...And um, no, I'm not talking about the last time I posted. It does feel like that long though. Today (a lil' over two months shy of my year-long hiatus), my boss handed me a book she thought would be helpful to me as an aspiring copy editor. It's entitled the Dos, Dont's & Maybes of English Usage, written by Theodore Bernstein. Frenchie informs me that Mr. Bernstein was a well-known editor at the NY Times for I don't know how many years, blah blah blah. The books looks a little weathered, and rightly so, since it was published in 1977.
It's nothing special at first glance. Perusing the pages of alphabetized words, a basic catalog of commonly misused phrases, contractions, and colloquialisms. I can see how three decades ago a respected editor would certainly benefit from having this linguistic resource handy.
G
GYNARCHY: If some of the extreme feminists have their way, we may one day have a gynarchy. That word comes from the Greek gyn- or gyno-, meaning woman, and the Greek -archy, meaning rule. Gynarchy, pronounced JIN-ar-key, means government by women. Anyway, it's better than anarchy.
Whoa, Mr. Bernstein, don't jump the gun just yet. It'll be a while before those extreme feminists get their hands on that ovum office. And I'm guessing it would be better than anarchy as well. Come to think of it, I think a few bushels are better than a prick any day.
GAY: Homosexuals have recently been taking over the adjective gay. Two things about the adoption of that word are to be condemned: first, that its meaning of merry, lighthearted or joyous is not specifically descriptive of homosexuals and may be completely nondescriptive of some of them, and second and much more important, that if the word is applied in this way very much more, it is going to be lost to the language in its true meaning. Why homosexuals want to use it at all is not very understandable; it is an adjective and only and adjective, which leaves its users without a much-needed noun. How about inventing a word that would serve both sexes--but especially males--as both a noun and an adjective? For openers, how about homex (plural homexes)? There's no patent on that invention; help yourselves, folks.
God forbid that the word "gay" be lost forever in its meaning of merry, lighthearted, and joyous. And he's right--it certainly doesn't apply to all homosexuals. I mean, on the days that I'm in a bad mood, I couldn't rightly call myself "gay." Angry dyke, maybe? Unfortunately this concept of homex didn't take off, though I do think I ate something called that at a Super Bowl party. With nut clusters. Maybe that's why Mr. Bernstein was thinking it could be exclusively applied to men, hmmm.
I guess the above entry should make me grateful for how far along we've come in 30 years. Here were are fighting for marriage and equal rights across the board--in 1977, we were fighting for a word. Well by GOBBLEDYGOOD (sticky muck...issuing from the mouth), I think we got it!
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