[SUBMITTED] I Didn'tNot Fail to Not Say That

[Candlewhisper Archive]

CURRENT DRAFT

TITLE:

I Didn't Not Fail to Not Say That


VALIDITY:

Elections, No state-controlled media


DESCRIPTION:

Your Foreign Affairs minister faced harsh media criticism yesterday when --following an official visit to Blackacre-- @@HE@@ said "I don't see any reason to suspect Blackacre operatives of having ill intentions towards @@NAME@@". This controversial statement was counter to a growing body of evidence collected by the @@DEMONYM@@ intelligence community.

OPTION ONE

"I realise there is some need for clarification," says the minister, sweating a little. "In a key sentence in my remarks, I said the word 'having' instead of 'not having'. Sort of a double-negative. I think that probably clarifies things pretty good by itself."

Outcome: the current administration is going for an all time record on lies-per-month


OPTION TWO

"Look, you know that this @@MAN@@ is under investigation for corruption, don't you?" observes Intelligence Chief Hal Clinton. "It's hard to get concrete proof, but when it comes to holding one of the highest offices in the land, shouldn't we at least suspend @@HIM@@ from @@HIS@@ role while investigations proceed?"

Outcome: secret spymasters can impeach elected officials with little to no evidence


OPTION THREE

"It is possible this was an honest mistake, that could potentially have been avoided by considering the information delivery medium," points out lawyer @@randomname@@, reading slowly and carefully from a prepared statement. "All official political announcements should be in the written format, with press questions submitted in writing too. Also, ban government ministers from 'Twitcher' and other social media. Hopefully, that will bring some accountability to political statements."

Outcome: politicians no longer start their day with an early morning covfefe

SECOND

TITLE:

I Didn't Not Not Fail to Not Say That


VALIDITY:

Elections, No state-controlled media


DESCRIPTION:

Your Foreign Affairs Minister faced harsh media criticism yesterday when following an official visit to Blackacre @@HE@@ said "I don't see any reason to suspect Blackacre operatives of having ill intentions towards @@NAME@@". This controversial statement was counter to a vast body of evidence collected by the @@DEMONYM@@ intelligence community.

OPTION ONE

"I realise there is some need for clarification," says the minister, sweating a little. "In a key sentence in my remarks, I said the word 'having' instead of 'not having'. Sort of a double-negative. I think that probably clarifies things pretty good by itself."

Outcome: the current administration is going for an all time record on lies-per-month


OPTION TWO

"Look, you know that this @@MAN@@ is under investigation for corruption, don't you?" observes Intelligence Chief Hal Clinton. "It's hard to get concrete proof, but when it comes to holding one of the highest offices in the land, shouldn't we at least suspend @@HIM@@ from @@HIS@@ role while investigations proceed?"

Outcome: secret spymasters can impeach elected officials with little to no evidence


OPTION THREE

"It is possible this was an honest mistake, that could potentially have been avoided by considering the information delivery medium," points out lawyer @@randomname@@, reading slowly and carefully from a prepared statement. "All official political announcements should be in the written format, with press questions submitted in writing too. Also, ban government ministers from 'Twitcher' and other social media. Hopefully, that will bring some accountability to political statements."

Outcome: politicians no longer start their day with an early morning covfefe

FIRST:

TITLE:

I Didn't Not Not Fail to Not Say That


VALIDITY:

Elections, No state-controlled media


DESCRIPTION:

Your Minister of Foreign Affairs was yesterday broadcast stating "I don't see any reason to suspect Blackacre of having ill intentions towards @@NAME@@", a bold and controversial statement that goes counter to a vast body of evidence collected by the @@DEMONYM@@ intelligence community. Today, in the face of backlash from both the media and even your own political party, @@HE@@ has said @@HE@@ has realised he slipped up, and @@HE@@ meant to say "not having" rather than "having".


OPTION ONE

"I might have accidentally missed off the word that made it a double negative," says the minister, sweating a little. "Any rumours that I am in the pocket of Blackacre are false, and it's clear that the intelligence communities have my full support and confidence. Can we just let it go already?"

