/flame on

The recent presidential election in America was truly a historic event.

Yes... 'a historic event', not 'an historic event'. Unless, of course, we've started swallowing our 'h's the same way the Americans have. How many people in Singapore say 'erbs' when they mean 'herbs'. Take note, CNA, if you want your television reporters to say 'HIStoric' instead of 'IStoric', it is an 'A' that belongs in front of it. See what I did? I used the correct word!

Moving on, it seems that the copywriters at Mediacorp have latched on to the 'historic' tag and gone wild. Apparently, an upcoming football match in the S-League or some-such is going to be a 'historical' event. Oh, really? Has it already happened? If it was going to have that much of an impact, it would be a 'historic' event... the two are NOT interchangeable for the love of cute baby kittens! Historic means it is an event of note, some sort of history-making thing. Historical means that it has already happened and is an event of record. Historical events need not be important, in fact the vast majority of historical events probably aren't. Going on that though... the upcoming football match in 'one of Asia's top 10 leagues' is likely to be just such a historical event (see what I did again? I"m clever, me!) unnoticed and pretty much not cared about.

Moving on again, what on earth is with the use of 'ironical'? Making a word longer doesn't make it sound more intelligent or emphasise your point any better... Why? Just... why? Just because something may be logical, it doesn't mean that 'ironic' needs to be dressed up with '-al'. Something may be ironic and retribution may be ironically come by... but what use, ironcial? It's just 'ironic' with window dressing... unnecessary, ugly window dressing.

Next, 'so-called'. I used to be platonically acquainted with this phrase. Never in love, mind you! Our relationship was purely platonic and I did use it from time to time. For example: 'Your so-called friend just ratted on you, hah!' I can even tolearate 'this so-called financial crisis'. But oh, how I've grown to hate it. People use 'so-called' much too often. Particular annoyance: 'This so-called plaintiff'. Excuse me? It says right here on this piece of paper we call a case report that this was the person who started the action. Since people who start actions in court are called plaintiffs, ipso facto, this person is a plaintiff. No 'ifs', not 'buts' and certainly no 'so-calleds' about it. If it's true, it's true.

Oh and one last thing! 'Voir dire'. Learn to pronounce it please. please. pretty please. baby kittens die every time someone gets it wrong. It is not, in my approximation of IPA (call it pig IPA), Voo-ire die-er or Voy-er die-er. It sounds something like vwa di-r(with a little bit of a roll of the tongue on the 'r'). C'est comme 'voir dire' en francais. But the term is derived from an old French phrase which means 'truth say'. Tidbit done!

In summary: Hire people who can speak English to write it; English is a beautiful language if you craft it right... and longer words do not make better English; be accurate; and pronunciation (in pig IPA, pro-NUN-si-ay-shun) is everything.

Thank you.
/flame off