Does this particular (supposed) definition change matter here? Because if it doesn't, pushback by the aggressor is heinous and obviously disingenuous even if your abstract love of accuracy means you happen to agree with the objection.
And the definition does matter, because 'famine' has the meaning of a certain level of bad thing happening. If we do not preserve the meaning, then the word will not have a meaning, then we have no more word to talk about that bad thing, so we will pay no attention to averting or fixing the bad thing because we don't have the literal ability to talk about it.
I'm in favor of being able to have a productive discussion about famines and how to avoid them, so I'm in favor of having a word for 'famine' with a clearly defined meaning.
PS Do you really think the number “15%” is some natural value that nature or the Bible or teams of scientists chose to define “famine”? It’s an arbitrary threshold that someone picked because it’s a bit larger than 10% and less than 20% and divisible by the number of digits on the human hand.
But it’s a threshold. Remove the threshold and we lose accountability. Any level is simultaneously abhorrent and unavoidable.
A village of 100 people where 50% are starving is better than a country of 1,000,000 where 10% are.
Who cares?
We just watched this nonsense happen with the word genocide. Both sides were careless with it. Now, it's lost meaning. Famine is still a hard line in the sand. All the evidence points to Israel having breached that line. The solution isn't to get rid of the line, it's to point to the line, point to the ground and say you're past the fucking line.