Outcome: the current administration is going for an all time record on lies-per-month


OPTION TWO

"Look, you know that this guy is under investigation for corruption, don't you?" observes Intelligence Chief @@randomname@@. "It's hard to get concrete proof, but when it comes to holding one of the highest offices in the land, shouldn't we at least suspend @@HIM@@ from @@HIS@@ role while investigations proceed?"

Outcome: secret spymasters can impeach elected officials with little to no evidence


OPTION THREE

"It is possible this was an honest mistake, and such mistakes could potentially be avoided if we consider the medium of information delivery," points out lawyer @@randomname@@, reading slowly and carefully from a prepared statement. "Limit official political announcements and speeches to the written format, with press questions only answered after a minimum of 24 hours consideration. Also, let's stop government using 'Twitcher' and other social media."

Outcome: politicians no longer start their day with an early morning covfefe

SUBMITTED 28/8/18

[Frieden-und Freudenland]

I really love how quickly you dashed off an issue on this

OK, here are my comments.

TITLE:

I Didn't Not Not Fail to Not Say That


VALIDITY:

Elections, No state-controlled media


DESCRIPTION:

Your Minister of Foreign Affairs was yesterday broadcast stating "I don't see any reason to suspect Blackacre of having ill intentions towards @@NAME@@", a bold and controversial statement that goes counter to a vast body of evidence collected by the @@DEMONYM@@ intelligence community. Today, in the face of backlash from both the media and even your own political party, @@HE@@ has said @@HE@@ has realised he slipped up, and @@HE@@ meant to say "not having" rather than "having".

This sounds a bit cumbersome. Too many embedded sentences with "he." Also, one of those he's needs to be a macro, too.

OPTION TWO

"Look, you know that this guy is under investigation for corruption, don't you?" observes Intelligence Chief @@randomname@@. "It's hard to get concrete proof, but when it comes to holding one of the highest offices in the land, shouldn't we at least suspend @@HIM@@ from @@HIS@@ role while investigations proceed?"

Outcome: secret spymasters can impeach elected officials with little to no evidence

Maybe use the macro @@MAN@@?

-----------------------

Also, maybe it would be better if you stated that the Minister of Foreign Affairs made this statement while s/he was on a diplomatic visit to Blackacre and attended a press conference in the presence of Valeria Drake and her bodyguards who accompany her everywhere (and the rumor has it that they are well-trained assassins). After coming back to @@NAME@@, the minister changed his/her statement. You know, maybe not exactly in this way, but I think it would be good to somehow point out that this minister is - for some reason - afraid of what Blackacrians can do to him/her.

[Candlewhisper Archive]

Okay, tried to inflict some efficiency of writing in draft two.

Have added in a visit to Blackacre, but left off Valeria Drake for now. Maybe she could turn up in a 4th option. Not sure yet.

[Jutsa]

Omg you fit covfefe in!

Your Foreign Affairs Minister faced harsh media criticism yesterday when following an official visit to Blackacre @@HE@@ said

This sentence's kinda confusion. That could be intentional, given the nature of this issue, but adding a comma after "yesterday" and "Blackacre" should help clarify things.

ed: Oh I'd love her in this; good counter to Hal Clinton.

[Trotterdam]

By the way, I just noticed I mistyped a "shouldn't" as "should" when giving advice on another draft. I've already fixed it, but, so y'know, it does happen.

[Jutsa]

I think you mean it doesn't happen, yes?

I'd not have thought that you wouldn't have not necessarily known that to not be the case.

[Trotterdam]

I think you mean it doesn't happen, yes?

No, I didn't not refrain from failing to mean something else.

