"Words Mean": Precision, Clarity, and Royal Pudding (13 July 3013)

Royal...Pudding...

Rich, rich, rich in flavor!

Smooth, smooth, smooth as silk,

More food energy than fresh, whole milk!

            I'm sure there were exceptions, but my memory is that every term I taught a writing course — which pretty much meant every semester for forty years — I'd write on the board at least once, "Words means." Often words mean complexly and sometimes ambiguously, but it's only rarely and perversely that we get the Humpty-Dumpty rule that a word "means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less." If you're a legislative body words can mean what you command them to mean, and you can define "weapons of mass destruction" to include a hand grenade, which is destructive, but not massively, or nerve gas, which is somewhat figuratively "destructive to life" — though less effectively than well-placed hand grenades — but leaves objects very clearly undestroyed.

            Few of us, though, have such power, and most of us, most of the time, use words to communicate and have to stick to generally accepted definitions.

            Still, many were the times my students (and older folk who should know better) said, "Oh, you know what I meant!", and sometimes I did know. "Pedagogical confusion" is an old trick, where the teacher pretends not to understand what the student is saying and prods the little sod … uh, encourages the pupil into clarifying the point. Sometimes, though, no, I didn't understand; sometimes I'd been grading essays into the small hours of the morning and had trouble even seeing the words on the page. Sometimes, yeah, I understood — but I understood because I knew the material, knew the context, knew the student's dialect, and was a professional with a lot of experience and someone paid to read and figure out what authors mean; it's really arrogant for most writers to place such expectations on normal people, working for free.

            Sometimes, though, people expect you to just know what they mean and not challenge them because they're passing on received wisdom and speaking in clichés. A few such folk have an agenda, as your boss or coach very well may when urging from you a "110% commitment"; that 110% is a figure of speech and a cliché, but it's also a veiled demand for a blank check for your time and effort.

            Most clichés, though, are less pernicious than bosses of various sorts setting themselves up to demand way more of your time and effort than you should reasonably give. (If you give more than, say, 33.3% commitment to your job or 22.7% to a sports team, you're probably short-changing your family, community, and yourself.)

            I was generally spared motivational and inspirational balderdash, and most often just got innocent lemming-thought like a fair number of my more sentimental students' seeing Romeo and Juliet's being together "forever."

            I would quote Hamlet at them and suggest that "The rest is silence" is probably the best way to think about deaths at the end of tragedies. Romeo and Juliet, as tragedies go, is highly romantic and upbeat, and ends like an Italian comedy gone horribly wrong: a new and better world coalesces around a young married couple — Verona will finally know some peace — but the newly-weds are dead. So I would repeat back to my students, "they will be together forever" and ask, where?

            Romeo and Juliet are Catholics, you know, and so were most of my students; the earliest reference to Montagues and Capulets is in Dante's Purgatorio (canto 6, lines 106-08). If Catholics get the doctrine right, and Dante correctly supplied the gory details, Romeo and Juliet are together forever in the middle ring of the Seventh Circle of Hell, as trees or bushes eaten by Harpies.

            If the Protestants are right, R&J are less graphically burning in the lake of fire.

             Taking a more materialist or spiritualist view, the question is still, if "You can never kill love / When love is true" — as The Kingston Trio affirmeth unto this day on my old tapes — where does love live eternally. Unless you're a Buddhist, the fashionable cosmologies open to you insist on a doomed universe. "Some say the world will end in fire, / Some say in ice," but there's wide agreement that the world will end. Mythically, there's the Christian Apocalypse — possibly that "fire next time" — or Nordic Ragnarok for the ice alternative. Or the universe peters out through entropy or comes to a fiery pop out of existence with The Big Crunch. Take your pick: if you want to see love lasting forever, it has to be outside our universe.

            Even a saved pair of lovers up in heaven will have their love subsumed in an infinite divine love, or they will be in a variety of hell. Think seriously for a moment on heaven as an eternal family reunion. Then wait for a Rod Serling voice-over reminding you that an eternity of anything not infinitely interesting will become torture. However much Juliet et al. think their loves infinite, eternity had better be an "eternal Now," 'cause a century or so of human time with Romeo, and she's going to try to strangle him (if he doesn't snap first).

            Romeo and Juliet's love is a bright flash, tragically beautiful, tragically brief; it's of infinite value, if you like that idea and believe, but also "sudden; / Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be / Ere one can say, 'It lightens'" (2.2.119-20): its an awesome fireworks of "fire and powder, / Which, as they kiss, consume" (2.6.10-11).

            Let it go at that, kids, I'd say; it's plenty.

