Stupidity is a word that appears often as a general intensifier: \u201cBring me the stupid hammer.\u201d\u00a0 In fact, such usage is the topic of this post: the stupidity of using words senselessly.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
\u201cStupid\u201d is derived from a Latin word for being knocked senseless.\u00a0 Sadly, such trauma isn\u2019t even necessary to evoke what passes for English now.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know if things were ever better in English and I assume that every language has the same malevolent aberrations.\u00a0 I call it \u201cgrunt & point\u201d English, as though one were pointing at the salt and uttering \u201cUgh!\u201d instead of \u201cPass the salt, please.\u201d\u00a0 When confronted (which only happens when a parent corrects a child), the offender offers \u201cOh, you know what I mean.\u201d\u00a0 And indeed I do: pointing at the salt and uttering \u201cUgh!\u201d would indicate clearly that the speaker wishes for me to pass the salt.\u00a0 And having studied Greek, Hebrew, Spanish, and German, I have enough linguistic facility to decipher such barbarity as:\u00a0And I was like, \u201cDuhhh,\u201d and he was like, \u201cReally?\u201d and I was like, \u201cDude!\u201d and he was like, \u201cHellO?” and I was like, \u201cCome ON,\u201d and he was like, “AWKward,\u201d and I was like . . .<\/em>\u00a0you get the idea.\u00a0 But the fact that I can decipher it does not lessen its stupidity.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Today I decided to read up on how to plant a tree.\u00a0 I came across this statement:\u00a0As you look around town at well formed and healthy trees, invariably you will discover that the root flare is exposed.<\/em>\u00a0 It isn\u2019t important that you understand what a root flare is, or what its benefit is.\u00a0 Just read the claim as it lies, noticing the word \u201cinvariably.\u201d\u00a0 That word means \u201cthere are no exceptions.\u201d\u00a0 But the next sentence in the article said\u00a0There are always exceptions to the rule.<\/em>\u00a0 In other words, there are no exceptions except when there are exceptions.\u00a0 The writer should have said \u201cusually\u201d instead of \u201cinvariably.\u201d\u00a0 And if he were to object with the defense \u201cWell, you know what I meant,\u201d I would point at my previous paragraph and utter \u201cUgh!\u201d\u00a0 He used the word \u201cinvariably\u201d with stupid disregard (or ignorance) of its meaning.\u00a0 The meaning was of no more significance than \u201cUgh!” would\u00a0 have been; it\u2019s just a placeholder.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Reading that barbarism this morning reminded me of a letter to the editor that I read in a magazine years ago.\u00a0 A woman gushed that she enjoyed the magazine a lot and her young son did, too.\u00a0 In fact, \u201cHe literally devours each issue as soon as I bring in the mail.\u201d\u00a0 I needn\u2019t explain to you that \u201cliterally\u201d is exactly what she\u00a0did not<\/em>\u00a0mean.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n You: Oh, you know what she meant.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Me: Ugh!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n The very word \u201cbarbarism\u201d is enlightening.\u00a0 It referred originally to the unintelligibility of a foreigner\u2019s speech, as though it sounded like \u201cbar bar bar bar.\u201d\u00a0 Now it refers generally to an inability to conduct oneself according to traditional standards.\u00a0 Verbal stupidity is a kind of barbarism: using words not for their meaning, but just as meaningless sounds which get the listener\u2019s attention and help, along with gestures, intonation, facial expression, and the situation generally, to convey the speaker\u2019s intention.<\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Stupidity is a word that appears often as a general intensifier: \u201cBring me the stupid hammer.\u201d\u00a0 In fact, such usage is the topic of this post: the stupidity of using words senselessly. \u201cStupid\u201d is derived from a Latin word for being knocked senseless.\u00a0 Sadly, such trauma isn\u2019t even necessary to evoke what passes for English … Continue reading “Verbal Stupidity”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p45dxY-5Z","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.barleyservices.biz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.barleyservices.biz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.barleyservices.biz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.barleyservices.biz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.barleyservices.biz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=371"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.barleyservices.biz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":525,"href":"http:\/\/www.barleyservices.biz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371\/revisions\/525"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.barleyservices.biz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.barleyservices.biz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.barleyservices.biz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}