"apology" -- stretched again

[Victor Steinbok]

  Whether we call it "unapology", "non-apology" or "non-apology
apology", there appears to be a new one this morning:

> This morning, Kilmeade told viewers <http://bit.ly/b5I3cJ>, "On the
> show on Friday, I was talking about Bill O'Reilly's appearance on 'The
> View,' and I said this: 'Not all Muslims are terrorists, but all
> terrorists are Muslims.' Well, I misspoke. I don't believe all
> terrorists are Muslims. I'm sorry about that, if I offended or
> offended or hurt anybody's feelings. But that's it."

     VS-)

On 10/13/2010 6:27 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:
> At 4:37 PM -0400 10/13/10, Ben Zimmer wrote:
>> On Wed, Oct 13, 2010 at 4:27 PM, Joel S. Berson<Berson at att.net>  wrote:
>>>   At 10/13/2010 04:03 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:
>>>   >These have been called "unapologies".
>>>
>>>   Aha!  The NYTimes reporters and headline writers should be instructed.
>> On Language Log we've used "non-apologies":
>>
>> http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/003320.html
>>
>> --bgz
>>
> My first sighting of "unapology" was in Robin Lakoff's _The Language
> War_ (U. of California, 2000).  She defines the "un-apology" (with
> hyphen) more specifically as "the now fashionable practice of "high
> public officials in this and other countries to make public
> 'apologies', almost always for behavior occurring prior to their term
> of office, usually before they (or those to whom the apology is made)
> were born." (pp. 29-30)  Examples include George Bush 41's apology to
> Japanese-Americans for the internment camps, Clinton's to
> African-Americans for the Tuskegee syphilis experiments, Japan's to
> Korea for its use of Korean "comfort women" during WWII, the Pope's
> expression of "regret" for the Church's inaction during the
> Holocaust, Britain's apology to Ireland for the potato famine,
> Australia's to the aborigines for past mistreatment, Switzerland's to
> Jews for appropriating Jewish holdings during the Holocaust, etc.
> etc.  Lakoff notes that "the patent insincerity, smarminess, and
> inappropriateness of such apologies make them irresistible targets
> for ridicule." (p. 31)
>
> Note that she uses "un-apology", "'apologies'" [with scare quotes],
> and "apologies" [without scare quotes in a context that makes the
> reference clear] to refer to the same phenomenon. I find the term
> appropriate for more general use, as in the conditional apology
> mentioned in my earlier post.  One nice one, foreshadowing Mr.
> Paladino's and Jose Guillen's in the 2006 Language Log post in Ben's
> link, occurred in December 2003 following the Detroit Lions being
> edged out by the Kansas City Chiefs 17-45, when Matt Millen--the
> spectularly unsuccessful president of the Lions--engaged in a heated
> post-game exchange with receiver Johnnie Morton (an ex-Lion who at
> the time was playing for the Chiefs) and called Morton a faggot, as
> various reporters witnessing the exchange observed. Millen later said
> that if he offended anyone with his remark, he apologized.  An
> unapology if there ever was one; can't recall if he was reported to
> have used air quotes around "offended", but it does seem clear that
> politicians and sports personalities find it easier, or more
> tempting, to try to get away with homophobia than with other forms of
> prejudice, although anti-Islamic sentiments may be overtaking it.
>
> LH
>
> P.S.  Just noticed I posted almost the same (first half of this)
> message three years ago here in response to a query from Geoff
> Nunberg on the "non-apology apology", as in "Now [then VA Gov.
> Douglas] Wilder has given the standard non-apology apology: 'If I
> have offended anybody,
> I'm sorry.'"  Oh well, nothing new under the sun.  If I've offended
> anyone with the redundancy, I "apologize".

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