Watch Your Language Before You Watch Someone Else's

            One of the pleasures of writing a blog is that you can comment on subjects without being a verified expert in the field.  I know I do that much of the time.  But there are occasions when a topic is right in, as John Hodgman would say, my area of expertise.  Here’s one.

            Evidently no one today knows the meaning of the word “grammar.” Taking a simple, everyday, and accurate definition of the word from Merriam Webster, grammar is “the set of rules that explain how words are used in a language.”  Thus subject-verb agreement, tenses, negatives, etc, are parts of grammar. So, “You didn’t never” is a grammatically incorrect in mainstream English, while “vous n’avez jamais” is grammatically correct in French.

            But style, punctuation, spelling, and other areas in which a person may err, are not grammar.  You would think that publications like the Huffington Post and the Harvard Business Review would know this, but evidently they don’t.  This is especially disturbing when the writer, or his or her editor, is an alleged judge of good grammar or good writing.

            Here are two examples.  A recent article in Huffpost, called by its author, the site’s book editor, “In Defense of Adverbs.” However, the headline writer for Huffpost Books decided to lure us in with these words: “This Popular Grammar Advice  Is Totally Wrong.”  The advice?  “Never use adverbs.”  That’s not grammar advice, it’s style advice. Adverbs are a normal part of grammar, and can be used wherever it is clear they modify a verb, and adjective, or another adverb.  “You completely misused the word ‘grammar’ in your headline,” “Your advice is totally wrong,” or “Your error is made very often” are all appropriate uses of an adverb. 

            As the editor suggests, this is certainly bad advice.  Just look below at one of America’s most famous texts, which contains no fewer than five adverbs in three sentences.  But it’s not grammar advice.

            “The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain.”

            The second example is even worse, because it is entirely the fault of the author, and because one would think Harvard Business Review had pretty high standards. (Adverb alert.) Yet it published a piece by Kyle Wiens, “CEO of the largest online repair community, as well as founder of a software company dedicated to helping manufacturers publish amazing documentation” titled “I Won’t Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar.”  His examples of poor grammar? Scattering commas everywhere, not understanding the use of semicolons, writing “too” for “to,” “it’s” for “its,” or the wrong “their.”  Not one is a grammar error – they are either punctuation or spelling errors.  None are detectable in spoken language, which is the basis for all grammar.

            Fortunately, I and a great many others have been able to lambaste Mr. Wiens for his pomposity and ignorance, because HBR is open to readers’ comments if they sign in.  Sadly, the same is not true for Huffpost, which requires a Facebook account for anyone wanting to post a comment.  (No, Facebook doesn’t own Huffpost, AOL does.) I left Facebook some time ago, and I am rapidly deleting, unsubscribing, or cancelling any online entity that only allows me to approach them through the gates of Zuckerberg’s Hell. I most strongly, vehemently, and urgently advise you to do the same.

You Can’t Always Get What You Want

If you listen to the business news even occasionally, you’re familiar with this phrase or some variant of it: “the market doesn’t like uncertainty.”  Entering a few versions of the phrase on Google alone yields over 1.5 million results.  The phrase is as ubiquitous as the sports cliché “we’ve got to play one game at a time.”  But the more you think about it, the more the phrase splits into two parts, one trivial, the other irritating.

            The markets don’t like uncertainty.  Who does?  Does the employee hearing rumors of layoffs or plant closures like uncertainty?  Or the patient waiting for test results, the athletes wondering if they’ll be drafted, the couple trying to have a baby, or the older person concerned about the value of their IRA?  The list could go on interminably, but the message is simple: no human being, and probably no sentient creature, likes uncertainty.  Like the auto in The Phantom Tollbooth, the statement “goes without saying,” even though nearly every financial analysts says it.

            I suppose there are exceptions. Many thrill-seekers do appear to like uncertainty, whether they’re trying a new Xtreme sports trick or gambling everything they have in Las Vegas or on their new software idea.  John Keats even praised the “the Man of Quality” for possessing “Negative Capability, that is, when a man is capable of being in uncertainties, mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact and reason.” 

            But these special cases aside, uncertainty is, perhaps only second to mortality, the most universal and universally stressful parts of the human condition.

            That said, why do the economic pundits sing this refrain daily?  There are, I think, three reasons:

            First, it is a fact, and often a fairly successful explanatory fact.  Given the burdensome task of explaining why the stock market dipped, or why businesses are not hiring, the interviewee reaches for an incontrovertible fact, however bland that fact may be.  More specific attributions, such as concern over some country’s debt, some large corporation’s poor earnings, or simple profit-taking, are more debatable.  No one is going to counter Jim Kramer with the reply, “oh yes they do like uncertainty.”

            A more important reason, or maybe assumption is a better word, is that the speakers have elevated business’s or the markets’ uncertainty to a privileged position.  You and I may have to live with uncertainty, but the business world certainly shouldn’t have to.  After all, a major goal of entrepreneurs, big investors, venture capitalists, and the rest of those whose life is in the markets, is to achieve such a level of financial security that they can personally minimize uncertainty.  Having millions spread among a variety of assets, living in a gated community, being able to hire security guards, afford the best medical care, and possessing all the accoutrements of great wealth enable the a select few to feel secure from almost everything except death, and maybe even, delusionally, that too. 

