kayla: No, this is when people were, like, mean to him. Chris: Yeah, just kidding. This did nothing more than stir the debate up even further. So giffers have a bunch of weapons they deploy against the whole creator's rights argument. Here are a few. Doesn't matter what the creators say, you can't make up the word banana and tell everyone it's pronounced ping pong table. Or this quote.

1:01:23 Kayla: Except. Okay, okay, sorry, go. I'm just gonna say, why is Colonel spelled like that? And why is. Chris: Oh, I. Yeah, that's something that comes up. Kayla: That's basically ping pong table. Chris: I know. Kayla: And why is lieutenant pronounced left tenant in places? Fuck off. Chris: That's just wrong. For all of our listeners in England. You pronounce it wrong. Kayla: I'm just saying that's weird aluminium. Chris: That's not so. Okay, so first of all, we've chopped our audience in half. Cause all of the giffers are now tuned out. And now we're just. Now we're like jettisoning all of our UK listeners. Kayla: No, I'm not saying they're wrong. I'm just saying that if a word looks like banana is pronounced ping pong table, sometimes that happens in our stupid language.

1:02:08 Chris: Yes, that's true. Or how about this quote from John Sim? Actually, this is a combined quote from John Simpson and from our friend up in the how to really pronounce Gif website. John Simpson, who is the chief editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, disagrees with Mister Wilhite. However, the pronunciation with a hard g is now very widespread and readily understood. A coiner effectively loses control of a word once it's out there, end quote. And I'm sure you would agree this is still the guy on the website talking. I'm sure you would agree it's far more likely that these masters of the english language understand better than anyone how to pronounce a word. Chris: Wilhite also mentioned that he is annoyed there's still a debate over the pronunciation to be frank, isn't it his own fault for choosing a pronunciation that simply doesn't make sense, end quote.

1:02:54 Kayla: Everybody needs to shut up. Chris: Just. But then we wouldn't have a podcast, Kayla, but just do so the way. Kayla: You have more going on in your life to worry about. Chris: So the way the creator says so argument gets shot down is basically by pointing out that creators don't always dictate how their creation gets used. Personally, I'm a little torn on this one. I really go back and forth. And this is the part that reminds me about the documentary we just watched. Kayla: Right? Chris: Again, about that artist that created Pepe the frog. So, like, that makes me go like, oh, man, this guy really should have say over whether people say Jif or Gif. Kayla: Yeah, I get it. Chris: But at the same time, you know, this is a widely used shareable. Like, it's. It's. It's like public domain now.

1:03:42 Kayla: Alexander Graham Bell wanted people to say ahoy when they answered the phone. Chris: Right? Kayla: And we say, that's terrible. Chris: Yeah. So, right. So you don't always get to, you know, that just because he says it doesn't necessarily make it correct. Right. So that's kind of what the argument, that's what the counter argument to this is. And I think it holds some water. By the way, part of why Steve Wilhite claims that Jiff is the correct pronunciation has to do with this anecdote. Apparently back in the eighties and nineties at Compuserve. So if you recall, that's where he was and where it was developed, Steve and his colleagues would throw around the phrase choosey, developers choose GiF as sort of a joke and a way tout their creation. Kayla: That's so cute. Chris: So for our younger audience, this is a reference to a popular tv ad from the time sexist popular tv ad for Jif Peanut butter that went choosy. Moms choose gif. So until the GIF format was popularized outside of CompuServe and got into the wild of the Internet, there was a time when the only correct pronunciation was Jif. In the entire world, this anecdote actually gets used by both sides in their arguments. By the way, giffers say that this precedence means that it's the correct way. Giffers say, well, the only reason anyone doesn't say GiF is because these dumb developers started it that way. Whenever anyone outside of that group sees it for the first time, they automatically think Gif.

