So…have you noticed it’s crept back in?
I’m referring to the pointless use of the word ‘So’ that irritating people being interviewed on TV and radio invariably use to preface their answers. All their answers! No matter what the question.
Interviewer: “As the Minister responsible for this terrible mess, can you explain how you intend to repair the damage your department has done to the British public. And would this not be the perfect opportunity for you to apologise to the nation for your incompetence and abject failure to do what you promised to do less than three weeks ago?”
Politician: (After the briefest of pauses) “So…the question you really should be asking me is….”
And that’s how they try to deflect the questions that really should be answered.
So…don’t tell me you haven’t noticed?
I wrote about this ‘phenomenon’ a few years ago and, being a man of considerable influence in various media circles – and certain London squares – the numbers of politicians, celebrities, sports people etc., who had, for a long time, got into the habit of responding to any question asked of them “So…” were gradually reduced.
But, like indigestion and “Love Island”, just when you think ‘So!’ has gone away…it comes back.
People use it all the time and I have two theories why.
(A) – they do so out of habit, not even realising they’re guilty of it.
(B) – it gives people a moment’s ‘thinking’ time to come back with a response or, in the case of politicians, another whopper great fib.
But, as those TV infomercials like to say “That’s not all!”
The expression ‘Going Forward’ has become one of the most annoyingly over-used expressions used in the media.
It’s not used to describe a person or a vehicle going forward to get somewhere. Allow me to quote its modish meaning…
Going Forward is a relatively new and apparently convenient way to indicate a progression in time from the present. As in…
Interviewer “And having achieved this, what are your plans…going forward?”
Or as we normal people might ask “What are your plans…for the future?”
Which is what ‘a progression in time from the present’ is!