{"id":4118,"date":"2013-03-28T19:56:16","date_gmt":"2013-03-29T00:56:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/?p=4118"},"modified":"2013-03-28T19:56:16","modified_gmt":"2013-03-29T00:56:16","slug":"scarequote-overkill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/?p=4118","title":{"rendered":"Scarequote overkill"},"content":{"rendered":"

Scarequotes are a form of downplayer (I’d posted on them and what I call the scarequote exercise<\/em> earlier HERE<\/a>) — you use them when you invoke the vocabulary of the opposition, but to call attention to how false the vocabulary is.\u00c2\u00a0 And so, when you introduce the opposition’s experts, you call them “experts,” and thereby you are on record for holding that they are only so-called experts<\/em>. It’s a form of indirect discourse, like sarcasm or irony.\u00c2\u00a0 But it’s the club-instead-of-scalpel form of indirect discouse.\u00c2\u00a0 Now check out George Neumayr’s post<\/a> over at the American Spectator and his use of the scare quote to address those who support gay marrige:<\/p>\n

Were the people on their side, they wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need to doctor \u00e2\u20ac\u0153social science\u00e2\u20ac\u009d to justify their propaganda. They wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need to use judicial activists to undo democratic results. They wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need to ignore the written Constitution in favor of a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153living\u00e2\u20ac\u009d one.<\/p>\n

Plenty of regimes that no longer exist once thought themselves on the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153right side of history.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There’s plenty more, but it would require more work contextualizing than it’s worth.\u00c2\u00a0 Here’s the weird thing: most of it doesn’t actually make sense.\u00c2\u00a0 Take the first use of scare quotes.\u00c2\u00a0 Unless Neumayr doesn’t think there’s any legitimate social science, the claim that doctored “social science” is being used by the opposition is a form of double-dipping.\u00c2\u00a0 Why not say just ‘doctored social science’?\u00c2\u00a0 What does doctoring so-called social science<\/em> do?\u00c2\u00a0 In fact, that seems counter-productive for all sides.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 The same goes for the “right side of history” downplayer, too.\u00c2\u00a0 Nobody he’s invoking thought they were only on the so-called right side of history<\/em>.\u00c2\u00a0 Notice further that Neumayr’s thoughts aren’t clarified by adding the scarequotes — you can get the message that he thinks the social science is illegitimate, that the written constitution is preferable to the doctrine of a living constitution, and that those who believe they are on the right side of history are regularly wrong.\u00c2\u00a0 In every case, scarequoting in attributing thoughts to others confuses what’s so-called and what’s being attributed.\u00c2\u00a0 Scarequoting like that is just sloppy writing.<\/p>\n

I’ll perform the scarequote exercise from earlier below, taking the last few sentences from my previous paragraph.<\/p>\n

Notice further that Neumayr’s “thoughts”<\/strong> aren’t clarified by adding the scarequotes — you can get the “message”<\/strong> that he thinks the social science is illegitimate, that the written constitution is preferable to the doctrine of a living constitution, and that those who believe they are on the right side of history are regularly wrong.\u00c2\u00a0 In every case, scarequoting in attributing thoughts to others confuses what’s so-called and what’s being attributed.\u00c2\u00a0 Scarequoting like that is just sloppy “writing”<\/strong>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Now that’s how you use a scarequote! And, again, notice that it’s mostly just cheapshots.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Scarequotes are a form of downplayer (I’d posted on them and what I call the scarequote exercise earlier HERE) — you use them when you invoke the vocabulary of the opposition, but to call attention to how false the vocabulary is.\u00c2\u00a0 And so, when you introduce the opposition’s experts, you call them “experts,” and thereby … Continue reading Scarequote overkill<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,54],"tags":[1626],"class_list":["post-4118","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-op-ed-writers","category-things-that-are-false","tag-scarequoting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4118","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4118"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4118\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4119,"href":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4118\/revisions\/4119"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thenonsequitur.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}