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Forum -> The Social Scene -> Chit Chat
PSA: "Pressure" vs. "Pressurize"



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zaq




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, Nov 24 2015, 7:52 pm
When you keep an enclosure under higher pressure than its surroundings, that's "Pressurizing". Airplane cabins are "pressurized", meaning that the air inside is at higher pressure than outside, because up at cruising altitude, the pressure of air is too low to sustain life. Moonwalkers wear pressurized suits for the same reason. You make sure not to try to open your pressure cooker while it's still pressurized, but wait till the pressure goes down.

When you try energetically to influence a person to do something, you "press" or "pressure" the person. You do NOT "pressurize" him or her. She or he is already pressurized to match the pressure of the atmosphere.

Thank you for your cooperation. When you talk about "pressurizing" people, I keep visualizing the poor victims connected to little hoses, being pumped full of compressed air until they rupture like overfilled balloons.
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PinkFridge




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, Nov 24 2015, 8:44 pm
Thanks. I feel your pain though I haven't seen this one. Might this be an English thing? I think I've heard some Brits use "pressurize." Then again, they'd probably write "pressurise."
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pesek zman




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, Nov 24 2015, 8:52 pm
British Husband often feels pressurized
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Maya




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, Nov 24 2015, 8:55 pm
PinkFridge wrote:
Thanks. I feel your pain though I haven't seen this one. Might this be an English thing? I think I've heard some Brits use "pressurize." Then again, they'd probably write "pressurise."

I've seen this a hundred times on this site. Drives me crazy. Thanks for the PSA.
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cm




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, Nov 24 2015, 9:04 pm
LOL! I have only seen it on this site, so I thought it might be a "frum" thing, not unlike "staying *by* someone's house," rather than "at."
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gp2.0




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, Nov 24 2015, 11:02 pm
Sorry zaq, it totally seems wrong to me too, but several online dictionaries concur that it can be used both ways.
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etky




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Nov 25 2015, 12:58 am
It's a Britishism that I've never heard used by Americans off of this site.
Odd that it's such common usage on a site dominated by American English, because unlike many other Britishism's, it's one that, as an American, sounds totally off to me.
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