[Australian rePublic]

Interesting. However, this is a purely English thing. In other languages, in some other languages, more negatives serve to reenforce eachother, which means that in Greek, for example, "I didn't went nowhere" translates to "I went nowhere", as the double negative reinforces the original negative. Even if @@NAME@@ speaks a language where multiple negatives cancel eachother out, the translator could very easily cancel eachother out, and that's a point which the translator should bring up. I reacon that'd make a far better issue. Also, a double negative? How maundane. Why not a quadruple, sextuple negative? It probably won't work in the lost in translation part, I don't know whether or not more than two negatives reenforce eachother, but for NS's sake, we could probably work out something

[Trotterdam]

Interesting. However, this is a purely English thing. In other languages, in some other languages, more negatives serve to reenforce eachother, which means that in Greek, for example, "I didn't went nowhere" translates to "I went nowhere", as the double negative reinforces the original negative.

So, if someone said "I don't see any reason to suspect Blackacrian operatives of not having ill intentions towards @@NAME@@" in Greek, that would mean "Backacrian operatives really, really don't have ill intentions towards us"? I find that unlikely.

Hilarious multiple negatives are not the point here. That's just a title joke. The point is how leaving off a negative - even if it's the only negative - can completely change a sentence's meaning even though it's only a very slight change in wording. Multiple negatives would defeat the purpose, since it would leave the sentence as incomprehensible gibberish regardless of whether the speaker technically said it right or not.

Though now that I think about it, I recall when I was looking up Zulu stuff and discovered that...

(Hey... this language has negative versions of verbs that aren't just the positive versions with "not" prepended/appended? That's awesome! That would prevent so many typos!)

[Jutsa]

Though that's probably true, it's probably safe to assume must players' languages have "not" in it.
Safer than assuming commas, actually.

[Hediacrana]

The description speaks of "a vast body of evidence" collected by the intelligence community, but in option 2, a representative of this community says they have nothing concrete so far. Of course it's technically possible to have a vast body of only circumstantial evidence, but still the two statements seem a bit confusing when taken together. Maybe it would be better to speak either of a growing body of evidence, or only of a wide consensus in the intelligence community that Blackacre is up to no good?

On a minor note, 'Minister' is with a capital in the description, but 'minister' with a small 'm' in the first option.

[Candlewhisper Archive]

Omg you fit covfefe in!

Yeah, I thought it was too forgettable a thing to base an issue around, but there's a lower standard of reference-notability for effect lines.

Bearing in mind it's normally a couple of years for my issue's to be edited, I suspect it'll raise concerns at that time. I guess we'll just see if it still feels usable by that time.

This sentence's kinda confusion. That could be intentional, given the nature of this issue, but adding a comma after "yesterday" and "Blackacre" should help clarify things.

Okay, gotcha. Might give the dreaded emdash a go instead.

By the way, I just noticed I mistyped a "shouldn't" as "should" when giving advice on another draft. I've already fixed it, but, so y'know, it does happen.

Heh.

The description speaks of "a vast body of evidence" collected by the intelligence community, but in option 2, a representative of this community says they have nothing concrete so far. Of course it's technically possible to have a vast body of only circumstantial evidence, but still the two statements seem a bit confusing when taken together. Maybe it would be better to speak either of a growing body of evidence, or only of a wide consensus in the intelligence community that Blackacre is up to no good?

On a minor note, 'Minister' is with a capital in the description, but 'minister' with a small 'm' in the first option.

Nothing concrete on the guy being corrupted, but a vast body of evidence on Blackacre having ill intentions towards @@NAME@@.

I mean, there's all those issues if nothing else.

Growing works fine for me though, so used it.

[Hediacrana]

Nothing concrete on the guy being corrupted, but a vast body of evidence on Blackacre having ill intentions towards @@NAME@@.

Ah, yes, I see now.

You still have 'Minister' and 'minister,' btw.

[Candlewhisper Archive]

Nothing concrete on the guy being corrupted, but a vast body of evidence on Blackacre having ill intentions towards @@NAME@@.

Ah, yes, I see now.

You still have 'Minister' and 'minister,' btw.

Oops, fixed.

[Jutsa]

The below comment is not important to the draft, as I personally don't see anything more to add.

Might give the dreaded emdash a go instead.

You don't like my beautiful — and I do mean beautiful — em dashes?
(ftr I used normal dashes until Shwe converted me.)