            All of us some of the time and some of us much of the time just don't think much about what we're saying. And that's OK, so long as we note that when we get serious about, say, love and marriage, the legal formula is precisely, clearly, and with hope but minimal bullshit, "until death do us part."

            In less exalted matters, and more generally, precision and clarity can still be difficult.

            I recently contributed to a tribute to my colleague Brit Harwood upon his retirement from the Miami University (Oxford, OH) English Department. My comments included the point that he improved our vocabularies.

            Brit was into precision, and his suggested wording for rules and policies and reports and such were very, very precise — and sent us to the dictionary. On at least one occasion, the trip, so to speak, was worth it. Brit taught us the word "cognizable," which is a very useful word for white-collar peasants and the professorial proletariat: in an extended meaning. it's a claim that actions by one's superiors can be reviewed and potentially blocked.

            I didn't know "cognizable" but do now. Similarly with a number of words Brit used, including in communicating with the Department's Promotion and Tenure Committee. Some of Brit's totally precise terms were totally unclear to your average full professor in English at a respectable university, though not a first-rate one.

            Which brings us to another question of precision and clarity.

            The closest thing I ever had to an argument with the Chair of my Department came when I was making claims for more appreciation of my scholarship or some such thing, and my Chair said to me, "Oh, come on Rich! You've got a second-rate mind." To which I replied, "Yeah, but I'm at a third-rate university," an assertion with which he didn't argue.

            My boss and I were both PhDs from the University of Illinois at Urbana, which is a second-rate school: usually in the top twenty-five world-wide, but not in the top ten or even up there with my other alma mater, Cornell: ranking thirteenth in the Shanghai Rankings of 2012. If Miami University has ever appeared in the top 500 in the Shanghai Ranking, then I missed it.

            Talking about Miami U as "third-rate" was precise (arguably even generous) but maybe misleading. Something like "third-rank" might be better, ranking just behind, say, the academically major Big Ten schools. Miami University is a good school and nearly a perfect "fit" for many of our students; it's a place where an undergraduate and even many graduates can get a good education, usually more than adequate for their needs and abilities.

            That the whole ranking system might be legitimately characterized as having "all the intellectual respectability of a pecker contest": that's a different issue. Still, if you can't make the top 500 on an international list, calling yourself a "top-rank" institution is either really parochial — "Best School in the Miami Valley!" — or it's hyper, or lying.

            My favorite example in this area combines precision with obfuscation disguised as clarity, and with gleeful dishonesty.

            I refer to a Royal Pudding jingle from my childhood, the one I quote as my headnote and can sing from memory, and the associated Royal Pudding ads.

            The ad copy touts that Royal Pudding has "74% more food energy than fresh whole milk" in large red type and informs you that that extra energy is "in every delicious serving!" That last part is undoubtedly true, given that it'd be 74% more food energy in any size serving. The ad continues in smaller, black type, "Milk is Nature's best food — as every mother knows. It's needed for strong, sturdy bodies, for growth, for vitality. But a serving of ROYAL PUDDING gives you all the benefits of the milk you make it with plus 74% more Food Energy," and then goes on with useful and straight-forward reminders that you can buy Regular  ROYAL or Instant ROYAL.

            The Royal Pudding people got into trouble for misleading advertising.

            Regular or Instant, Royal or Jell-O or homemade, you make pudding by adding to milk a thickening ingredient, stuff for the specific taste (color preservation), a touch of salt, and sugar or sugars, lots of sugar.

            Sugar is the point with most desserts — well, and fat, which the whole milk supplies — and Royal Pudding delivered sugar, and with it a whole bunch of food energy.

            Food energy in the US and UK is measured in "food calories" or "dietary calories" or kilocalories.

            Now consider a modified form of the jingle (and ad): " Rich, rich, rich in flavor! / Smooth, smooth, smooth as silk, / More food cal-o-ries than (even) fresh, whole milk!" Since the extra calories are (a) plentiful and (b) pretty much uncontaminated by vitamins, minerals, protein, fiber, or nutrients you might want in addition to high-power carbs and fat, tight-ass nutritionists and various health agencies would deride them as "empty calories" and assert that rich, sugary, smooth Royal Pudding and its successor products are pretty much just fattening.

            Still, the jingle and ad might be misleading, but they are eminently defensible as precise.

            Verily, even (sort of) as it is more exact to talk of "the environment" rather than "the ecology" and "rock formations" rather than "the geology," so it is more exact to talk of The Thing Itself, food energy, than the units in which food energy is measured, i.e., for most of us, calories.

            Changing "energy" to "calories" would make the ad less precise.

