[Ads-l] Fwd: Peculiar use of "alleges" -- a self-alleged-ie?

[Dan Goncharoff]

Is this really such a peculiar use of allege? One of the definitions I see
is " to assert without proof or before proving". That, to my reading, is
exactly what Handler has done. That said, it is not my word choice; I
prefer assert, or contend.

DanG

On Thu, Mar 26, 2015 at 11:39 AM, Joel Berson <berson at att.net> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Joel Berson <berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject:      Re: Peculiar use of "alleges" -- a self-alleged-ie?
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Further analysis -- Handler is not "one of the 20-plus women who *have*
> com=
> e forward claiming to have been sexual assaulted" since she writes that
> she=
>  was not assaulted (her two male friends served as bodyguards).=C2=A0 She
> m=
> erely "alleges" that she might have been a 21st.
>
> Joel
> =20
>       From: Joel Berson <berson at ATT.NET>
>  To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU=20
>  Sent: Thursday, March 26, 2015 11:27 AM
>  Subject: [ADS-L] Peculiar use of "alleges" -- a self-alleged-ie?
>   =20
> =C2=A0 The insertion of the allegedly lawsuit-protective "alleges" below
> is=
>  peculiar.=C2=A0 Who said or wrote "alleges", the news writer or Handler?=
> =C2=A0 If Handler, as the passage reads, would she not *know* if she
> "could=
>  have been" one of the women who has come forward?=C2=A0 If the
> news-writer=
>  (Ryder), at best the "alleges" seems misplaced -- it should be in "women
> w=
> ho have allegedly come forward"=C2=A0 or "women who have come forward
> alleg=
> ing to have been sexually assaulted" (although "claiming" seems sufficient
> =
> here).
>
> "Chelsea Handler is not buying Bill Cosby's innocence. Why? Because she=20
> says she, too, had a sketchy close encounter with him 10 years ago.
> When speaking with Esquire, Handler alleges she could have been one of the
> =
> 20-plus women who have come forward claiming to have been sexual assaulted
> =
> by the once-beloved comedian."
>
> From=C2=A0 Yahoo News, by Taryn Ryder
> Joel
>
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