The other day, I saw that ordinary summer temperatures were now labeled as “Extreme heat”. Sounds scary.

Then I saw a story about a “Mega El Nino”. These terms are not confined to weather stories – many topics are now linked to the word “crisis” or other superlative wording.

A big part of it is attention economics: more alarming framing tends to get clicks, views, and shares, so outlets (and content farms) have incentives to escalate language. People and audiences show negativity bias (threats and fear draw more attention), so “crisis”-style phrasing performs better than calmer wording.

On the science/forecasting side, “category inflation” also happens. Weather/climate agencies describe events with thresholds and probabilities, but journalists amplify that into more dramatic labels (“extreme,” “mega,” “historic”)—sometimes because it’s easier to communicate, sometimes to reflect a worst-case range, and sometimes simply because it’s become a recognizable style.

Stacking scary qualifiers, using escalating adjectives, and converting risks into constant emergencies—is a known media phenomenon: headline escalation plus risk communication turned into marketing language.