1:05:03 Kayla: False. I thought Gif the first time I learned about gifs. I said GiF in my head. Chris: And again, it's a bit dogmatic to say everyone must have thought the same way I did when they first read the word. Which, to be fair, that gets a little bit dogmatic on both sides. You want another little window into the dogmatism going around with this thing. Kayla: Yes. Chris: Look no further than the article titles of all the stuff I was talking about researching for this. Kayla: I don't want to. It's just so frustrating. I'm so frustrated. Chris: All right, that's the end of the show. Kayla: No, it's just I know what they're all gonna be and I just want everyone to be. I just want everyone to be happy. Chris: Well, that's not happening. Especially not with this topic. Alright, so there's howtoreallypronounce gif.com, which we've talked about. Then there's an article called how the hell do you pronounce gif anyway? That's from Gizmodo. They're on the gif side, swayed by the creator said so argument. Then there's this article entitled you are 100% wrong about the pronunciation of gif. That's a wonderful article title from Newsweek, who is in the gif camp.

1:06:09 Kayla: Why is Newsweek talking about this? Chris: Then there's it's settled. Creator tells us how to pronounce gif. An article from the cable news network, that is CNN, which you'll recall from earlier, agreeing with the creator puts them in the GiF camp. Then there's how to pronounce GIF once and for all from newyorkdailynews.com. I'm not really sure how to classify their decision on it. I guess I'll say neutral, but their analysis was basically that GIF was 100% technically correct. But language changes, and in this case it's changing towards GIF. More people pronounce it that way now. So eventually GIF will become obsolete. Kayla: Okay, I can buy that. Chris: Note how both this article title and the CNN article title make the decision sound like really definitive and quote, settled. Right? Like the CNN article literally says it's settled. Creator tells us how, and this one is entitled how to pronounce GiF once and for all. Anyway, there's a article from Medium called, or a blog post, I guess, technically my irrefutable three point platform and final word on GiF pronunciation. This guy presents a strong case for the GiF camp. But again, notice the dogma and his article title as well. And yes, I know a lot of this dogma, as you were sort of talking about a minute ago, is tongue in cheek. But so is this whole episode. So STFU.

1:07:25 Kayla: But it's also, like, not. It's also, like, in that it is and it isn't in that weird, like, space where people kind of hide behind saying, like, it's a joke, but then they really yell at you, like, actually get mad. Chris: Then there's this one. It's time to stop arguing about the pronunciation of GiF. Kayla: Did I write that one? Chris: Nope, that was the Atlantic. Thanks for that neutral one, Atlantic. And while we're tallying things up, here's a few more that aren't necessarily articles. Former President Obama weighed in at one point on the side of hard G Gif. Kayla: Who cares? Chris: USA Today admits that soft G Jif is correct, but that's in an article about a cross promotion between the Peter Butter company GiF that we just mentioned and a company named Giphy, who is in the business of maintaining a database of gifs where they claim that Jif is always the peanut butter and Gif is always the looping image. So they did this whole cross promotion thing. It was actually earlier this year in 2020, and you could buy commemorative peanut butter that had gif instead of jif.

1:08:27 Kayla: But here's my question. Where the fuck does Giphy get to come into this with its g I p h y. Bullshit. Chris: What? So that's my next thing. Interestingly, Giphy decided to spell their company name with a ph, not an f as in the original gif. So I'm not sure how much weight their lexical arguments hold. Kayla: None. Chris: It's like, yeah, it's Giphy with a hard g. Okay, but then why'd you spell it ph? Kayla: What the hell does that mean? I think format with a ph. Fuck you. Chris: It's clearly no, but that's the thing. To me, that is, like, this really clear microcosm of the whole. Like, once you transform something, you might want to be pronouncing it differently or spelling it differently. One or the other. Right. Because it would look weird to see, like, g I f y. I'd want to pronounce that, like, Giphy or something. So if you want to pronounce it Giphy, I think. I don't know. The pH makes more sense, but then they're changing the letter.

1:09:24 Kayla: If you from the original type in g I f y, do you want to know the first thing that comes up? Chris: What? Kayla: Giphy. Giphy. Chris: One of the things that I don't really mention here, an argument in favor that the gifrs use in favor, is that if you input the word Gif into text to speech programs. It pronounces a gif because of the lexical closeness thing. Kayla: That's such a definitive resource on how things are pronounced. Yeah, huh. Like the thing that you like type in words to get funny pronunciations. Yeah, that's real definitive.

1:10:07 Chris: So for those keeping score at home, that was four articles in the gif camp. Four articles. Plus former presidents and marketing promos in the gif camp and two undecided voters. Kayla: So don't be undecided. Chris: We can't even use which pronunciation has the most number of publications on their side rubric to help us decide. So I guess we're left with the notion that there isn't actually a winner in this debate. Only losers. There's a bunch of anecdotes claiming that they're correct for various reasons that are not supported, and there's a bunch of motivated reasoning going on, and there really isn't any hard data to help us decide. So the answer is ambiguous. Or is it?

1:10:50 Kayla: Yeah, I knew that was happening. Chris: What if there were a PhD linguist that tackled this exact problem and had data to back it up? Enter onto the battlefield the Napoleon of the Gif war. A PhD linguist at the University of Montreal. Here's how he enters into the battlefield with his blog post. Bear with me. It is a bit long, but it cuts like a hot knife through butter. Let's say you're an english speaker reading a text, and you run into a new word, should you ever have to pronounce that word out loud. Short of looking it up in a dictionary, you'll draw on your knowledge of English, especially the correspondence between certain combinations of letters and the sounds they make. So far, so good.

1:11:34 Chris: But sometimes there's conflicting evidence in the lexicon, and while we like to think we all speak the same English, in reality your own personal English is ever so different from somebody else's because your experiences with language are unique. Fortunately, this doesn't keep us from understanding one another. For example, when I moved to Canada and heard the first syllable of pasta being pronounced passed and not with the vowel of paw like I was used to, it was certainly new and notable for me, but it didn't lead to any confusion. That difference you can easily pin down to regionality. You hear a certain pronunciation and you can guess a thing or two about the person. The GiF debate or GiF debate, strikes me as similar, but with a crucial distinction. Chris: I can't think of any easy group signaling, intentional or otherwise, that either pronunciation brings with it beyond simply the pronunciation, its self. Saying it GIF signals that you're a gif er, pure and simple. You can't tell where somebody's from, what socioeconomic class they might fit into, their sex or gender, etcetera, just from that initial consonant. If we could, I doubt we'd be talking about which form is right or wrong. Instead, we'd probably imperfect beings that we are fall into some pretty harmful traps if that distinction fell along some power differential. Just look at vocal Frye. Men use it more than women, but because it's associated with women's speech, it can be seen as undesirable, unprofessional, and so on.

1:12:52 Kayla: Yeah, I wear glass, so it's a. Chris: Vocal fry, for those of you that aren't sure is the whole, it's like the valley girl sort of speech when. Kayla: You talk like this? Chris: Yeah, it's like when you say, no. Kayla: You don't have to say, you can. Everybody just does it because Ira glass does it. And everybody loves listen to Ira glass. But the second, a Kardashian does it makes you dumb. Chris: Anyway, he continues with this post. I want to probe one aspect of why that initial, subconscious decision is made when you first saw GiF, why you heard it in your head as GiF or GiF. And to do that, we need to look at patterns and regularities in the english lexicon. I'm going to disappoint you right away. Both forms can be justified, and because english speakers understand both of them implicitly, both forms are right.

1:13:37 Kayla: There you go. Chris: The debate may be fun, but I think we all know deep down that nothing will ever definitively prove one over the other. End quote. Kayla: Boom. That is the argument that I think is correct. There is no correct way to say it. Get me a can of soda. Get me a can of pop. Chris: Then he dives into the sweet data. So, remember when were talking about some of the arguments made by giffers and jiffers, like, about which words are lexical neighbors and which aren't, and, oh, it's. It's just like gift, but I'm cherry picking gin, that sort of thing? Kayla: Yes. Chris: Well, basically what this PhD linguist does at this point is that except instead of just cherry picking, he analyzes a huge set of data of english words. It's called the English Lexicon Project, and it's just like this huge database of words and words usage. So he does, he takes a look at that and looks at two things. First. Well, actually, first, he cleans up the data. So, for example, removing, like, present participle words ending in ge, such as arranging or hinging or caging. Because he felt like that would be, like, a little unfair.

