letter H saying "I demand to be heard"

LANGUAGE PEDANT: “I could care less” and other speech absurdities

Last updated: March 28th, 2019

My Kindle almost flew at the mirror, but reason prevailed. A broken mirror is interesting… a broken Kindle useless. What provoked this? A mutilated phrase in an otherwise well-written book. I was reading Do Travel Writers Go to Hell by Thomas Kohnstamm and there on page 25 it appeared, one of my pet peeves:

“For most people, November 24 is not a special day. Sure, it hosts Thanksgiving every few years, but I could care less about that.” Grrr.

I recently had a casual bumping into in a supermarket. A pilot was looking for cream—special cream as he makes his own butter—and asked if I could read Thai. Course I can’t, but we started talking and moved outside to continue. He was telling me about his life, his family, his parents and siblings. Sister was a b… and had a problem with everything he did and then … “But I could care less what she thinks.”

And it was the last straw.

“What did you say?”

“When?”

“A moment ago, backtrack. You were telling me how much your sister drove you crazy, then you said something about how you felt about what she thought. What did you say?”

“You mean ‘I could care less’?”

“That’s it, what do you mean?”

“That I feel absolutely nothing of what she thinks of me.”

“Really? If you could care less, it means you care at least something, not so?” He looked at me as if I had lost it. I had. “The expression is, ‘I couldn’t care less… get it? I could NOT care less. I care nothing. I don’t care at all. I care nix, nada, zip, mahala, zero. Nothing. I couldn’t care less.”

He started laughing. “You’re right. I never thought of that. I will never forget now and every time I say it, I’ll remember you.”

Gee, what a way to be remembered… I couldn’t care less.

This fits right up there on the top of my totem pole of English peeves shaking hands with others that have me growling.

Your/you’re, it’s/its, there/their/they’re, were/we’re …

Repeat after me … hospital, him, her, help, heart, habitat, hobnob etc, etc, etc.

But ‘erb? ‘ERB?! Was für eine ding ist ‘ERB?!

Do you ‘ate things, or ‘eed warnings … or not, or ‘ope things will turn out well, or perhaps you ‘ave ‘ad a ‘aircut, celebrate ‘alloween and enjoy the writings of ‘afiz?

The H isn’t silent. The H demands to be said and heard! It stands alone. It has stature! It’s proud with both feet on the ground, arms spread wide hands in the air saying “Hey, here I am, use me, say my name, enunciate me!” We are not speaking French, we are speaking English, folks, English, and the only time “h” isn’t pronounced is when it’s assisting another letter—ph or gh or sh or ch or th—being its foundation, backing it up, being used as a crutch or a shoulder to lean on, turning something hard into something softer, playing nurse.

Right? Yes?

Why? I don’t know. After all, besides now looking decidedly weird to the trained eye, what’s wrong with having a fobia, or coffing, or getting fysical, or reading filosofy? It is what it is.

‘ello there! Stop ignoring it, ‘arry! You too, ‘elen! As for you, ‘oney …

‘afiz is rolling in his grave and I’m ‘eading ‘ome to ‘eal my ‘aemorrhaging ‘aemorrhoids with ‘erbs.

And I COULD CARE LESS! … a whole lot less.

Honestly? Oops! Oh dear, English, you let me down and show me up so badly sometimes!


image: Taken from cartoon letter h via Shutterstock
  1. Lol! Could care less bothers me too… though not nearly as much as it bothers you it seems! Some expressions get warped through poor usage until they become the accepted norm. Good to see you’re questioning them when they come up. We have to do that to keep meaning and clarity in our language.

  2. That expression does bother me a bit, but I think what bothers me more is when people misuse the word “literally.” For instance, “It literally took me a million hours to walk over here.”

  3. My best friend and I, during a search for the Linnaeus description of a frog (which he photographed and needed to describe correctly on his website), mused about the fact that we are both pedants. I believe the word pedant is very much like agnostic or atheist. These nouns were concocted because non-pedants and religious fanatics felt the urge to create opposite terms for who they were (them being good and the opposites being bad – a bit like calling someone ‘stinking rich’). Buying into other people’s reality is therefore pathetic. I am a logophile. I have spent years doing text and layout work for ‘pedants.’ They loved me to bits and paid me very well. I strive to be in a state of hootlessness when it comes to people judging my passions, such as languages and wholesome cooking. Best not to get worked up over slackers or naives. After all, we’re all imperfect and incorrigible. However, it was great to encounter some empathy on here, so thank you for that!
    P.S. The very worst I’ve ever come across during my years in North America: “I should have went.” “I should have did that.” “The room’s been took.” Now THAT is a pandemic! Greetings from The Netherlands!

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