A Couple of Linguistic Pet Peeves

I'm not extraordinarily fussy with language. While I like playing with it as much as the next writer, more often than not I have a tendency to stick with plain language to drive my point home. So, really, I'm the least likely candidate to pick on someone's use of language, but, on Fox News Channel over the past couple of days there have been a few linguistic follies repeated ad nauseam that have driven me to the point of distraction.

Just to get them off my chest, and to entertain and enlighten you all, I shall list them out here.

1. "Shot Dead." As in, "So and so was shot dead on an L.A. freeway and it was broadcast on live television." I cannot tell you how much I hate these two words when they are thrown together. I will not quibble that "shot dead" is efficient language. Two words are used to get a message across, instead of five or ten or fifteen, which is handy when you have a word count to pay heed to and there are other things to focus on because their death is not the real story, but rather an unfortunate by-product. Yet, I cannot help but feel it's callous language. That its usage alone denies a victim of their dignity. I hate this phrase. It knocks someone's death down to two words. How cruel is that? Particularly when the rest of the story is nothing but hot air or bloated speculation meant to fill air-time, rather than to inform? The repeated usage of this phrase irks me to no end.

2. Filibustering. As in, "Senate Democrats are filibustering Republican judicial nominees." I did a doubletake on this one last night. It was so blatantly wrong that it stuck out like a sore thumb. This, to put it mildly, is inaccurate language. This is lazy language. If you took this literally, you would be well within your rights to believe Teddy Kennedy is out there on the Senate floor right now, a coffee cup full of scotch at the ready, reading the collected works of William Shakespeare into the Senate record. He's not. Neither is Hilary Clinton warming up her vocal chords by singing scales at a piano bar in Georgetown. They're not filibustering anything. Yet. The Democrats have threatened to filibuster Republican judical nominees; they have not, however, followed through. There is a difference. The threat of the filibuster is not the same thing as the actual filibuster itself. Yet, as far as the media is concerned, it is. Hence the liberal usage of the word "filibustering" to describe something that hasn't happened yet. In the process of using this lazy language they are misleading people. They skip over procedural steps that the public should be informed about; they are creating a foregone conclusion where there is none.

Since the Republican leadership is threatening to get rid of the filibuster altogether, it might behoove this news channel (and all the other ones) to describe the filibuster correctly, so as not to mislead their audience on this very important bit of news.

Ok, I feel better now. Throw your own lingustic pet peeves into the comments section. You'll feel better, too. I promise.

Posted by Kathy at May 14, 2005 10:25 AM