Mistakes Were Made

[terribleturnip]

I hereby propose that we ban the use of the phrase "Mistakes were made."

Look, people, sh*t happens all by itself, but a mistake requires specific action or action on someone's part. A decision of some kind, even if the decision is to close your eyes, clap your hands over your ears and sing the "la-la" song.

You hired the wrong person. You failed to manage or supervise them properly. You screwed up, you forgot, you were an idiot, you were overwhelmed, you forgot to put it on a shelf where the dog couldn't reach it, you failed to back up your hard drive (see idiot).

You start to appease me when you say "I made a mistake"...but really, I'm not going to be happy unless I hear that you have a plan to make sure it won't happen again, that you're genuinely contrite and have learned a lesson.

(For those of you who overthink things and are trying to read between the lines...I'm referring to politicians, celebrities, mostly -- nothing personal. And politically speaking, I'm not picking on any particular party. You're all morons.)

Gee...didn't take long for the vacation buzz to wear off...I gotta stop getting the paper delivered; it just pisses me off.

Comments

[thatliardiego.livejournal.com]

I hereby propose that we ban the use of the phrase "Mistakes were made."

Good luck with that.

[pyratelady.livejournal.com]

I'm with you. It's a passive-aggressive thing to say. When you do something wrong, you do something wrong.

But like Diego said, good luck with that. People in positions of power (politicians, celebrities, rich schmucks) seem unable to admit that they're ever wrong or ever make mistakes.

[majorchaos.livejournal.com]

Yeesh... don't listen to the radio or tv either... LOL

[madam-macaw.livejournal.com]

You know, I try to keep up with the news to stay informed, etc. But, sometimes I just feeling like putting on the cartoons in the morning and night instead and just have "ignorance is bliss" as my credo.

[pyllgrum.livejournal.com]

They were going to ban the phrase, but the actual decision to make a decision was tabled until they could resolve a previous issue, which was not resolved without incurring a staff training session, where mistakes were made regarding the correct phraseology of blame, so it never happened.

[warriorsway.livejournal.com]

Right on. I've never been a fan of waffling and refusal to take responsibility.

[giantsloth.livejournal.com]

Yow. People still use that phrase non-ironically in the year 2007? Makes me glad that I'm too busy with other things to pay much attention to the news. I agree with the other folks on the thread: people who violate Strunk & White composition rule #10 (use active voice) are weasels.