“The Moderator, Panel of Judges, (Accurate) Time-keeper, my
co-debaters, colleagues, and viewers here and at home, good morning.
I am here to propose a motion that doctors are more
important to our society than lawyers with the following points:…”
Those were the opening lines with which we started our
debates in those days. Those days when we went from school to school and from
studio to studio, using simple and understandable English words to make our
viewpoints heard. We avoided those long words, not because we did not know how
to use them, but because our English teachers in those days told us that
communication only successfully occurs when the listener is able to completely
decode the intended message passed by the speaker. My teachers taught us that
the word blame is also known as censure, opprobrium, and vituperation among
others. But they also taught us when to use which word.
It appears that students today are being taught differently;
it even appears that some students from many years ago who have now become
senior political figures were also taught differently. Some of them seem to
believe that their “educated-ness” is amplified and made more visible by the
number of tongue-twisting, high-sounding, seven-syllable words and non-words
they can manage to fit into clumsy sentences. It doesn’t matter if the audience
is totally at sea with respect to what they have just said. It does matter (to them) that
the audience gives them a resounding round of applause at the end of their
performance.
There is one thing my teachers did not teach me, but something
which I learnt anyway, and that is, to view those who use such expressions to
bamboozle their audience as jesters who, like their peers, do not deserve to be taken seriously.
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