The Bert Lahr Awards

We did a segment in December 2022 on qualifiers, which are a form of cowardly writing. But we keep catching you using them. Stop! Be brave!

Phone call: “Hello. I’m checking to see if my business may qualify.”
Wrong! It will or it won’t.
Correct: “Hello. I’m checking to see if my business will qualify.”

Same mistake. The subcommittee is not investigating whether he might have done these things. They’re investigating whether he did do those things. The federal bureaucracy is rife with cowardly writing.

You speculate on opening day that your team will win the title. You speculate in eighth grade that one day you will marry the girl sitting behind you. People speculate that someone will be criminally charged. Not might.

If there’s a chance the grand jury will vote today on charges, you don’t have to say “possible.”

Remember: By definition, a suspension is temporary. The bus company is ending the service. For good. Then the writer said, “permanently ending,” which, of course, is both a qualifier and a redundant redundancy.

It is a fact that this could be wine. There’s a chance it is wine. Pick one.

Good grief. 100 out of 100 may be using illegal drugs. Or zero out of 100! Right? Also, when you use a figure such as “one in ten,” there’s an understanding that it’s not exact. So just say, “In the population aged 16 to 59, one in ten is using illegal drugs.;..”

And we go to the video archives for Segment 52: Anachronisms. https://youtu.be/OZHusBtDpA4

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, menus, TV news graphics, 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 can credit you properly. 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!