Why Do We Type LOL When We're Not Laughing Out Loud?

I'm replaying this posting from September, 2018.


Thirteen years ago a friend and I devised a surprisingly non-ditzy system for rating food (and other things) on a scale of one to ten. I continue to be amazed at how useful and effective it is. But there's one problem: "8" devaluation.

Here's how the system distinguishes 8s:

The problems began when I first found myself 8-ing without any actual vocal expression of pleasure. Over time, it's gotten worse and worse, to the point where now anything merely good strikes me as 8-ish. And "good" should be 7.

There's no such problem with 9. Either rational thought breaks down or it doesn't. But "Mmmm!" is a mental concept as well as a sound, and if you divorce the two, the concept becomes awfully slack. "Store-bought cookies! Mmmm! Of course, I don't literally mean 'Mmmm!' I'm not making that sound! But I'm typing 'Mmmm' just to express my general affection for cookies!"

Once 'Mmmm!' becomes more conceptual than literal, 8 starts devaluing until it covers anything decent.

This is surely the exact same process that makes us type 'LOL' even though we're not laughing out loud. Once the concept untethers from the physical act, devaluation begins. At this point bona fide LOLs likely account for less than 5% of all LOL reportage.

I've been straining to come up with more examples of this phenomenon, and came up with one:

You know how people in long-term relationships eventually start giving each other those perfunctory kisses? They're more gestural symbols than real kisses. Tepidly theatrical "Mwahh!" kisses never appear early in a relationship. It's where things devolve once love becomes more of an abstraction rather than an actual thing.

The first time an early girlfriend kissed me like that, I told her if she ever again kissed me symbolically, the relationship would be over. I was pretty uncompromising back then, but it's not like I didn't have a point.

When "laughing out loud" is an abstract label - something I would do, even if I'm not actually doing it - then anything vaguely amusing starts to fit that bill. Same for "Mmmm". And same for kissing. This is what happens when the actual dissolves into the conceptual, losing its gist and power.

So one sits stone-faced, munching a merely decent cookie while joylessly reporting "Mmmm!". Or barely cracking a grin at a minor attempt at wit while reporting uproarious laughter. Or cursorily pecking at some cheek with a tightly puckered mouth as a report of loving affection.