The popular book “On Writing” contains surprising advice for writers: Read a lot of bad writing so you know what bad writing looks like. Then don’t write like that.
Like other technologies, the written word is morally neutral, used by saints to spread love and sinners to enflame hate. All the devices of making meaning are right there for the well-intentioned and for those of ill will: active verbs, parallel constructions, emphatic word order, alliteration and much more.
Changing crafts, director and photographer Leni Riefenstahl’s cinematic innovations were breathtaking. Sadly, they were employed in the service of exalting the mythology of the Third Reich.
In this sense, we can never separate craft from mission and purpose. The rifle is there to commit mass murder, or to stop it.
George Orwell has something to say here, including his belief that political abuse and language abuse are interchangeable. One leads to the other. In other words, good writing cannot exist without an enlightened intent.
Which brings us inevitably to Donald Trump and what may be the worst sentence he has ever written:
“I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT!”
He wrote the four-word message on his media platform Truth Social after the world’s most popular entertainer endorsed Kamala Harris for president.
In my family, the word “hate” was taboo. My mom, into her 90s, could use the F-word as five different parts of speech, but would not tolerate the H-word, especially when it was applied to another human being. I could detest Richard Nixon, but not hate him.
Sometimes we take old, familiar words for granted, so let’s take a close look at the word “hate.” According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word had a different spelling in Old English texts, written before the year 1000. By 1500, the poet William Dunbar would write, in a woman’s voice: “I hait him with my hart.”
The Oxford English Dictionary defines the primary meaning of “hate” as a verb:
“To hold in very strong dislike; to detest; to bear malice to …” It adds that it is “The opposite of to love.”
In our time “hate” can be used as an adjective, as in the phrases “hate speech” or “hate crime.” And versions of the word can be found in slangy catchphrases:
“Don’t hate the player, hate the game.”
“Don’t be a player hater.”
“Time for him to stop drinking the Haterade.”
None of these lighter uses are relevant to Trump’s.
I am no Swiftie, so I can think of lots of things Trump might have written in response to her endorsement of Harris:
“She’s overrated.”
“My crowds are way bigger than hers.”
“I hear she dumps a lot of guys.”
Instead, he went right to the H-word.
Let’s examine it closely:
“I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT!”
- It would be harsh enough printed in normal typeface. But each letter is in upper case. In the age of digital communication, we know that using all caps has the same effect as yelling. And why use a conventional period, or full stop, when you can finish off your howl with an exclaimer?
- The verb “hate” is intensified by both grammar and syntax. It is a transitive verb, part of a subject-verb-object formation that magnifies meaning. The verb is also active, which means the subject “I” (Trump) carries out the action of hating.
- When writers want to emphasize their meaning, they often rely on the shortest sentence they can craft. When St. Paul sent a letter to the Corinthians about the great virtues, he wrote “The greatest of these is love.” Short sentences have the feel of the gospel truth. For a writer whose use of language is marked by hyperbole, repetition, long asides, nonsequiturs and a meandering style Trump has named “the weave,” a simple four-word sentence intensifies the hate.
Much has been written about Trump’s personal insults pointed at women whom he sees as disloyal, antagonistic, or dangerous to his personal ambitions. Taylor Swift, at 34 one of the most creative entrepreneurs on the planet, does not need me to shield her against Trump’s language. That said, as someone from the same generation as Trump, I find this attack on a young woman at best disgraceful and, at worst, vicious and dangerous.
I think my mom, who died at the age of 95, would agree with me. She would be proud, no doubt, that I could express my disapproval in vigorous language, and without using the four-letter word. You know the one.
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