4 ms·
Vaccinated should be in quotes. Then it would make sense and the title would take on a sinister tone.
by xwdv 6y ago
Vaccinated should be in quotes. Then it would make sense and the title would take on a sinister tone.
- dehrmann 6y agoReminds me of when people would use quotes for emphasis. "Quality" ingredients.
- cryptoz 6y agoI haven't been to the "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks in a while and I couldn't believe they are still posting! http://www.unnecessaryquotes.com/ http://www.unnecessaryquotes.com/
- EdJiang 6y agoIs this a reference to this skit? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DqoQq1zME8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DqoQq1zME8
- Wowfunhappy 6y agoIt would indeed give the title a sinister tone, but it wouldn't describe the article at all! These workers are in fact getting the vaccine, not some fake pantomime!
- xwdv 6y agoThe workers are essential, but there’s not enough vaccines to go around, so some people will get placebos to keep them working.
- tialaramex 6y agoThat's not a thing. Medical ethics relate to individual patients, so even if you have a coherent public health strategy that makes sense (and a placebo to spread supplies more thinly could be such a strategy), the medics insist on applying ethics to individual patients. For example the early data for HPV vaccination was enough that as public health policy it made sense to immunise boys. The men would not spread HPV and thus contribute to reduced cancer in any future female partners. But that would be unethical because it's no direct benefit to the boys you're vaccinating. So they waited until they had data showing it would likely also prevent some cancer in men, bingo now it's both ethical and good policy.
- CyberDildonics 6y agoNot only are there "enough vaccines to go around", no one is getting placebos and these people have already been working through the pandemic, why would they need a placebo?
- chrisseaton 6y agoQuotation marks mean... quotation. I don't know why everyone thinks they mark something as not true these days?
- xwdv 6y agoBecause they are often used to quote something someone said that is probably not true, but you don’t want to take responsibility for it or legitimize it by presenting it as your own word or belief.
- mewse 6y agoFundamentally, putting a thing in quotes distinguishes between what words you’re standing behind yourself, and what words you’re attributing to someone else. (there are some other orthogonal uses of quotes, of course, my favourite being when we’re talking about words themselves rather than about the things the words normally signify. For example: My favourite type of animal is dog, but my favourite word is “dog”. The quotes signify that I’m talking about the literal three-letter word “dog”, and not about the type of animal) In general, people (including people who work for the media) put words or statements in quotes when they’re doubtful of the veracity of those words or statements, and aren’t willing to put their own reputation on the line by making the statement themselves. Instead, they just report that other people say those things. And so maybe it’s not surprising that a high percentage of stuff which gets communicated to people in that kind of quote structure eventually turns out to be untrue (and often is just laughably untrue on its face). Since people aren’t stupid and since English is a living language (apologies if you’re a linguistic prescriptivist, but that’s not a fight that can be won), then it probably isn’t surprising that people have learned to associate that syntactic structure with falsehoods. That’s just how it’s used in the real world. And has been for quite a long time.
- chrisseaton 6y agoI don't think the media use it to say they're doubtful - that's a common misunderstanding. Take this headline https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-55382212 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-55382212 > Covid: WHO in 'close contact' with UK over new virus variant The BBC aren't doubting that the WHO are in close contact with the UK - they're just quoting a source and aren't expressing an opinion either way.