If you enjoy alliteration and have a colorful vocabulary, you can imagine what the original working title of this article was.
Let’s keep it clean, shall we? My mother might read this.Today’s first gripes, in order of annoyance:
The overuse of acronyms in the workplace
People who publicly denounce audiobooks and feel the need to announce it
The Acronyms
It’s an everyday occurrence, especially in the government contracting world, for entire sentences to be built from acronyms, buzzwords, and maybe a preposition or two. Maybe it’s not just GovCon. [EDIT: it’s definitely not just GovCon.]
This faux pas, at least in the world according to Chris, can be committed in writing or out loud. For simplicity, I’ll refer to you, the reader, as the “speaker” and your audience as the “recipient.”
If your recipient is fluent in your acronymic jargon, fine. If there’s a chance they aren’t, I invite you to take the extra three seconds necessary to say or spell out the full name/title/position/action/organization/process/turn of phrase, whatever it is you’re trying to convey. I promise it won’t waste too much oxygen.
You’ve heard the sage advice that ‘it’s dangerous to assume, because it makes an ass out of u and me,’ yes?
Ass-u-me: an oldie but a goodie.
Assume incorrectly, and two unfortunate things can happen:
You come across as a moderately elitist prick.
Your conversation partner either carries on without actually understanding you, or has to ask for clarification, which can be embarrassing.
Bottom line, it demonstrates poor communication skills on the speaker’s part. When a message can be conveyed more clearly, clarity should win over marginal efficiency.
The Audiobooks
Speaking of elitism, a new pet peeve of mine is the claim that audiobooks “dOn’T cOuNt As ReAdInG.” If you read that in a mocking tone, you read it correctly. I can’t help it.
Yes, obviously books are read and audiobooks are heard, if we're really getting into definitions. I just wasn’t aware that this genre of particularity was a topic of discussion, let alone something people actually express when someone has just mentioned listening to an audiobook.
It’s like telling someone that you like pizza only to have them respond with, “It’s not real pizza unless it’s deep dish.”
Um…okay?
I enjoy the smell of books and flipping paper pages as much as the next person. But if I have multiple ways to consume information that is of interest to me, why reject one simply because of its relatively recent auditory adaptation?
And what purpose does qualifying someone else's preference serve? Differing opinions make for good conversation, but when an opinion arrives wrapped in superiority, it stops being conversation and starts being a lecture nobody signed up for.
I considered digging into statistics on global and national reading-vs-listening trends to support the argument for audiobooks. Or pointing out that they have made literature more accessible.
Then I realized it would all be in defense of audiobooks, and they don’t need defending.
If this particular medium offends you, I invite you to try not worrying about it. Someone else’s listening habits don’t subtract from your total page count for the year.
The Common Thread
So what do acronym-slinging and audiobook-shaming have in common? Beyond making my eye twitch, both habits send the same unspoken message: I have it right, and you don’t.
The speaker who rattles off alphabet soup has decided their vocabulary is the standard, and anyone who needs a translation is the one who’s behind.
The self-appointed literary gatekeeper has decided their way of consuming a book is the only legitimate one, and everyone else is merely pretending.
Maybe neither intends to come across as arrogant (or as an “elitist prick,” if you prefer), but intent is a lot less memorable than impact. Impact is what people walk away with.
Communication is meant to share information and create mutual understanding, not serve as an audition for the smartest person in the room. Nobody is impressed by the acronym you didn’t explain or the book you think someone didn’t really read. They’re just quietly crossing you off their list of people they’d like to sit next to at lunch.
So spell it out, let people listen, and keep your hot takes on other people’s reading habits to yourself. Because if I told you what I was really going to call this article, one might agree it fits.
