Government-doublespeak

Government-doublespeak, we all hear of it, see it and ignore it. No, I am not talking about the words George W. mispronounces. Truth be told, I read an article saying the President enjoys all the humor the press has made of his mistakes. I mean the all out, read something and have no idea whatsoever of what you just read. The ones where you read it look at your friend and ask, “What the hell was that?”

The problem is it has become a standard. Our daily lives have been saturated with this for so long that it is now the way businesses speak and write.

I have a good friend of mine who was recently applying for a grant for his company. Warning: Grant writing is an art onto itself, and should never be attempted by individuals with high-blood pressure, nervous disorders, or the ability to levitate objects in a whirlwind about you when angry; especially sharp objects. Let me be frank with you, if you are the type of person who turns into Carrie at the school prom, destroying everything in your path, don’t even think about grant writing. Hire professionals, they are trained to write these and probably well medicated in the process.

I was having coffee with my grant-writing buddy and could not figure out why he kept muttering things to himself and shaking his head. After a few minutes of this I had to ask, either that or pretend it was normal to mutter silently then scream obscenities at anyone who approached him. He looked at me and asked, “What does the phrase, Submit documentation of literature, written material and program review documentation of the presenting plan mean to you? To which I responded, “What?” He simply shook his head and began telling me about his experience. As a non-professional grant-writer he uses templates, which aid him greatly. That is when he can actually understand what it is they are asking for. He had explained that the proposal he had just completed actually asked this question, as well as many others that would have needed an army of monkeys to understand. Monkeys because they may have been the only creatures capable of understanding something as miswrote, misspoke or mistyped. Some of the other quotes were even worse, so bad that it is impossible for me to even remember them.

The sad part is a grammar checker finds nothing wrong with that statement. The sentence structure is accurate, it is simply double-speak and they are not programmed for that. If they were the government community would never be able to use them. That is where the standard came from too. I am sure some of you are on or have helped someone apply for Medicare. I read that the application and subsequent coverage was so full of double-speak that it was impossible to comprehend it.

We all are subjected to this, but most of us don’t bother to read it. Perhaps it is time we did. Oh, to update you on my friend, he was last seen walking down the street screaming obscenities at strangers and had a constant whirlpool of chairs, tables and other objects floating around him. I think he was heading in the direction of the company he had just written the grant for too.