Are you sick of the word 'unprecedented'?

Over the years, I've gotten quite a few chuckles reminiscing about my youngest cousin Scott's purely logical reaction to an unfamiliar food that was set before him.

"I cannot eat that because I have NEVER eaten that before."

(To his credit, Scott the successful civil engineer has outgrown that childhood logic, although it probably still bubbles to the surface now and then. "I cannot design that project because I have…er, I mean, how flexible is your budget?")

In other words, "unprecedented" was bad.

Now in 2026, I find myself wincing whenever a TV/print/podcast/Post-it Note journalist trots out the overworked buzzword "unprecedented."

(X's chatbot Grok agrees the media "significantly overuses" the word. Grok added that "unprecedented" has become a "lazy rhetorical crutch – dramatic hype for clicks, narrative framing or to signal gravity – rather than a precise descriptor. And, oh yeah, Elon Musk needs a raise.")

"Unprecedented" is one of those phrases like "existential" and "game changer" and "only time will tell" that journalists suddenly, "organically" adopt simultaneously. I wish we could hack into their shared database and get everyone to start using, say, "scrumdiddlyumptious" all the time. ("Sources close to the massive interstate pileup say that the injuries were, um, scrumdiddlyumptious.")

Whenever the Fourth Estate smells something that might be without precedent, they are embarrassingly giddy about delving into their internet resources to vindicate their mania. I miss the old days when the fact-finding involved two rural housewives chatting across the fence. ("Land sakes! Did you ever hear of such a thing in all your life???")

Thank heaven the Bible's account of the day-to-day existence of Adam and Eve was kept mercifully brief. I don't think the religious world would have been appreciably better off with a pompous reporter hanging around. ("Humankind's first hug. Unprecedented! Humankind's first Thursday brunch. Unprecedented! A talking serpent…ho-hum…nothing to see here. Move along.")

Breathless weathermen have made every dry spell, late frost or early daffodil an "unprecedented" weather "event." ("Summer breeze makes me feel fine –although there has never been such a phenomenon before, at least according to our records, which date all the way back to last Wednesday…")

A modern weather forecast will get you so revved up you don't know whether to carry a parka, an umbrella or the Revelation of St. John the Divine.

Journalists continue overusing the dreaded "unprecedented," but most parents outgrow the fascination with "firsts" remarkably fast. "Baby's first tooth! Baby's first word! Baby's first step!" can quickly transition to "Third child's first time overhearing Dad screaming, ‘Why wouldn't you let me get that vasectomy when I asked for it???"

(I suspect that many of the people embracing "unprecedented" do so because it sounds more refined than the "I swear this has never happened before!" assurance they've had to deliver on more than one occasion.)

The biggest burr under my saddle with "unprecedented" is when pundits take that honorable neutral adjective and put a sinister spin on it. ("This is unprecedented! No president has ever attended a midweek National League doubleheader wearing cufflinks purchased from a salesman named Monty. Our NATO allies are on high alert.")

*Whew* I've worked up quite an appetite with this tirade. In case y'all have leftovers to spare, it would be unprecedented for me to turn down a free meal.

For that matter, a bathroom scale utilizing lunar gravity might be a real game changer…

Controversial author Harlan Ellison once described the work of Mr. Tyree as "wonkily extrapolative" and said his mind "works like a demented cuckoo clock." Tyree generated a particular buzz on the Internet with his column spoofing real-life Christian nudist camps. A lifelong small-town southerner, he graduated from Middle Tennessee State University in 1982 with a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications.

(COMMENT, BELOW)

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