            My memory is that the ad was eventually pulled but not before it had run its course and drummed that dumb-ass jingle into at least hundreds of thousands of little minds. And frankly, I kind of admire the hucksters who developed the Roy-al Pud-ding! ad campaign. It's a rare and brilliant example of how to be precise and apparently clear while being memorable, effective, and really, really, dishonest.

            "Words mean," but if you're wily enough they can mean in nastily misleading ways and get the gullible public buying a lot of product. 

"Yes," "No," "Just Say 'No'" and Sexual Responsibility (29 Aug. 2014)

"our courteous Antony,

Whom ne'er the word of 'No' woman heard speak"

— His aide and friend Enobarbus on Mark Antony,

in Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra

            I think most of my readers will agree with the formula, "No" means No; "Yes" means Yes; "Maybe" means maybe. Now I'd like you to think about the implications of that formula for young Americans, and especially how we educate and train young Americans.

            First off, if "Yes" is to mean "yes," people have to ask yes/no questions, and other people must be free to answer "yes" or "no." As one of my feminist colleagues put it (I'm quoting from memory), "I tell my students that asking once isn't harassment; it's what he's supposed to do. If he repeats himself after you've said "No," that is harassment. The first one is a freebie."

            And, second off, it's a freebie for everyone, or at least everyone in a voluntary encounter between (or among) people of the age of consent. Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra is from the early 17^th century, and it's set shortly before the Christian era. Even back then, they had the concept that at least a good looking, imperial-class stud would be asked for sex by women, and he might, in theory, say "No." Antony won't, but (a) undesirable women probably couldn't get near him, and (b) by the mid-20^th century guys had developed the concept of male slut, which we can apply to this vision of Antony, as in the rhetorical question, "Is there anything you won't fuck?!"

            Antony won't say "No," but he could, so his "Yes" is significant.

            And Enobarbus seems convinced that women who want a man might very well ask, which is more significant.

            When I was in high school in Chicago around 1960 and guys would say, "Hey, she really wants me," we could respond, "If she really wanted you, she would ask you."

            Women and older girls, then, need to be able to say "Yes," or their "No" isn't totally convincing. Women and older girls need to be free to ask, and if they do not ask, then guys should assume that these gals might be willing to have sex with them but aren't exactly, let's say, champing (or chomping) at the bit.

            If "Yes" means yes and all, then the old idea of the coy young maid is a bad idea.

            The Machiavellian Duke of Buckingham tells the even more Machiavellian Duke of Gloucester — soon to become King Richard III — that when offered a crown Richard should "Play the maid's part: still answer nay, and take it" (Richard III 3.7.51; through-line 2252). Or as Shakespeare sexistly puts into the mouth of a young woman, "[…] maids, in modesty, say 'no' to that / Which they would have the profferer construe 'ay'" (Two Gentlemen of Verona 1.2.54-55; through-lines 207-08).

            So let us say an emphatic no to the gushy old romantic ideal of the shy maid who cannot say "Yes" but really wants "it." And equally no to the old romantic ideal of the pleading lover who keeps pressing his case; the repeatedly-rejected wooer always was a pathetic schmuck with no sense of dignity, but now we can, and should, see him also as an incipient stalker.

            "No" means no, damn it. Give her your number, and tell her that if she changes her mind to call. Ditto for "him" and all the various variations.

            I would not go so far as to push the case that people engaging in sex should ask permission for each stage of the encounter — each "base" in the sports metaphor — or I won't make that case unless they both get off talking dirty. After the initial "Yes," most couples can get along on body language and monosyllabics like "no," "stop," or "Oh, yeah!"

            (Sometimes, though, it's simply necessary to pause and "Use your words." I have no idea what sort of squeal or grunt I made, but a woman once courteously stopped what she was doing and asked, "Did that hurt?" And I had to think a moment and say, "I … I'm not sure. Do it again.")

            Initial saying of "Yes" or "No" and, if "Yes," some basic decisions — "Your place or mine?" "Do I need to buy condoms?" "You're sure your creepy roommate is out of town and took her iPhone with her?" — initial negotiation, even if quite brief needs some physical and aural space for communication. This is an additional reason why hook-up bars designed for noise and sensory overload are abominations on the face of the Earth. Indeed, some of the customers are in such places precisely because serious talk is impossible, but that's no reason they should be encouraged, or no reason beyond financial gain.

            So: One problem area in serious sex-ed for America's young people is more or less in the political Center and Left: squishy Romance and the subspecies of feminism that discourage  talking about sex, especially guys' directly asking older girls and women for sex. (My colleague had to tell her students that "The first one is a freebie" because other people had told them that any request for sex that turned out not to be desired was sexual harassment.) This problem area overlaps with the Right, and the "Just say 'No'" American puritanical tradition.