1:14:43 Kayla: Sure. Chris: Then he looks at the two things. So first, how often the hard g and the soft g appear in terms of number of words in the language. So, like, how many words have those two sounds? And secondly, how often those words are actually used in communication. So, for example, the word gift is used much more than the word incorrigible. So gift would. Even though, like, if those were the only two words in the language, then they'd score equal on number of words. But gift would score much higher on usage, if that makes sense. Speaking of usage, do you know what the most used soft g word is? Kayla: The most used soft g word. And it's not gif.

1:15:23 Chris: Nah, I don't know if he counted that one for this. So other than that, I want to. Kayla: Think about this for a second. Chris: That's also probably not that. Kayla: Sorry, it's not Jin. Chris: No, it doesn't have to be the beginning of the word. Kayla: I don't know. Then. Chris: Magic. Kayla: Magic. Chris: So, I don't know. I'd say maybe my exposure to the gathering was what makes me a jiffer magif. But it also has the hard g in gathering, so maybe that's not a good exposure. Kayla: Magif. The jathering. Chris: No, it would be magic. The jathering. Kayla: It doesn't roll off the tongue? Chris: No, not really. So he looks at both of these factors, the number of words and the usage, crunches the number using a process called log transformed frequency, and finds, essentially that it's more or less tied.

1:16:11 Kayla: Mmm, beautiful. Chris: But it's tied in such a way that maybe explains the existence of the debate. You see, while it is tied overall, the hard g sound is more prevalent when a word starts with the letter g, but it's fully flipped around when the letter g occurs in the middle of the word. So when all of the jiffers and the giffers are saying like, oh, it's the thing. It's naturally this way. If you read it, you naturally read it this way, they're all wrong because it's split down the middle. If 90% of the usage was 90% of the usage of, like, ge or ga or whatever in the English language was soft, then the jiffers would be right. Because it's like, yeah, that's how you naturally, like all the other words in english language are like that, right?

1:16:57 Chris: If it was the other way, the giffers would be right. But this guy who crunched the numbers said that it's split down the middle. Kayla: Jit fucked. Chris: Good one. But yeah. So it's flipped to whether the g occurs in the middle of the word or the beginning of the word. The beginning of the word is more hard, g, and the middle of the word is more soft, g. So I will let Doctor Dow take it from here. Again, let's step back a moment and ask what's right and wrong when it comes to stakes like these, the pronunciation of a word, is it what an authority said? For those of you who invoke Steve Wilhite, tempting as that might be, I advance, and I think most, if not all linguists would agree with me that right is simply an intelligible form implicitly understood by a speech community. That is, it's right because they agree it's right.

1:17:47 Chris: There may be a right within our community versus right in some other community that I can gauge like dialectical differences, but there's also wrong in the sense of I don't know anyone who says it that way. Dare I say, for instance, that we native english speakers are all in agreement that the letter I in gifden doesn't make the vowel sound I, as in beach, right, doesn't make that long I sound. The evidence is just that strong, consistent in English that the letter I makes the sound I when it's in a syllable that ends with a consonant, or at least a consonant, like f. Change the spelling to gif and our intuitions change. Bottom line is, hard as it is to accept, language actually is a democracy. That's linguistics 101.

1:18:30 Chris: When we talk about the arbitrariness of capital l language and between the jiffers and the giffers, really all we differ in is what generalizations we made from our own vocabularies in order to decide how the word quote sounds to us. Some of us pay attention to word position. Others tend to use the lexicon as a whole. The rest is just after the fact attempts to justify ourselves and have some fun along the way. End quote. Kayla: So we have to next month, vote out all the giffers, is what I'm hearing exactly right. Chris: We have to make sure that none of the giffers are able to vote at the polls. So what do you think about this final analysis?

