![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Aug. 5th, 2012
Saying, "I apologize" is not an apology.
Aug. 5th, 2012 04:15 pmI don't know why this bugs me so much, besides the obvious grammar problem. It's probably because it screams insincerity.
If you want to apologize, saying, "I apologize" is no more of an apology than saying, "I eat dinner" makes you less hungry, or saying, "I talk people through software problems" actually helps anyone.
If you want to apologize, say, "I'm sorry." It's really that simple.
The phrase "[We|I] apologize" always strikes me as something the CEO of a petrochemical company would say when he realizes his company got caught poisoning three towns downstream and causing an environmental disaster they can't burry with payoffs and spin. "I apologize" is an abstraction from "I'm sorry" that allows the speaker to imply it, without actually saying it.
The thing that brought this up (today) was Readercon's public statement on their recent troubles.
I applaud their actions and sentiment, which I think is genuine and heartfelt; I truly do not believe that Readercon's ConCom had any covert or overt intention to avoid full responsibility, their actions (and the eventual actions of the BoD) prove that out; I think they got caught in the distortion of language we've seen over the last few years (forever, probably) that cause people to use fancy sounding words when they're trying to sound formal, like confusing "I" and "me".
However, their otherwise spectacular statement kinda loses something because nowhere in its entirety does the word "sorry" appear.
Every time they wrote, "we apologize", they could have (should have) written, "We're sorry".
Feel free to tell me I'm being a grammar jerk and I should shut up.
If you want to apologize, saying, "I apologize" is no more of an apology than saying, "I eat dinner" makes you less hungry, or saying, "I talk people through software problems" actually helps anyone.
If you want to apologize, say, "I'm sorry." It's really that simple.
The phrase "[We|I] apologize" always strikes me as something the CEO of a petrochemical company would say when he realizes his company got caught poisoning three towns downstream and causing an environmental disaster they can't burry with payoffs and spin. "I apologize" is an abstraction from "I'm sorry" that allows the speaker to imply it, without actually saying it.
The thing that brought this up (today) was Readercon's public statement on their recent troubles.
I applaud their actions and sentiment, which I think is genuine and heartfelt; I truly do not believe that Readercon's ConCom had any covert or overt intention to avoid full responsibility, their actions (and the eventual actions of the BoD) prove that out; I think they got caught in the distortion of language we've seen over the last few years (forever, probably) that cause people to use fancy sounding words when they're trying to sound formal, like confusing "I" and "me".
However, their otherwise spectacular statement kinda loses something because nowhere in its entirety does the word "sorry" appear.
Every time they wrote, "we apologize", they could have (should have) written, "We're sorry".
Feel free to tell me I'm being a grammar jerk and I should shut up.