Monday, September 05, 2011
Pet peeve
Since I turned off the TV, I haven't had many chances to get irritated by the peculiar language of Conservatese or Foxian. Every now and then I'll accidentally listen to a Foxian-speaker, and the old bile rises. The most egregious bits of Foxian are the "correction" of every dangling preposition and split infinitive into ridiculously clumsy and ambiguous Germanic syntax. Another aspect is the insistence on "conservative" definitions of certain specific words, which means picking a random date in history and using the word's definition in some ancient time.
Jed Babbin, the purest of the Neocons, got off a perfect example today. Subbing for Jerry Doyle (who doesn't speak Foxian), Babbin was talking as always about how everything was heavenly and perfect and Nirvana under the Holy Saintly George Double-U Bush [Sanctified Be His Holy Name], and everything is now Dirty and Horrible and Hellish since the very moment of the Satanic Inauguration of Satan Himself on January 20, 2009, a Day That Shall Live In Infamy.
Babbin was saying something about the workforce being decimated, then interrupted himself to say "Of course decimated really means reduced by one-tenth, not eliminated."
No, asshole. That's what decimated really meant to the Romans. In modern English, for at least 200 years, decimated really means "nearly eliminated."
If you're having a private audience with the Pope, you can speak Latin. But if you're talking to modern literate speakers of English, then you MUST use the accepted modern meanings of words. No choice. Otherwise you're talking in secret code. ¶ 12:50 PM
Jed Babbin, the purest of the Neocons, got off a perfect example today. Subbing for Jerry Doyle (who doesn't speak Foxian), Babbin was talking as always about how everything was heavenly and perfect and Nirvana under the Holy Saintly George Double-U Bush [Sanctified Be His Holy Name], and everything is now Dirty and Horrible and Hellish since the very moment of the Satanic Inauguration of Satan Himself on January 20, 2009, a Day That Shall Live In Infamy.
Babbin was saying something about the workforce being decimated, then interrupted himself to say "Of course decimated really means reduced by one-tenth, not eliminated."
No, asshole. That's what decimated really meant to the Romans. In modern English, for at least 200 years, decimated really means "nearly eliminated."
If you're having a private audience with the Pope, you can speak Latin. But if you're talking to modern literate speakers of English, then you MUST use the accepted modern meanings of words. No choice. Otherwise you're talking in secret code. ¶ 12:50 PM