1:19:13 Kayla: Pretty good. Chris: Good analysis, Kayla. Kayla: No, I think the thing about language being a democracy makes sense. I also think that we should, all of us, look a little bit at our dogmatic nature that we harbor about the way language is utilized as a whole. Because people pronouncing things differently or using language wrong can get. I think that's why the jiff gif thing does get so, like, heated is because. Chris: Oh, my God. Kayla: No, it's because language actually is something that. That there is a lot of dogma about and has been used. Chris: Like you saying literally. When you mean figuratively, I just mean.

1:19:55 Kayla: More like, if somebody misspells something, it's really easy to go, like they're an idiot. Or if somebody uses aave as opposed to standard English, it's like, oh, that's. That's incorrect. When that's not incorrect, it's just different. Chris: If you use the wrong usage of your. Kayla: I don't care anymore. Chris: I lose all respect. I'm sorry. Kayla: How do I know Kayla? Chris: I'm a gatekeeper. I gotta keeping my gates. Kayla: Why? Why? Chris: It's cause it's funny on the podcast. Kayla: No, it's stupid. Just let people say what they want. Chris: Well, you're stupid. Why? Kayla: O u r. Especially if it does not. If there is not an issue with your ability to understand what the person is saying, maybe chill out a little bit. Chris: Yeah, but doesn't it also, like. It's a bit of. I don't know. I don't want to say virtue signaling. It's like class or education signaling. Right. I mean, like, I always want to try to make sure that I'm spelling things correctly because I worry about how I'm perceived.

1:20:46 Kayla: That's fine. But that's you. Chris: But then you're saying, on the other side of things, I should be more forgiving. Kayla: Yeah. Because especially, like. Especially when we're talking so often to each other, like, on the Internet now, and, like, talking only through text. If somebody's misusing your. Your. You don't know if this is the third language they speak. Chris: Right. Kayla: And if you are speaking pig Latin lingon, if you're speaking your third language and you mix up the yours, that's not an indicator of your intelligence. Chris: That's a good point. I can still barely conjugate Spanish, so. Kayla: Oh, my God. Chris: Plus, they have vasotros, which is really a godsend. Kayla: I don't even know what it means. We need to. We never got to learn it. When I was y'all, it was always grayed out on all the workbooks. They wouldn't teach it to us. Teach the controversy of vsotros.

1:21:36 Chris: Teach it to us vasotroses, please. Yeah. The other thing that I want to say about this guy's analysis is that it really puts the whole dogma of the only logical way is my way. Kayla: Right. Chris: Thinking into sharp relief. It essentially proves it wrong and demonstrates how silly that thinking is. Kayla: Thank you, sir. What's his name? Chris: His name is Michael Dow. Kayla: Thank you. Michael Dowd, PhD. Chris: All right, Kayla, it's about that time. Criteria time. Since today's topic is a little bit of a round peg in this cult. Square hole, maybe. Kayla: Yeah, this was a stretch. Chris: You're a stretch. Whatever. Cicada 3301. Or should I say cicada. Kayla: Cicada. Chris: Let's agree on what we're talking about. Lest we create another arbitrary semantic debate, I think we should just go over each of the criteria for each of the two camps, or maybe just in general, decide if either or both of them is a cult.

1:22:25 Kayla: Okay, so it's two cults. Chris: Yeah. Two for the price of one. Kayla: In this episode, you did not read to me any websites of how to really pronounce jif.com. So I'm already feeling better about my side of things. Chris: But I read to you my irrefutable three point platform and final word on GiF pronunciation. Kayla: Not a whole website. Chris: Well, it's. But it's the same thing. Just a dude writing. Kayla: Fucking dudes. Chris: Writing. Kayla: Stop writing dudes. Chris: Yeah. Get out of here, dudes. By the way, this is not a gendered debate. There are folks on both sides of the gender divide that have argued both ways. Kayla: I've gotten yelled at by women about this expected harm towards the individual.

