As someone who is frequently pedantic I sometimes sit and hypocritically brood on which unnecessary pedantry from other people annoys me most I've decided it's people who try to draw a distinction between the word "possum" and "opossum"
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Explanation: There are two different families of pointy-faced trash-eating marsupials in the world One is from North America and is called "opossum" from a Powhatan term meaning "white dog" Everyone who actually interacts with them just says "possum" though
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The other is from Australia, and looks somewhat similar but is not actually at all closely related (all native Australian species are pretty distant from the rest of the world) For one thing, they don't have the characteristic white face the North American opossum was named for
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However, these are officially called "possums", because the British colonists named them after the North American opossum They did not include the O because no one in America actually says the O, and colonial Australia was, I gather, a somewhat informal place and time
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As a result of this, it's a whole stupid trivia thing that in the official dictionary spelling of the term, American opossums have the O (and "possum" is a mere "slang nickname") and Australian possums do not
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Therefore if you should ever refer to "opossums" as "possums" in print in some public venue, the chance is small but significant that someone will helpfully correct you "Those are opossums, possums are from Australia" This is very, very annoying
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Because NOBODY in the United States actually pronounces it "opossum" THAT'S THE WHOLE REASON THE AUSTRALIAN ONES ARE CALLED "POSSUMS" IN THE FIRST PLACE
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The whole thing is that a certain kind of linguistic pedant always defaults in the direction of maximal disambiguation, even though this isn't really how most humans think (it's arguably the *opposite* of how we think, we name most things directly after other things)
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So if you can find a way to make there be two distinct names for two different things instead of one you always must This is probably a good habit if you're a specialist working in a field But it's really annoying in everyday life
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This is the same as why pedants insist that the "American buffalo" is not actually a buffalo at all but merely *named* for the "true buffalo" (the African buffalo and the Asian buffalo/water buffalo) and instead should always be called a "bison"
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Even though it's pretty damn obvious the Americans who regularly interacted with this animal and saw it as something of a national symbol called it a buffalo! That's what it says in the song! It's where the buffalo roam!
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Where is the city of Bison, NY? Who has ever eaten a bison wing? Has anyone ever exhorted the Bison Gals to come out tonight and dance by the light of the moon?
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