LL-L "Grammar" 2005.12.04 (06) [E]

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   L O W L A N D S - L * 04 December 2005 * Volume 06
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From: "Ian Pollock" <ispollock at shaw.ca>
Subject: LL-L "Grammar"

> From: Global Moose Translations <globalmoose at t-online.de>
> Subject: LL-L "Grammar" 2005.12.03 (05) [E]
>
> Let's admit it, people - don't we all have this feeling of "help, my
> language is being hijacked by morons"?? I certainly do. And 
> unfortunately,
> those aren't only unfeeling and/or uneducated people who don't give a 
> damn
> about the beauty of the language, but, in the case of the new and 
> certainly
> not improved German spelling, also those theoretically in charge of
> preserving the language, who are butchering it instead ("rau" versus 
> "rauh"
> no longer looks rough at all!).

Yes, we all certainly have our beefs. Mine generally fall into the 
category of euphemisms general, business and military. For example, the 
lovely new euphemism for punishing a child "to be consequenced", e.g., 
"He was consequenced." For me that simply sounds like mealy-mouthed 
whitewashing.

> Honestly, people who do bad things to my language make me feel 
> violated,
> just like someone had secretly come to my house and redecorated my 
> living
> room in a tacky fashion, and switched the contents of my kitchen 
> drawers.

It may be initially a purely emotional response, but nonetheless I 
think we owe it to ourselves to ask about the exact reason that we 
dislike something. Sometimes discussions about hated words can get 
quite irrational, with people taking apparently random dislikes to 
normal words. For example, it's very popular in business circles now to 
not use "however", because it's a three-syllable synonym of "but". So 
what if it is? Can't we have synonyms?

-Ian

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