Ooh, What You Said!

Sometimes when no one "gets it," it may not be because what you wrote makes no sense, it may be because your readers don't understand the subtext. (I say may be because I don't know the readers in the example that follows, don't know if they even read what I wrote, or if they did, what they thought; I'm extrapolating based on reactions from real people in other circumstances).

Case in point: I commented on a Herculodge post here with what I consider to be a very wise approach to foul language. No one commented on my comment. No applause, no boos. My guess is that the reaction was "Ho hum. If it works for you." I think what I wrote deserves closer scrutiny than that, but you can't make someone appreciate your opinion in 100 words or so, and the way blogs work of course, older posts move to the next page and eventually become a PITA to find, so after an initial flurry of activity, you wouldn't normally expect much except for the most controversial topics.

I'm not under any misapprehension that every word that trips off my fingertips should elicit ooh's and aah's. It's rather that when a valid point is made and no one remarks on it, it makes one wonder why, and you start asking yourself questions like "Did they understand it?" "Did they think it was stupid?" "Did they think it was out of place?" "Did I misunderstand something?" "Maybe it was as complete as it needed to be and no comments would have added anything to it?"

The point I thought I made was that the words that hurt people are more often not the 4-letter variety; but I have shared this with others, in person, and I think most of the time there is agreement, but that folks have so much difficulty controlling the most hurtful words (fat, lazy, stupid, etc) that they just don't want to look any more closely at it.

(Most of us who are acutley aware of what we are thinking often judge ourselves even if the words never leave our mouths. It's a rare person that rarely thinks them.)

I also think there is a powerful inclination to want there is a limited set of bad words, to believe they are bad for good reasons and you shouldn't use them, period. Just like there are bad behaviors (homosexuality) and politicians (Obama) and systems (Communism) and people (mainland Chinese - yes, listen to Lou Dobbs, is an important distinction for him, I think because he got tired of being accused of racism, which is a real bummer when you're a racist), etc.


Just guessing. There's no way to know what sort of neural networks have been built in your audience over years at the teat of family and community and media. Aside from basic shared constructs (language, physical laws, etiquette), there is, like an ice berg, vastly more beneath the surface that informs the reader, the student, the parishioner, the Nielsen household, etc.

We really don't know each other.