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If "tortuous" didn't already have a completely different useful meaning, I wouldn't object. Calling harmful behavior "tortious" shouldn't be ambiguous. I'm not sure what happened in olden times, but over the last decade "tortuous" has dominated because of clueless spellcheck.


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I guess you mean tortious (wrongful) rather than tortuous (winding, full of obstacles).

I generally don't like to bring any attention to language, but I do wonder if you mean tortious.

Hmm, I've been using "tortuous" as the adjective for tort for probably a couple of decades and you're the first person to try to correct me. Clearly I'm using what Wiktionary classes as usage that's obsolete.

Interestingly googling around the principle usage -- to mean pertaining to a tort -- of this spelling is in UK Terms of Use. It's quite hard to search though as often people will talk about tortuous caselaw [1], meaning 'twisting and turning'. Both usages can be in the same document, so Google Search - in particular - is no good here.

Spelling "tortuous": I find supporting documents from the UK Home Office [3], the UK IPO (including in court proceedings for trademark), and in private practice references to UK tort law, eg [2] dated 2019.

I don't consider my usage to be wrong per se but will consider using tortious in international forums (I so wanted to write "fora", lol); thanks for the query, terse as it was.

It's possible we're all using it "incorrectly" of course. I work in the IP sector, we might all be drinking from the same fountain (eg perhaps reading past UK caselaw keeps us archaic).

[1] https://www.worldtrademarkreview.com/brand-management/signif..., example of talking about an intricate case that twists and turns.

[2] https://thelawreviews.co.uk/edition/the-intellectual-propert... talking about an infringement of a tort, as tortuous.

[3] https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/references-to-the... , note I'm assuming the Home Office is the origin, it's Gov, but I don't really see mention of the department that owns that data.


I think in some cases, we could say it was "tortuous tortious interference".

Not to be confused with "tortious" or "torturous" (even though all three etymologically refer to twisting!).

Doesn't seem that out of line to me according to [0]. Subsituting from definitions in [0] yields 'as a result of Larping's deceitfully indirect or morally crooked interference' || 'as a result of Larping's circuitous interference', etc.

[0] http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/tortuous


Maybe that adjective is not quite right, "rapaciously" perhaps?

I took the "malicious" as being "severe" so didn't really find the wording redundant.

I mean, same with "harmful" right? But I've rarely heard a person described that way. Usually it's a behavior.

I used the word more tongue-in-cheek.

Not that I don't agree with your point about ambiguous use of words, or euphemisms to minimize or normalize bad behavior.

Words like "telemetry" or "advertising", which nowadays mean "conduct surveillance on someone and keep a detailed dossier"


I think the right phrase here might have passed out of our vocabulary during a long recent period of extreme permissiveness. It's ungentlemanlike to speak of such things.

"Abusable" is an interesting word choice.

I think "naughty" is a great word for that quality. The undesirable quality would be maybe something more like "reckless".

I meant it's a useful and descriptive term. I abhor the behavior.

> moral torpitude (sic)

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/turpitu...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_turpitude

Turpitude: very immoral behaviour; from Latin turpitudo (ugliness). Not a word I was familiar with - adding this comment for others.


Perhaps a better word would have been “excoriate”

Yeah, it almost reads derogatory. Thanks for looking it up. Strange word

> quite litigious

I would have used the term "vigilant" instead of "litigious". There is much less connotation of barratry, shakedowns, and other distasteful activities.

> it can be easy to get caught out by licensing requirements

Indeed, a possibly dire situation to fall into.


At some point you are just choosing medicalized word to describe undesirable behavior.
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