            Old-style, capital-"P" Puritans can be seen as generally orthodox Christians, who believed human beings are essentially souls and that the crucial issue is whether those souls are saved or damned. So far as we have any control over our salvation — and we may have none — traditional doctrine taught resistance to the soul's enemies: the World, the Flesh, and the Devil.

            Souls, in traditional Christian theory, are lead into evil by the bodily sins of Lust, Sloth, and Gluttony, and by the Worldly/Demonic sins of Wrath, Envy, Greed, and Pride. Puritans emphasized the threat of the Flesh, and today many pious Americans put little energy into condemning wrath, envy, or greed. And, with one crucial exception, today's puritans have nearly forgotten that Pride is a sin.

            Young Americans are taught morality mostly in terms of their sexuality and secondarily as an imperative to obey the laws or social conventions governing what drugs they may put into their bodies — variations on that battle against Lust, Sloth, and Gluttony. "Pride is the root of all evils" only when it takes the form of intentional disobedience to adult authority. "Just Say No" means "No" to peers, not to parents, ministers, or the law.

            One student at my university used puritan doctrine to explain the tendency of our students to "Get drunk, get stupid, get laid," without planning and without protection, and certainly without negotiation. One can get drunk, get stupid, get laid, and then get repentant and get absolved and get welcomed back into Holy Church. One can get wasted and sin and remain "a good kid."

            The fleshly sins are deadly, but easily forgiven. Unforgivable, she argued, would be the rebellion of an unmarried 19-year-old's planning to get laid, buying condoms, having sex, enjoying sex, and responding to older-adult accusations with "Yeah, I got laid—So? 'Sex is dangerous'? Skydiving is dangerous! Anything worth doing is worth a little risk to do! You take sensible precautions, which I did."

            If the question is obedience and the soul's salvation, not bodily health, equally unforgiven would be a 19-year-old who says, "No, we didn't smoke pot; we drank dope tea, talked, and took a bus home as a group. Tolerate it." Far better, in terms of obedience, for teens to sneak tequila and beer Friday nights, get drunk, get wild, and meekly repent on Saturdays.

            All the more so if the 19-year-old in question was a young woman. Again, when guys in high school would say, "Hey, she really wants me," we could respond, "If she really wanted you, she would ask you." More exactly, she would ask back then only if she had a lot of guts, and even after graduation, as a legal adult, it would take guts to tell her parents, if asked, "Actually, I planned the date, and the sex."

            Things have gotten better with educating gals on sex. I'm not so sure there's been progress with guys about sex or with either group on the closely-related matter of alcohol and other drugs. When I was growing up, fathers and "older guys" would instruct boys in sexual protocol (e.g., "bathe; take your socks off; spend the night; cook her breakfast"); and both sexes often got informal training in how to "drink like ladies and gentlemen." Bingeing and puking on your date was bad form, to say nothing of a bad introduction to asking for sex.

            Nowadays, chastity training discourages all nonmarried people from asking for sex. "Abstinence Only" precludes discussions of sexual hygiene and sexual manners — and helps makes mutual bingeing, not negotiation, a primary way for unmarried teens to get sex, however sloppily and dangerously.

            "Just Say No" undermines the believability of "No means no" and contributes to alcohol abuse, sexual assault, and morning-after charges of sexual assault. Under "Zero Tolerance," teaching your kids how to drink and throw a responsible party can get adults arrested.

            Under "Abstinence-Only" regulations, straight-talking, honest drug education — "This is what the drug will do for you, this is what it may do to you" — is forbidden.

            "Just Say No," "Zero Tolerance," and "Abstinence Only" cut off debate and forbid discussing relative risks and risk reduction.

            Puritan policies make excellent sense in terms of saving souls and training obedience, but in secular, democratic terms, they have high costs.

            Unless ruthlessly enforced, such policies contribute to teen-pregnancy, venereal diseases, and abuse — as opposed to learning responsible use — of alcohol and other drugs, and of other people. When ruthlessly enforced, Abstinence Only/Just Say No train for submission to power, not ethical choice.


            You want to reduce sexual assault on campus and elsewhere? After you've arrested, tried, convicted, and put in prison a whole lot more of the serial rapists responsible for much of the problem, start working on the cultural issues. Tops among those cultural issues are the people who haven't thought through "Yes means 'Yes' … (etc.)" and have implemented policies they see as solutions but are very centrally part of the problem.