The Grammar Police State

“Irregardless isn’t a word!”

So began a diatribe at work recently. During an idle moment, when we had briefly outpaced the amount of work we had available to actually do, and therefore had to wait around somewhat impotently for something to happen, a guy opened his phone and began watching YouTube videos. As so often happens anymore, his attention drifted onto politics, and he began watching a comedian baiting protesters.

To judge by my co-worker’s rant, the comedian had targeted liberal and progressive activists; I later learned he’d found this video on Breitbart. But the specific content was immaterial to this particular response: caught in a minor logical inconsistency, the protester responded with the verbal equivalent of a shrug, saying “Irregardless.” The comedian began a lecture, which my co-worker repeated mostly verbatim, that “Irregardless isn’t a word.”

We’ve probably all heard this somewhere. “Irregardless isn’t a word,” lecture schoolteachers, newspaper editors, media pundits, and amateur scolds. I’ve always found this argument baffling.  What is “a word,” other than a unit of vocal sound which native speakers agree conveys some concept of meaning? If somebody says a thing, and another person understands the intent, where’s the lack of a word?

But I noticed something more nefarious here. The comedian, and my co-worker who passively received everything that passed through his head which ratified his existing opinions, wanted to shut protesters down because they used “incorrect” English. Unless you speak the Queen’s English as well as me, the argument goes, you have no right to express opinions publicly. Or, put another (possibly more accurate) way, you’re too dumb to do anything but shut up.

The Oxford English Dictionary says the word irregardless “dates back to the 19th century, but is regarded as incorrect in standard English.” Merriam-Webster identifies the word being used in 1795. So it’s hardly a neologism. It’s probably overkill; people who use it presumably want the extra “ir-” syllable for verbal emphasis which their point doesn’t need. So yeah, as verbal filler, it’s sloppy, demonstrating somebody is probably thinking on their feet. But is it really “wrong”?

Before anybody accuses me of liberal propaganda, this isn’t an isolated example of conservatives attacking progressives. We saw liberals belittle George W. Bush on similar grounds for “misunderestimated,” a supposed Bushism which Merriam-Webster actually tracks back to 1913. Sarah Palin’s “refudiate,” an apparent actual neologism, received broad mockery, even though audiences clearly understood her intent.

All these cases demonstrate a tendency, among both the punditocracy and ordinary people, to claim the opposition cannot have legitimate arguments until they savvy “acceptable” English. This standard of acceptability usually means “my English.” We won’t address the substance of your position, this argument goes, until you address my concerns about your vocabulary. Anybody can see the flaw here: my concerns will never be truly satisfied.

It's a joke. Except when it's not.

We can consider this a form of “whataboutism.” This idea, deflecting serious questions by tossing out “but what about X” questions, has gained currency because President Trump uses it frequently. But rhetoricians have known about this technique for decades, and consider it a logical fallacy. Political scientists consider it something far more insidious: a propaganda technique.

“Whataboutism” and grammar policing share a similar goal: to steer discussion away from the stated topic, onto something the other debater better understands. By crowing “Irregardless isn’t a word,” the comedian doesn’t have to address the protester’s serious sociopolitical concerns. By harping on “refudiate,” commentators avoided actually calling the question underlying Sarah Palin’s original tweet. Both techniques attempt to illegitimately steer the conversation.

Thus, both whataboutism and grammar policing serve to create the appearance of public debate, without moving toward a solution. They give the punditocracy the opportunity to talk about things going on, fill otherwise vacant time in the 24-hour news cycle, and maintain their high public profile, without actually doing anything. They don’t have to address one another on actual data, ensuring nobody feels attacked, because they’re not actually saying anything.

Further, it allows citizens to join the public “debate” without having to know anything about the issues. My co-worker, already cruising self-identified partisan sources, doesn’t have to become informed about issues, because he already knows that “Irregardless isn’t a word,” and therefore he’s smarter than the protesters getting demeaned. This secures his justification to continue as he’s always done, without needing to understand anything or stage an argument.

We often treat grammar police behavior as cute, quirky, or a necessary nuisance. But recent events prove it isn’t really neutral. At root, grammar policing is an attempt to silence others. When that applies to important public issues, we can see its more nefarious ends: the grammar police want to regulate the marketplace of ideas.