1:23:06 Chris: Super high. Kayla: Very high. Chris: Very high for both sides. Yeah. Cause people yell at me and they hurt my feelings. Kayla: Yeah. Psychological harm. Social. Literally, I have to fucking. I'm not kidding. I'm shocked that I said gif on the podcast. Chris: I know. I know. Kayla: Because I am very careful about what word I use. Chris: Honestly, I do the same thing. Kayla: I don't want to get into it. I just don't want to get into it. Chris: I do the same thing. I typically say Gif in mixed company now, which. It's actually funny now that we're saying that, because I've never had somebody be like, really gif. And I use gif all the time now. So. Kayla: I just think that. I don't necessarily know if that has anything to do with society. I think it might just happen to be that we surround ourselves with more giffers than jiffers.

1:23:51 Chris: Right, right. Kayla: So for both giffers and jiffers, your harm is. Your harm. Chris: Expected? Harm is just super high. As high as it's ever been. Kayla: Is it niche? I would say it is not, considering all of the articles. If fucking Newsweek is talking about it. Chris: Newsweek, CNN, the president, medium. Kayla: No, not niche. Chris: Read about this on Reddit. And it's all over. It's everything. Kayla: Anti factuality. Chris: So it's low on the niche thing, so. Okay. Okay. Anti factuality. Kayla: Pretty high. Chris: We talked about motivated reasoning. Kayla: Yeah. Chris: Other than that, though. I don't know. It's weird. Kayla: Well, it's a lot of, like, here's why it is the way it is. And it's like, well, but that's not actually a fact. Chris: Right? Kayla: All of the. Like, this is why I'm right. It's like, that's not a fact.

1:24:32 Chris: Yeah, let's get back to that one. Kayla: Why? Chris: Because I want to get back to it later. Kayla: Just say it now. Chris: No, I'm gonna wait. Kayla: Percentage of life consumed. Well, we're talking an awful lot about it right now. Chris: Oh, yeah. I mean, some people, it seems to be their whole life. Like, that guy has his whole website with t shirts. I'm assuming he thinks about it morning, noon, and night and when he's asleep. Kayla: I think in general, though, it's low. Chris: Oh, okay. We're not. We're gonna do that one for real, not fake. Kayla: It's hard to. Chris: Because we said expected harm was high. Kayla: So I think it is. Chris: You think it's actually high? Okay. Kayla: I think that. I don't have. Think that it's great for people who are friends or strangers to be yelling at each other about a word.

1:25:13 Chris: They're kidding. Kayla: Not really. Well, I'm sorry. Then I think of kidding differently. I don't want to be shouted at while you're making a joke. That hurts me. Chris: That's. You're a very nice person. Kayla: I'm sensitive. Please don't shout. I don't like it. Chris: All right, ritual. Super high here, I gotta say. Kayla: Is it. Chris: I don't know. Kayla: You just pulled a me. Chris: No, I mean, like, the fact that we're talking about words and language and sort of inherently ritualistic, maybe. Kayla: I don't. Chris: I don't know. Kayla: I think you're wrong. Chris: What about the ritual of yelling at someone when they say the way you don't agree with. Kayla: I don't know if that's ritualistic. I think it's just reaction.

1:25:55 Chris: So low. Kayla: I think it's low on ritual. No one's being like. Chris: No one's holding a catholic mass in honor of gift, gift. Yeah, well, maybe not today. Kayla: I don't think. Chris: Maybe in the future. Kayla: Okay, Jiff. Charismatic leader is the creator. Chris: Yeah. I think for jif, it's definitely Steve. Wellhite, Gif. I don't know that it has one. Kayla: Gif is how to really pronounce gif.com. Chris: That guy. He has a name, by the way. I don't know if I use it on the podcast, but it's, you know, I guess. I guess he's. But I don't know if he's, like, recognized in any way. Kayla: Well, we recognized him on our show. Chris: Although he is referenced on other articles. Kayla: About, like, well, there you go. Chris: His website is referenced. Kayla: There you go. Chris: Okay, so I think they both have charismatic leaders.

