Having spent so much of my adult life amongst Johnny Foreigner I’m something of a lover of the way in which newspapers supposedly written in English aren’t in fact written in it. Technically correct, but just not quite right.
Meanwhile, the European Commission is hoping to convince young people to say "No" to abstinence.
The Commission is worried about the level of voter turnout at the euro-elections and is thus running a campaign to get the young to vote.
Saying "No" to abstinence is thus "correct" but the message given to a native English speaker is really rather different, isn’t it?
7 responses so far ↓
1 Mr Eugenides // Apr 15, 2009 at 7:54 am
Heh.
2 Alan Douglas // Apr 15, 2009 at 7:59 am
… so they can continue to screw us …
Alan Douglas
3 Serf // Apr 15, 2009 at 9:42 am
They decided to do something to boost their popularity?
4 Longrider // Apr 15, 2009 at 12:18 pm
That’s what I love about language, direct translation can be highly amusing – like the recent letter I received from EDF that explained to me the benefit of valleys. Off peak, of course…
5 Monty // Apr 15, 2009 at 10:52 pm
Is “abstention” a real word, or an Americanism?
Because it indicates to me someone who abstains from casting a vote in a specific poll. An event.
Abstinence strikes me as a long term practice or stance.
6 dearieme // Apr 15, 2009 at 11:01 pm
Of course a speaker of decent English would say “persuade” rather than “convince”.
7 Pat // Apr 16, 2009 at 12:29 am
Clearly todays youth are already saying no to abstinence- so are they trying to get credit for an existing trend?
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