Writing Pet Peeves: "Mute Point"

Mute Point.

Pardon me?  Are you sure you meant to say "silent point"?  Think about that for a minute, and let it sink in.  What is a mute point?  Is it a point left unexpressed because it is silent?  Does the silence of the point mean there really is no point at all?  If you are a person who makes mute points, what do you mean by that term?

You meant to say "irrelevant point", did you not? 

It is disheartening to say that today's pet peeve is made by otherwise reasonably educated people who should know better.  I have heard this one and seen it in writing one too many times.  I cringe when I hear it coming out of the mouth of a normally literate and articulate professional person.  When I hear it in speech, it makes me want to stand up and rudely interrupt the speaker and ask, "Was it a deaf point too?"  I want to grab a red pen and bleed on offending lines in written work.  When I read it online, usually in a blog post or in a journalistic article I want to tear my hair out. 

I don't understand why people who usually write well commit this one.  The only thing I can figure is they have heard and not read it and assumed the word they heard was "mute", and not "moot". 

I am sure that they would be upset to know that they are abusing the language as they are usually educated enough not to want to sound stupid.

Those undereducated rarely make points, either moot or mute.  This is a term foreign to their usage.

But for those who in the future would like to make their points correctly:

Mute =
1) adj. silent, not speaking
2) adj. incapable of speech
3) n.  One incapable of speech
4) n. a device to deaden the resonance of a musical instrument
5) Transitive verb to deaden the resonance of

Moot =
1) adj. debatable, open to discussion
2) adj. of little or no practical value
3) adj. irrelevant, of no significance
4) adj. hypothetical
5) v. to present or introduce for discussion
6) v. To reduce or remove the practical significance of
7) n. Assembly of people in early England exercising political, administrative and judicial powers
8) n. An argument or discussion of a hypothetical case

For our purposes, a moot point is a debatable point or an irrelevant point, or a point of little or no practical value.   There is no such thing as a mute point.

Harleys Part 2

This post has been moved to http://ironhorsemusing.blogspot.com/2010/09/shoppiong-for-harleys-part-2.html

As We Celebrate...

As we celebrate Independence Day,  Let us not call it by it's date; rather let us call it by its significance.  For all who are citizens of the United States of America, it is a day to be remembered.  It should be remembered at this time in our nation's history lest we allow our government to forge greater bonds of tyrrany than those broken by our Founding Fathers.

By way of remembrance, I am posting the Preamble of the Declaration of Independence.  Let us never forget:

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.


We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

-That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,


- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to affect their Safety and Happiness.


Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.


But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.


- Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government.


The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States.


To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

November is a good time to begin to provide new Guards.

The Writing Process: Computer or Longhand?

There is an interesting article from yesterday's Slate by Jan Swafford called Bold Prediction Why E-books Will Never Replace Real Books.

In this article, Mr. Swafford discusses the what the late Marshall McLuhan had to say about media and its effect on society.

Later in this same article, Mr. Swafford tells about his experience as a teacher of college writing classes, and his own writing process.  He contrasts writing first drafts on a computer screen and longhand drafts, and the benefits of the latter.

It was this part of the article that particularly interested me because, while I like the speed of writing on a computer, I find that onscreen editing, even after using spell check and grammar check, is a challenge.  There is always something I miss.  The cut and paste feature of word processing has saved me much time, and has helped me to organize my thoughts, but I much prefer to write out lengthy pieces in longhand.

The longhand process slows me down and helps me to order my thoughts better on paper.  I find that there are more picturesque turns of phrase in my longhand drafts than in those processed on the computer.  I find, as does Mr. Swafford, that punctuation is more easily applied in longhand.  But at some point, my handwriting has to be deciphered for my target audience.

There are times when, in my writing process, I use a combination of both.  Word processing is for the more technical aspects of what I'm writing.  It is good for sequencing events in a plot outline.  It is also good for moving phrases, entire sentences and paragraphs to a different place on the page. 

Wherever I begin, there always ends up being an editing draft, word processed and printed out in hard copy.  Final edits are best done on a hard copy and not onscreen, at least for me.

The creative part is best done in longhand.  The clean up is best done on the computer.  The fine tuning is best done on a hard copy and then fixed on the computer.

No matter how many times I edit my blog posts onscreen, I still have to go back and fix someting.

I don't know how writers did it before the advent of word processors.  Typewriters were so unforgiving.

If any of you are still out there reading, I'll be interested to know which you prefer in your writing process.

HT:  Katie

Shopping For Harleys

This post has been moved to http://ironhorsemusing.blogspot.com/2010/09/shopping-for-harleys.html

Writing Pet Peeves: "Would of, Could of, Should of"

"Would of, Could of, Should of"

This latest offense was seen, not for the first time, on facebook. 

I suppose I should've been happy that the offender chose to express himself, but if one is going to use poor grammar, then one should not write at all for public consumption.  Ah, vanity. 

The problem with contractions is they're spoken more than they're written.  I have an aversion to using many contractions when I write because I had it drummed into me in English Composition class that words shouldn't be contracted in writing unless used in dialog.  This makes it more difficult to learn from reading in context, as many writers shunned the use of contractions in formal writing.  That was back in the day.

Just ask the members of my writers' group.  I dislike contractions in their writing too. 

I see more contractions in the prose of contemporary works. 

However, I suspect that the sum total of the offending writer's reading experience is found in pop culture.  People are beginning to write the way they speak.  Twitter and texting are  wreaking havoc (!) with spelling and grammar.

I learned about contractions when I was in what used to be called "grammar school"  I know I'm dating myself, but again I ask, what are they teaching in English class these days?

Karen's unofficial grammar class for today, for those who care:

Contractions really are for speaking.  They're there to make two words easier to pronounce when used together.

Would have  = would've
Could have = could've
Should have = should've

I suppose I should've taken it in stride.  I could've overlooked it.  But that would've gone against my grain. 

Those last three sentences go against my grain too.  In fact, it almost killed me to write this piece.  **sigh**

The Rich Man In the Midst of His Pursuits Will Pass Away

I have to say that I admire less and less the glitterati and beautiful people who entertain us.  Especially when they open their mouths and start talking politics.  These folks use their celebrity as a pulpit from which to spew their liberal ideas that have no basis in the moral underpinnings with which I was raised and passed along to my children.  They are the walking dead and they are making disciples of the weak-minded people who idolize them on the big screen, on the small screen, on the radio and on mp3 players.

The cult of celebrity has a very strong following here in the USA.

Having said that, celebrities are dropping like flies.  In the last several weeks a now grown up child actor, a Golden Girl, a gorgeous singer and actress who refused to by stereotype cast and  a well- know older actor have all lived out their appointed days and kept their appointments with death.  I don't know their spiritual state of affairs, but I hope they knew the Lord.

No amount of wealth or beauty or fame will get you out of that appointment.

James tells us, "...the rich man is to glory in his humiliation, because like flowering grass he will pass away.  For the sun rises with a scorching wind and withers the grass; and its flower falls off and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed; so too the rich man in the midst of his pursuits will pass away."

It is hard to find humility within the cult of celebrity.  They grasp at everything to keep the beauty from fading.  Unfortunately, they set the example for their admirers.  Personally, I find little to admire.

In this fallen world we wax old and our outer beauty fades.  but our inner spiritual beauty, which only comes from knowing and walking in Christ radiates on our faces.  We too will keep our appointments with death, but because we are in Christ, He has overcome death, our last enemy, and so shall we. 

Let us pray for our countrymen that they are ready for their appointment when the end of their days arrives.