> Passwords aren't rhetorical devices, they're functional ones.
All symbols are also concrete things. Did you notice that we have words for the letters that we use to spell words ?
Super Mario Maker troll design does a good job of showing this off. Mario Maker doesn't have distinct signifiers, so the way you tell a player, "You will need a POW block to pass this" would be to actually put a real POW block, just like the one they need, inside some solid blocks nearby. Likewise for Mario's powerup mushroom for example. But because the signifier is the signified troll makers will build puzzles where e.g. the correct solution is to use Yoshi's tongue to grab the signifying POW out of the sign and then you can blow that one up. With the powerup mushroom, if we're already Big Mario, a progressive powerup becomes Fire Mario's powerup - when we saw this sign before it told us to be Big Mario, so we got ourselves Big Mario but now since we are Big Mario the same sign says Fire Mario and sure enough, Big Mario doesn't help after all.
[[ Ordinary Mario courses shouldn't do this, because it's annoying, but Troll Mario is supposed to be annoying, it's a delicate art form, like Stand Up comedy ]]
> There is, or should be, no obligation on a writer's part to avoid such terminology.
That is not how language actually works, the clear distinction you're relying on is instead blurred because symbols are not just symbols. Because language is a co-operative activity, choosing to do things you know will offend others is your fault. Now, if you're a comedian, too bad, some of the audience didn't like the joke. But if you write technical documentation this is a failure, your goal was to inform, not to make some people angry as the price to make other people laugh.