Chinese swimmer Fu Yuanhui (left), posing with the bronze medal she won in the women’s 100m backstroke final during the Olympic last summer, was known also for the term “honghuang zhili,” meaning “prehistoric power” that she blurted out during an interview.

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The end of the year is always the time when institutions compile rankings of the year’s most popular buzzwords. One such list was the top 10 online buzzwords of 2016.

The famous Chinese writer Wang Meng, attending an event to select words for the list, condemned some of the nominations. For example, Wang said phrases like “xiaoxianrou,” which means “little fresh meat” and is used to refer to a young man, contain heavy connotations of vulgarity that debase the Chinese language. He said that some online buzzwords are corroding and effacing the diversity of the Chinese language. Are buzzwords a linguistic disease? This heated debated topic once again has made headlines.

Wang is not the only writer with a strong aversion to online buzzwords. Shortly before, Chinese writer Chi Li said: “I think it is a pity that though young Chinese Internet users display talent when coining Internet phrases, such creativity and imagination is quirky and even domineering. These personal expressions for people and things that make the news spread like wildfire—the crowd speaks in one voice and all of the same tone—everyone seems to think using online buzzwords is stylish. If an elderly man in his 80s or 90s, a civil servant, a bank clerk, or an apprentice of Chinese silk embroidery comes to me and calls me ‘qin,’ [meaning ‘darling,’] I would be more than stupefied, even overwhelmed by it.”

Some scholars have made the following comparison: When describing a man of charisma, the ancient Chinese people used the idiom “a man who has graceful bearing is akin to a jade plant” to refer to his charming appearance and elegant demeanor, but today many people say “tall, rich and handsome.” To convey sadness, the ancient people used “My grief overflows. Who knows?” but today the Internet users say “skinny blue mushroom,” which is “lanshou xianggu” in Chinese phonetic letters and a homophone for “Unbearable, I want to cry.” The latter expressions are apparently less refined and aesthetic than the former.

Such comparisons of expression might be sort of absolute, but if one day in the future, these buzzwords naturally come out of people’s mouths at an ever increasing frequency, displacing other daily words, would modern people be petrified by the  monotonous language use?

Chen Sihe, professor from the Department of Chinese Language at Fudan University, said that the popularity of online buzzwords can be explained by the masses seeking novelty in their choice of words. For universities and orthodox media, language use should be prudent and rationally guided. Word choice at random should be rejected, Chen said.

Chinese linguist Hao Mingjian, the honorary editor-in-chief of the monthly journal Excessive Wording, said that some Web users take advantage of the conformist mob mentality to market online buzzwords, making them spread through real space.

Hao added that the positive side of buzzwords should also be noted. Some words reflect the public’s passion for social reality and politics while others mirror the spirit of the times, such as “honghuang zhili,” meaning “prehistoric power,” a term used by Chinese swimmer Fu Yuanhui in an interview with CCTV 5 after she qualified for the women’s 100m backstroke final to describe her all-out efforts during the Olympics preliminaries last summer.

At the same time, through the lens of some buzzwords, people’s value judgments can be seen. For example, “tuhao,” which is used to denote nouveau riche Chinese who flaunt their wealth, embodies strong irony and opposition to money worship.

Chen said buzzwords themselves are significant, but research on the subtle changes of social mentality that these buzzwords reflect is insufficient. The fear that buzzwords may sabotage the language at large apparently stems from bias because language has the ability to self-correct. Given enough time, some buzzwords can become a necessary supplement to existing language, adding linguistic richness. Others might, as days go by, naturally be weeded out. Some of the buzzwords that are popularized rapidly disappear equally as fast, Chen said, adding that this is the natural result of word filtration through the medium of social life.