You seem to be putting yourself out there as the absolute authority on word usage
Wrong again. I use dictionaries and other language guidelines as the basis for my statements.
There have been examples provided by people quoting other common uses of the word "trawler" but you seem oblivious to these examples.
Wrong again. The fact that others use the word in other incorrect ways does not make them correct. It just makes them wrong in a different way.
I have tried to point out that the meanings and usage of words changes over time...
Even my dog knows this. Anyone still breathing knows that language evolves. But this does not automatically make every incorrect, ignorant use of a word valid other than in the mind of the person who uses it incorrectly.
You are stuck with a dated definition and refuse to acknowledge the current common usage.
Wrong again. It's not a dated definition according to the sources with a hell of a lot more authority and knowledge of the subject than either of us.
I will continue to describe my boat as a trawler and you will probably continue to insult my intelligence.
There. FINALLY you got one right. I learned long ago not to expect ignorance to cure itself so I have no false expectations in this case, either.
What your posts tell me is that you are the exact target of the marketing folks who cooked up the application of the word "trawler" to attach to a cabin cruiser in the hopes of fooling the market into thinking their toy boats had the attributes of a truly seaworthy, rugged, working boat. The objective as a lot of us know, was to change the perception of a (somewhat) mass produced pleasure craft in the eyes of a specific group of buyers.
Like the guys who in the 1800s mixed river water, dye, alcohol and a bit of flavoring and flogged it to a gullible public as a cure for any ailment they might have had, the cruising boat manufacturers read their target market perfectly and fed it a term they knew would clamp onto their buyers' egos and desires and sucker them right on in.
And, as evidenced by this thread, it worked probably better than the market folks ever dreamed it would. When I read one of these "my toy boat's a trawler" posts what I see is a guy standing in front of snake oil wagon in some podunk town holding up a fistful of dollars to the "doctor" and clamoring for "one a' them bottles of magic elixir."
It's a trick as old as the hills. Hell, I and the people I work with use it in some form or other almost every day with our audiences. It should surprise us that it still works as well as it does. But despite today's technology, sophistication and communications, human nature never changes. People will fall for anything if you give them just the right shove.
The word "trawler" was the perfect shove in this case. It would be fascinating to know just how many toy boat sales the use of that word has been directly responsible for.