Brooklyn is, population-wise, the largest of New York City’s five boroughs. It’s got more people than Houston, TX, Philadelphia, PA, and three-and-a-half Detroits. Kings County, with which Brooklyn is coterminous, is the most populated in New York State and the eighth most-populated in the United States. Should you attempt to find the most racially, ethnically, religiously, socially, and financially diverse part of the country that remains nationally important and insists on being called one thing, then you should probably make a case for Brooklyn and its upstairs neighbor Queens. Brooklyn hosts newspapers and magazines written in 43 languages. Richie Havens is from Brooklyn. Lillian Feickert was from Brooklyn. Arthur Miller was from Brooklyn. Coney Island is in Brooklyn. Brooklyn’s motto is in Dutch.

Detroit is, population-wise, the largest city in Michigan. It’s bulkier than Seattle, WA, but slimmer than Charlotte, NC.  It is the only U.S. city that has both attained and lost a population of 1 million. Wayne County, in which Detroit is located and to which the city contributes about 45% of the overall population, is the nineteenth most-populated in the United States. Detroit was at one time immensely diverse—and its larger metropolitan area remains that way—but the city is now primarily black, with modest showings from Caucasian, Hispanic, South Asian, and mixed-race bloodlines. Should you attempt to find the most racially segregated part of the country that remains nationally important and insists on being called one thing, then you should probably make a case for Detroit. One-third of the city is, according to whoever defines these things, living in poverty. There are three billionaires calling a fair amount of development shots in Detroit, and one 200-millionaire in the governor’s office helping them out. Dorothy Comstock Riley was from Detroit. Sugar Ray Robinson was from Detroit. Tracy Reese is from Detroit. America’s oldest continuously-operating jazz club is in Detroit. Detroit’s motto is in Latin.

Maybe you’ve heard about that thing that’s happening in parts of Brooklyn where various people are encouraging various other people to move to Detroit. Maybe you remember that Galapagos, the sane/insane DUMBO art space, is switching things up and heading to Highland Park. Maybe you read this quite convincing article a little more than a year ago and are here to see what kind of late-to-the-game bone I have to pick with its author.

What I’m here to do, though, is to take the facts that I opened with and gently place them on everyone’s laps while urging you, me, and whoever else to please stop using the words “Brooklyn” or “Detroit” to refer to things much, much smaller than what the names most purely represent. The literary term for this kind of word use is (most purely) metonymy, and metonymy is a pretty cool and handy thing. But there are some stakes involved when one uses the word “Brooklyn” (reminder—one of the most populous and diverse hundred-ish square-mile footprints in the country) to only mean “pizza” or “Brownsville” or “Orthodox Judaism” or “whatever isn’t Manhattan.” There are some stakes involved when one uses the word “Detroit” (reminder—a city raped and pillaged by racism, corruption, and blind capitalism, and now both earnestly protected and unfairly fetishized by seemingly every person who’s heard of the place) to only mean “Tigers” or “blight” or “two separate companies that make watches” or “everything that can go wrong does go wrong.”

Please: say what you mean. If you want to say that there are parts of Detroit growing a little too fast for just about everyone involved (like East Flatbush, Sunset Park, Bay Ridge, and a handful of other neighborhoods in Brooklyn), then say that. If you want to say that bikes and artisanal mayonnaise and a “certain type” of undefinable people kind of annoy you because you’re a little too easily annoyed, then say that. If you want to say that (a) you believe everyone has a right to live comfortably, affordably, and happily, and (b) you’re worried that not everyone will have a place at the table as things change, then say that. If by “Brooklyn” you mean “where all those effete white kids went fifteen years ago,” then say “Williamsburg.” If by “Detroit” you mean “where all those effete white kids seem to be going now,” then say “Midtown Detroit” or “maybe some parts of the North End.” If you want to talk about black folks and you’re white, then say “black folks” instead of “them.” If you want to talk about Juggalos and you’re not one, then say “Juggalos” instead of “those people.” If you want to talk about Mad Men, then say “Mad Men” and not “television.”

Words matter. That doesn’t mean that some can be used and others can’t or that you’re automatically a despicable person for saying something that someone else isn’t into. But it does mean that if we’re going to insist on using them to guide the courses of our entire human race and the various civilizations within, then we should at least be able to talk about what they do and don’t do. No one is going to die if you think “wherefore art thou Romeo?” means “literally where are you, Romeo?” (it doesn’t), and yes, plenty of people find it amusing (for some reason) when words that weren’t around when they were kids make it into one of several irrelevant reference guides uselessly propped up as some kind of law. But my two cents (as someone with a pretty strong bias) regarding this whole “language” thing is that we should be clear, clever, and capable with the words we sing and sling.