So, you know, it is what it is, but Americans are totally annoyed by the use of "whatever," pronounced "WHAT'-ehv-errr," reports Associated Press (AP).
Yes, "whatever," the popular slacker term of indifference was found "most annoying in conversation" by 47 percent of Americans surveyed in a Marist College poll of 938 people, easily beating you "you know," a term which grated 25 percent, "anyway" ( 7 percent), "it is what it is" (11 percent) and "at the end of the day" (2 percent).
"Whatever," immortalized in song by Nirvana ("oh well, whatever, nevermind") in 1991, popularized by the Valley girls in "Clueless" later that decade, it is still commonly used, often by younger people. And the expression was consistently disliked by Americans regardless of their race, gender, age, income or where they live.
"It doesn't surprise me because 'whatever' is in a special class, probably," said Michael Adams, author of "Slang: The People's Poetry" and an associate professor of English at Indiana University. "It's a word that - and it depends how a speaker uses it - can suggest dismissiveness."
Then again, whatever will be, will be.