1:26:36 Kayla: That they both have charismatic leaders. So I think. Chris: So it's a bit of a mixed bag. So the thing. So I mentioned back way up at the top of the show, before we judge, I mentioned maybe adding a new criterion to the list. And the reason for that is because I feel like one of the major reasons this is actually a viable topic for the show is less about any of our existing criteria and more about. Because, like, we saw that, like, a lot of these scored pretty low. Right. But it's more about, like, this idea of dogmatism that I've been talking about all episode. So I don't know. Kayla: Like, that's different than anti factual. Chris: I'm not sure that's what I was gonna ask you. Like, if anti factuality has motivated reasoning and close logical loops and just, you know, raw, like, bullshit, like, not doing true pseudoscience.

1:27:24 Kayla: Dogmatism is just another. It's like another subsection, like how closed logical system motivated reason. Chris: It does feel like it includes dogmatism. Yeah, I just. I'm not sure if it's its own thing. For example, the you know how to really pronounce gift.com. He presents some arguments that aren't anti factual, but he has this sense that only I can be right. That's the thing on both of these sides, that if you look at it in a technical sense, they can both be right. The problem is they both are saying the other guy can't be right. Kayla: Like, if you're dogmatic about something that is actually true, is that still dogmatic behavior? Is that still dogmatic? Chris: Yeah, it's the insider outsider. I'm right, they're wrong, even though both sides in this case are demonstrably right.

1:28:05 Kayla: But is dogmatism always anti factual? Like, even if you're, like, dogmatic about the thing that is true is not the way you then interact with that true thing. Chris: So you're being anti factual. So you're being factual when you say, here are all the reasons it should be pronounced GiF. But you're being anti factual when you're saying, and those are the only valid ones, maybe. So it's antifactual either way. I don't know. Might have to have some discussion. I tell you what, listeners, what do you think is dogmatism something we should add to our list? Send us your tweets and things, and send us. Send us some animated gifs. Kayla: Gifs and dogs. Chris: Yeah, send us some dogs for the dogma. Because if we had dogma, then the best friends would have been super high.

1:28:50 Kayla: They had a lot of dogma there. Chris: Yeah, dogma. Very high on dogma. Kayla: Yeah. So I'm gonna go ahead and say, let's keep talking about that. Chris: Okay? Gather feedback from our audience, and then. Kayla: I don't think we're dealing with cults here, as much as it pains me to say. Chris: Wow, really? Even giffers? Even dirty. Kayla: Even giffords? Chris: Dirty giffers. Kayla: Horrible giffers. Chris: I'm actually kidding. We love all of you. And as we said in the show, provably it is okay to go either way. It just depends on whether you have more exposure to some words in which it's pronounced soft g. In some words where it's pronounced heart g. There you go. All right. Anything else you want to add to the show?

1:29:37 Kayla: Don't come at me, bro. Chris: Fuck around and find out. Kayla: No, I just. I don't want to have an argument. Whatever. The way you say it is 100% fine. Just please let it be 100% fine for whatever way I want to say it. Chris: So should we have opened this episode by talking about Jalori holes or glory holes? Kayla: Pronounce it however you want. If it doesn't affect ping pong table, if it doesn't affect your ability to. Chris: Understand, that is exactly what the linguist PhD said, then it doesn't. Kayla: Then it's not a problem. Chris: It's exactly what he said. Kayla: So come on. Come on, people, now smile on your brother. Everybody get together. Try to love one another right now, God. And say Jif or Gif or whatever the fuck you want.

1:30:22 Chris: All right, I'm Chris. Kayla: And I'm Kayla. Chris: And this has been cult or just Jif? Oh, actually, sorry, one more thing. Kayla: Cult or gust? Weird. Chris: I left out the very last bit of the blog post from Mister Dow. Oh, man, he's got a sense of humor. Because after his big, long, data driven explanation of why either pronunciation is acceptable, he signs off the post by saying, quote, ps. All that said, it should be pronounced.