

The cause of the cultural behavior usually has a purpose though.
Yeah, but not necessarily one that is still relevant or even ever actually worked towards whatever goal there originally was. Cultural inertia is like that.
So it probably at some point had a purpose, but that purpose (whatever it was) might or might not apply any more or even be total nonsense.







Any term for something that is likely to be a target of scorn or mockery has this problem unless it’s so bloodless, detached and clinical that it is effectively only usable as medical jargon and barely has any meaning outside that context. George Carlin once did a bit on this.
Related is how therapy language seems to increasingly be seeping into literally everything.