LANGUAGE NEGATIONISTS

 I call language negationists those who reject some idioms and words, waiving them aside by saying: "We don´t say that in English" or "Eso no see dice en español!" They are self-appointed experts. 

Of course, every speaker is the owner of the language he speaks, and that´s why they ask: "Do you speak MY language?" Each one of us owns a piece of the whole language known as English or Spanish in our case. The average, run-of-the-mill speaker feels HIS language is THE language as a whole. But as Ortega y Gasset told us (let me paraphrase) the horizon of OUR language is not the horizon of language. There is more beyond our language, although negationists will chastise other speakers (especially foreign ones) with the remark: "We don´t say that in Engish" or "Eso no se dice en español."

My retort is always: "Funny, I´ve been saying that for over half a century." "Es curioso, pero vengo diciendo esto toda mi vida." 

Do not be intimidated by negationist native speakers, and double-check, and use creditable sources to ascertain the veracity of their "corrections" or negativity. 

I have been the butt of those negationists´ remarks all my life, in both languages.