Unneeded Words: Actively

I’m actively hating the sprinkling of the word actively on sentences these days as if it were salt or salad dressing. In most cases (like in the previous sentence), the word contributes zero meaning to the word it modifies, let alone to the sentence. I’ve run across ridiculous, and even contradictory uses, too:

“I was actively stopping my car when …”

“The patient was actively dying …”

“States are actively restricting …”

“Police were actively pursuing ….”

It’s being used not for meaning but for additional emphasis: “I was actively breaking up with him when he proposed! Can you believe it?”

Some of this activity must be happening on bicycles, treadmills, or trampolines for these sentences to make sense. How does someone “actively stop” or “actively die”? To include the word suggests we have equally silly opposing choices, such as to “passively die” or “passively pursue.”

“I passively stopped my car.” Do you mean you let it roll until it hit a tree or ran out of gas?

“I was passively pursuing my retirement plans from my lawn chair when ….”

“He passively asked me to marry him.”

I think the intended meaning is “in the act of,” as in, “Police were in the act of pursuing the suspect when ….” Or “He was killed while in the act of duty.” At some point editors must have grown tired of this wordy (and unnecessary) phrase and started to try to make it more efficient by substituting actively. But actively is not the solution. The solution is right in front of you on your keyboard. The key is labeled “delete.” Use it. Strike it often … actively!