This article, linked to at Tims place, is behind a paywall, but all you really need to know is in the first paragraph, which you can still read
People should not use colloquial phrases like “a piece of cake” and “kill two birds with one stone” because they are “very British-English” and may not be understood by foreigners, a university has suggested...
As my regular reader may be aware, we spend a lot of our holiday time in Corfu, as we love the place and want to retire there
As a result, I end up having a lot of conversations with local Greek people. Obviously in Englash, as my Greek is appalling (but better than your average tourist), and their English is better than that spoken in many UK cities, though I do try to throw in some Greek and pick up a couple of new words where possible
During such conversations though, I always try to simplify my English as much as I can, avoiding slang and other stuff they're not likely to know (Eg. This weather is a bit pants)
Of course this university is not suggesting we tone down English jargon while travelling abroad, but we completely remove our idiosyncratic language from everyday use, in case one of our imports happens to hear it and gets a bit confused
I'm all for particular language for a particular context, but in my native environment, I'm gonna talk proper. I'll happily explain anything that my listener doesn't quite grasp, but I'm not going to stop saying it
Why? Well I simply cannot think of a single reason why I would
And for the avoidance of any doubt:
Cardiff institution also says phrases such as ‘the blind leading the blind’ are ableist
At which point they can just fuck off
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