Repeat offenders: Read this column!

This is Eliot’s number one news bugaboo! Journalists — and police — have been getting it wrong for decades. A suspect is someone suspected of something. A suspect doesn’t rob a bank. A bank robber robs a bank. Later, an individual is identified as the person suspected of robbing a bank. Only then is he a suspect.

This headline doesn’t say people are suspected of attacking the base. It says they absolutely did attack. Then it calls them suspects? of what? They were suspected of something else before they stormed the base? Just say, “Authorities: Gunmen Storm Joint Base Andrews.” (It said later they were male.) Notice we cut out a word and tightened the headline.

It’s possible the good doctor wanted to say it was excepting — leaving out — Saturday appointments. But we’re pretty sure of what he meant: That he’s accepting Saturday appointments. And a reminder about appointments from a February 2021 segment: Your visit to the doctor is not an appointment. It’s a visit. An appointment is something you mark in your calendar. Substitute “reservation” for “appointment” and you see how it doesn’t work.

We previously have acknowledged that we might already have lost this battle. Keep in mind that no one is stopping you from using incorrect writing. We’re just here to show you the right way. A pickup is a type of truck, so this is a redundancy, similar to “sedan car” or “yacht boat.” So in mentioning this tragedy, you just can say “Pickup crash kills 9.” Really.

This is full of redundant redundancies and cowardly writing. Can we assume a user is smart enough to know what happens if he presses the power button, so that won’t be an option? And it’s nice that they say, “Please,” but we never figured out this practice. You don’t want to push the button? Frankly, the TV maker doesn’t give a hoot. How about: “To turn the screen back on, press any button.” We just tightened 15 words to nine.

Again: “Less” for volume, “fewer” for items. So, “Less pain” and “fewer steroids.”

“Princess Bride” is one of the Horribly Wrong team’s favorite movies. But the mistakes made by this film website are, well, inconceivable! First, the writer turned two words into one and changed a boy home sick to a homesick boy. Then the writer invoked the misplaced modifier to make the grandfather home sick. Or homesick. Or the guy who killed Inigo Montoya’s father.

How about: “While a young boy is home sick in bed, his grandfather reads him the story…”

And we go to the video for Segment 14: More horror in the boardroom. https://youtu.be/hoFfKcfK-pI

Readers: "Something Went Horribly Wrong" features samples of bad writing we see nearly every day. You can participate! Be our duly deputized “grammar police:” Your motto: “To protect and correct.” Send in your photos of store signs, street signs, newspaper headlines, tweets, and so on. It doesn’t have to be a grammatical error. It can be just what we call “cowardly writing.” Include your name and home town so we properly can credit you. You're free to add a comment, although we reserve the right to edit or omit. Now get out there! Send to Eliot@eliotkleinberg.com

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NOTE: Eliot and Lou Ann are available for speaking engagements, and can travel. Reach us through the comments section. Just think of all of your employees getting back to work on a Monday, their heads filled with all the ways we’ve shown them to be better communicators!