            So the first unquestioned assumption is that the markets, business, or corporations, despite the Supreme Court’s contention that they are people, should really be free of the uncertainty that plagues the flesh and blood person. And remember, the corporation in all its forms is founded on the notion of persistence beyond the lives of it members.  Too bad they’re not self-aware, so they don’t know they’ve achieved immortality.

            The second, and more insidious assumption is revealed in one of the most common contexts of the phrase.  Very often the uncertainty the pundit is lamenting is an uncertainty owing to government deliberation or action.  Will there be a shutdown?  Will taxes go up?  Will the Fed continue the stimulus?  The hidden critique is that bad old government is upsetting good old business, which is a lamentable state of affairs.  The odd paradox is that, at least in recent times, the party of business creates most of the uncertainty that it deplores, then blames the government it is hampering.  Of course, conservatives can have it both ways: if government can’t get anything done, even if they are responsible for the inaction, then they can point to the fact that goverment can’t get anything done to prove their position.  But that’s matter for another time.

            For now, let’s remember that uncertainty is far more harmful to the average person than to Tom Wolfe’s “Masters of the Universe,” and let’s remind the experts of that whenever we can.

The Law Sir, is a Ass

            Though the law is not always “a ass” (after all, Dickens’ Mr. Bumble was only talking about a specific law), lawmakers all too often belong inside a donkey costume rather than a legislature.

            Two current examples, one from various state legislatures and a lesser one being bruited in Washington, are perfect examples.  In the past few months, nearly twenty percent of the states have proposed laws allowing businesses owners to refuse service or employment on the basis of their religious beliefs.  The legislature in Arizona has actually passed such a law.  The bills vary widely.  Some are honest about their purpose, stating that business owners can discriminate on the basis of a person’s sexual orientation, but others simply allow discrimination against anyone at all based on religious belief.

            The mind truly boggles.  There are some cases where sexual orientation is apparent – when a wedding photographer, caterer, or reception hall is asked to work with a gay or lesbian couple.  Leaving aside such distinctive cases, which still raise huge questions about, for example, whether a business, especially one that is formally incorporated, can have religious beliefs, two obvious problems arise:

            First, how would an individual’s sexual orientation, or any other violation of the business owner’s beliefs, become apparent?  “Hi, I’m gay.  Would you please fix my flat tire?”  “Do you have a table for two lesbians tonight?”  One assumes that those with virulent anti-gay prejudice are hardly gifted with excellent gaydar.  Would we have new signs saying “No gays need apply” or “Gays not wanted here?” Imagine the thought process:  “Oh dear, I’m gay and I have a toothache.  Better not go to that dentist though.”  “Whoops, I know we’re almost out of gas, but that station doesn’t allow a Subaru with two women in it to fill up.”

            Second, how can the rules be limited to gays?  Every religion has innumerable bans, some of which are common, others rare.  Just take Catholics: no gays, divorced people, users of birth control. Or Quakers: no soldiers.  Could Jews ban someone who recently ate a pork sausage, Hindus an eater of beef, etc. etc?

(I know some of these apply only to members of the religion, but no doubt some would claim even proximity to treyf is unbearable.)

            More important are the universals.  Take the Ten Commandments and their parallels.  What faith doesn’t list adultery, stealing, lying, dishonoring parents, murder, and the like among sins?  Jesus, after all, spoke against divorce, but never against homosexuality.  Maybe we should rewrite his admonition: “Let he who is without sin among you buy my wares; all others keep out.”  (Of course, the business owner should by rights have nothing to do with himself unless he has never violated any of his church’s tenets.)

            So not only are these bills small-minded, bigoted, and most likely unconstitutional, they are about as unenforceable as any ever dreamed up by ass-headed politicians.

            Not quite so illogical, but still disappointing, is the recent proposal that Olympic athletes should not have to pay taxes on the money they receive for winning.  At first glance not a big deal:  the prizes top out at $25,000, and for most medal winners, taxes on their endorsements and appearances will amount to much more.

            It’s only when you realize that all other prizes, including MacArthur grants and Nobel prizes, are taxed – thanks to a tax hike in 1986 during the Reagan administration – that you start to get annoyed.  Prior to 1986, it was felt that prizes given for achievement, and for which no services were rendered, should not be taxed.  Unlike Olympic athletes, no one explicitly works on a scientific or artistic project, or strives for peace, because a Nobel or MacArthur lies at the end of the trail.  In fact, Olympic athletes are more like NFL, NBA, or MBL players, or indeed like contestants on Jeopardy or The Price is Right than they are like the writers, doctors, economists, physicists, or peace activists, who are awarded the aforementioned or similar prizes.

            So, unless they donated their prizes, which some did, Al Gore, President Obama, and Jimmy Carter were taxed – and the Dalai Lama, Nelson Mandela, and Aug San Suu Kyi would have been taxed, had they been Americans.  But the first woman to do a backward 1080 on the half-pipe, or the couple who included the best twizzlers in their dance routine, should get a pass?  

            The message couldn’t be clearer: curing cancer, stopping a war, making a breakthrough discovery, are all well and good, but what really boosts American prestige is finishing a tenth of a second ahead of someone on a hill.  What’s next?  The Indy 500 / Wimbledon / World Cup / NASCAR exemption? 

            Of course, guys like Scott Hamilton could have used the extra cash to hire a cab (if he can get one) to take him to a restaurant in Phoenix that would serve him.