Wednesday, September 19, 2018

"Scared" yet?



I've been accused from time to time of using "scare quotes" around certain words; words which I feel are generally misused or are nonsense. Like "taxation", "good" cops, "immigration", or "common good".

But those quotation marks are not there to scare you; they are there to illustrate my sarcasm. They aren't "scare quotes", they are sarcastiquotes.

The very name "scare quotes" is dishonest and biased-- an attempt to shame writers into going easy with the truth. Not gonna happen. I'm going to continue to use sarcastiquotes to illustrate the dishonesty of others.
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This blog is my job.
YOU get to decide if I get paid.

3 comments:

  1. You know, Kent, I MEVER heard the term "scare quotes" until during the interregnum of the usurper, and the corresponding ascendancy of "PURPLE! faction". I think it may have been something dreamed up by the "PURPLE! faction" for use against the "GREEN! faction", and especially against the logical rhetoric and reasoning of the "I don't HAVE a kriffing color! Get a kriffing LIFE! faction". That last would be us I think, kind of by default, not by joining or organisation...

    Seaking for "Myself", "I" rarely used them as sarcastiquotes; rather, "I" usuallyu used them as "skeptiquotes" when I was questioning the veracity of an "allegation", or a "claim". Then again, everyone's "experience" is different, although this does not change objective "reality".

    Anyway, I guess I'm not a very good member of the Stazi species, because I fail to see why I am supposed to be "scared" by a couple of quote marks placed around a word. What? The? Kriff? There. I just used "agressive" "threat" question marks. Because the Stazi as a "culture" find "questions" to be a "threat"...

    "Shinseiko"

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Skeptiquotes are good, too. But even when I'm skeptical, I tend towards sarcasm.

      Delete
  2. I'm too busy hiding in my Safe Space with my coloring books and stuffed animals to comment. I'm terrified by all this nasty, ucky truth, and I want my binky and my juice box.

    ReplyDelete