Stephen Colbert takes credit for the 'post-truth' era we're living in
This week, Oxford named "post-truth" its word of 2016 because of the word's popularity during the US presidential election and other recent events.
Oxford sums up post-truth this way: "an adjective defined as 'relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.'"
But Colbert says Oxford is stealing a word he actually coined while hosting "The Colbert Report" on Comedy Central.
"I am pre-enraged," the host said during his opening monologue on Thursday's episode of "The Late Show."
Colbert went on to explain, "'Post-truth' is clearly just a rip-off of my 2006 word of the year: truthiness."
He then contended that not only did Oxford rip him off - it didn't use the correct definition either.
"You want to know what truthiness means?" Colbert asked. "You know who to call: Stephen Colbert."
Colbert's definition is: "Truthiness (noun) - the belief in what you feel to be true rather than what the facts will support."
"Oh, I personally believe I'm being ripped off," he said after comparing the dueling word definitions. "But the experts have decided it's the word of the year, so post-truth, I'm going to be gracious about it."
He then feigned being gracious before dropping the facade.
Watch him defend his claim to the word of the year below (at five minutes in):