IRRITATING SPEECH MANNERISMS

Have we become so inarticulate a nation that we cannot speak without resorting to the irritating speech mannerisms of a sixteen-year-old valley girl? I refer to the annoying habit by some, both young people and adults, of inserting the phrase You know between every other word they speak.

"I think, you know, that the president, you know, should drop all this, you know, crap about, you know, a universal health plan. No one, you know, really wants it. He is, you know, destroying his, you know, political future and that, you know, of the Democratic party, you know."

I may have exaggerated a bit, but you get the point.

The same people, like, have to, you know, insert the word like between, you know, the other words they, like, speak.

Good god, if you don't know what you want to say and cannot say it without all these oral pauses, then you might consider just not saying anything.  At the very least wait until you have gathered your thoughts and can speak in coherent sentences.

As Abraham Lincoln said, "Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt."