Pet peeve dissection: "For the win"

[memnus]

For a while now, I've heard the phrase "for the win" spoken in casual conversation, and it increasingly became a phrase that would do nothing for me but a flash of anger. I had to ask myself why.

First, there's the context in which it's spoken. Roughly translated it means, "you just made a cultural reference that amused me." This hits upon a conversational tactic which I try not to subscribe to - that is, taking the funny words of others and repeating them. I find that this adds nothing to the conversation, but also tends to steer it away from the topic at hand and toward the reference that probably not everyone gets, leaving those out of the loop.

Second, it wants to imply that the conversation is something that can be won or lost. I don't talk to win. Not only does someone winning imply everyone else losing, a win also signifies an end. Keeping an interesting conversation going is hard enough; starting a new one is worse.

As usual, I thought I had more to say about that. Apparently I was wrong. So, if you've ever seen me explode at someone about that, that's why.

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Comments

[memnus.livejournal.com]

The exchange tends to be more like:

A: Line from TV show blah!
B: Ha ha, blah for the win!

[bobbzman.livejournal.com]

OK, that's even stupider than what I've seen, which is more like "my opinion for the win!"

[jibb.livejournal.com]

Hmm... I generally hear it at Crack, where it's "<strategy being followed> for teh win!"

[memnus.livejournal.com]

That may well be the origin, where it makes more sense.

[notsteven.livejournal.com]

And I just saw it on a computer magazine in Sprague, with an article titled "Javascript for the win; whether you like it or not".

[sithjawa.livejournal.com]

Weird.

I've only heard it used like "I am making this sandwich with peanut butter and curry paste, for teh win." or "Excessively large vertical margins FOR TEH WIN!" as in "I am doing this exceedingly random and pointless thing that is probably a bad idea because it amuses me," or "Someone thought this was a good idea, but I don't know why." Generalizing, I guess, to "Inexplicably."