My son was flicking through a 'phobias' website the other day and laughing at some of the daft things people are scared of: buttons, toes, beards, fear itself etc. but I didn't believe him when he told me what this one meant:
hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia
Apparently it is the fear of long words. Other sources (online at least) confirm that it does indeed have some currency.
As stupid as it may be I'd sooner be hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobic than xenophobic any day. People say that xenophobia is a misnomer because it's about hatred and not fear as such. I beg to differ though- I think it is fear: it's a cowardly fear of difference by shallow, small minded, ill educated people so is exactly the right word really.
ps. I just spell checked this and hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia isn't in the Blogger dictionary for some reason. I think the dictionary compiler is a bit hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobic.
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