When Did....Become...?

‘Male or female’ and ‘gender specific’ are entirely different things though.

My bugbears are: "avoid" when they mean "prevent"

CONtribute instead of conTRIbute
Also applies to distribute. And you can't blame the Americans for that. I've never heard any of them get it wrong.

When did call centre workers become customer assistants, morphing into agents, which changed into consultants...??

Outside - outside of
ReSEARCH - REEsearch

Nothing has a price anymore. It’s a price point.

Big challenge or question became big ask.
I was taught that you can ask a question but you can't question an ask.

One that I find irritating is ‘different to’. I was always taught ‘different from’ and ‘similar to’. Newsreaders on the BBC seem to use it all the time. Is it no longer correct?

One I notice frequently is the use of ‘right now’ instead of ‘at the moment’. Another Americanism. We could do without them.

Broken became dysfunctional
Male or female became gender specific

I thought medicine referred only to liquid whilst medication encompasses tablets, capsules and liquids

Things just used to be "free". Now they are "for free".

Personal assistant became support staff.

I grew up having "medicine" now I gather it is "medication". Why?

Keeping a good distance apart became social distancing.

Take away became take outs..

Tone polyperkins - " Here Endeth the Lesson ".
Maybe neither I or the poster who followed clarified but I don't think either of our posts meant we required a teaching lesson. I think the vast majority of people know the correct usage of all four words. There may be less wine in the bottle but that also means there are fewer units of alcohol.
As to the matter of your question see:
--Friday 03 -April 20 14:14:54
PS. your last "sentence" is not a sentence since it lacks a definer.

When did I incorrectly attribute a condition as a state of being?
And I only went on about using fewer or less than in the correct book text because some one put when did less become fewer and number become amount, or words to that effect.
Sorry if I offended!

Lyndag52

Think you’re on the wrong thread.

Feeling for myself, my eldest son has a new partner, they just started living together, they both have children, been on phone today and they went to see her mum and dad, (in the garden) self distancing, but my son hasn't been seen me for 4 weeks,, wished they would at least chat to me from a distance, mother of son and suddenly forgotten???

I agree with all the above and I would like to add ‘presently’.
I will do it presently, after I have finished what I am doing at the moment. Not, I am presently writing

Someone mentioned why the word ‘gay’ earlier. It was explained to me when I was in Greenwich village standing in a very short, narrow street called Gay Street. In the early 60s many homosexual men used to live in that street. When Marilyn M died there was a lot of mourning in the bars near there and fights broke out. The call went out that is was the people from Gay Street which got shortened to the gays. I am sorry if I have offended anyone.

Who are you trying to teach polyperkins? This thread is not necessarily about whether the use of a word or term is correct or incorrect in its usage. I do, however, find an inconsistency in your statement 'it annoys me when it's wrong' and yet earlier in this thread you incorrectly attributed a condition as a state of being. Is that not wrong or is it a case that it doesn't annoy you so therefore it is immaterial?

Also ‘very unique’ annoys me. It’s either unique (there is only one) or not!

For less/fewer and amount/number it of course depends on the context. If there are separate items then it’s fewer and. Number. If it’s one mass of something like flour you should say less and amount.
Eg there are fewer people here (not less people)
But there is less wine in the bottle.

That’s why ‘6 items or less’ is wrong . It should be fewer.

Same with amount and number. The ‘amount of money he Spent’ is correct. But the amount of coins in her purse is wrong - it’s the number of coins.

Here Endeth the Lesson. Sorry! Only it annoys me when it’s wrong!

Amount instead of number.