A British Editor’s Advice: Just Let ‘No’ Say It All

It should gladden the hearts of all English-speaking people to hear that the London Times is preparing a new style book to bring its writers and editors up to date on the language.

Though the Times is not widely read in the United States, its style is still the standard that many American newspapers adhere to.

(That last sentence ends in a preposition, a usage that is much despised by purists; but when an editor eliminated a terminal preposition from one of Winston Churchill’s manuscripts, he noted: “This is the sort of arrant pedantry up with which I will not put.”)

Some of the rules projected for the new style book reflect the Times’ acceptance of the new: for example, the verb “to video” will be allowed; though all other gentlemen in its news columns will be referred to as Mr, that title will not be given to convicted felons, the long dead, and artists, sports figures and others “whose fame transcends the rules.” Thus, the Times will no longer refer to Ringo Starr as Mr Ringo Starr.

The title Ms will be used only when requested, but it will be used automatically in stories from the United States unless otherwise requested. Curiously, the Times does not use periods after such titles.

According to an article in the Times itself, the new book will list several “sloppy” words that ought to be avoided: problem, provision, very, issue, accommodate, crisis, interesting, and, above all, situation.

One can imagine the crisis situation that would arise should such a rule be imposed on American political pundits.

The new rules will exclude words that cause needless offense, such as geriatric, paralytic and spastic. The word yuppies may be used only in quotation marks (though I don’t see how quotation marks excuse the use of any offensive word).

Simon Jenkins, editor of the book, reiterates the Times’ liking for the word no as an instrument of brevity. “Used firmly,” he says, “this splendid word will enhance any negative sentence.” For instance, he points out, “He indicated his reluctance to accept the terms on which the proposal was offered” means, simply, “He said no.”

I once speculated that yes was the most important word in the language; several readers argued that it was no .

“Brevity is the key to clarity,” Jenkins says. “Without clarity a newspaper is useless.”

Meanwhile, in one of his outspoken columns, the Chicago ace Mike Royko recently demolished a “bad-word dictionary” put together by a panel of news people on something called the Multicultural Management Program at the University of Missouri School of Journalism.

In an introduction, the dictionary was described as a “checklist of words, many objectionable, that reporters and editors must be aware of in order to avoid offending and perpetuating stereotypes.”

Royko quoted several words which he said were “obviously offensive. So you don’t see them in newspapers.” (Which is why you won’t see them in this one).

However, he was outraged by the inclusion of many words that he finds useful and inoffensive, among them Dutch treat, airhead, burly, buxom, dear, dingbat, ditz, dizzy, fried chicken, gorgeous, gyp, housewife, illegal alien, Ivan, jock, johns, lazy, pert, petite, shiftless, stunning and ugh.

“Ugh,” he noted, was on the list because “it is a guttural word used to mimic American Indian speech. Highly offensive.”

The list says that calling a shared luncheon bill a “Dutch treat” implies that the Dutch people are cheap.

Fried chicken was listed because it is “a loaded phrase when used carelessly and as a stereotype, referring to the cuisine of black people.”

As usual, Royko rebels: “The age of super-sensitivity is crushing me. I started to feel like a beaten man while reading the list of words that I shouldn’t use because they might offend someone. . . . I refuse to knuckle down to the dizzy new-age journalistic airheads in this ditzy Multicultural Management Program. . . . Fried chicken, fried chicken, fried chicken. I said it and I’m glad. Sue me. In conclusion, your dictionary is a stunning example of lazy shiftless thinking. Ugh.”

I agree with the authors of the proscriptive list that newspapers must be careful not to use words that are offensive for reasons of race, gender or physical disability. Even though Royko used several such words, to make his point, I would not. I’m sure the reader knows what they are.

But I agree with Royko that the wholesale exclusion of descriptive words, just because someone might be “sensitive” to them, is ditzy. Is Zsa Zsa Gabor buxom or is she not? Is Elizabeth Taylor stunning or is she not? Is Kirk Gibson a jock or is he not?

I am sometimes called a WASP. Actually, I am not a WASP. I am, it’s true, a white Anglo-Saxon, but I am not a Protestant. But being called one doesn’t bother me. I’m used to it. When I was inducted into the Marine Corps I was asked whether I was a Catholic or a Protestant. They wanted to stamp the appropriate initial on my dog tags. “Neither,” I said. “You have to be one or they other,” the man said. “I’m neither,” I repeated. “You’re Protestant,” he said, and stamped a P on my tags, for all time.

I’ve even been called an airhead. Didn’t hurt. I’ll tell you one thing, though, I wouldn’t want to be called gorgeous.