Words matter

You are probably thinking with that headline that I am going to talk about the importance of the written word and print newspapers. That is for another time, perhaps National Newspaper Week coming in a few weeks.

But this week I want to talk about when you say something and try to walk it back or make excuses or clarify. It does not work. You said what you said and in my opinion 90% of the time, or more, people believe what they said they just did not think they would get push back from the comments.

Perhaps the most notable is Republican vice-presidential nominee Sen. JD Vance’s comments about “childless cat ladies.” Yes, I am one of those and yes, I took offense. No, I did not realize he said that back in 2021. It went pretty much under the radar until he was selected as Donald Trump’s running mate.

Vance has tried to clarify his statement but it has only made things worse but to his credit (I guess) he has actually owned the thought behind it.

According to media reports in part of the speech Vance said the country was being run by certain segments including “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too.”

“It’s just a basic fact — you look at Kamala Harris, Pete Buttigieg, AOC — the entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children,” Vance continued. “And how does it make any sense that we’ve turned our country over to people who don’t really have a direct stake in it?” He went on to say that they should have less of a vote because he believes they do not have a stake in the country’s future.

He has gotten push back from many women who have tried to have children but for various reasons cannot. He and his wife have tried to clarify that childless women not by choice is not whom he was referring to at that time.

No, you do not get to clarify. You said what you said Mr. Vance. You basically said those of us without children are less in your eyes and have no stake in the future of this country. That’s hogwash.

I feel for women I know who have tried or are trying to have children and cannot. They are different than my husband and I, and several other Gen X friends I know, who have chosen not to have children. Whether you choose or not, not having a child does not mean you are less of an American, less of a person, or that your vote should not count, and it does not, or at least it should not, matter what political affiliation you are from.

Words matter Mr. Vance.

Example 2. Remember after the first attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump and everyone said they should calm down the hate rhetoric but that lasted all of about five seconds? Well, I think it didn’t even last that long after this second potential attempt over the weekend.

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries posted on X (formerly Twitter). “Extreme MAGA Republicans are the party of a national abortion ban and Trump’s Project 2025. We must stop them.”

Since Mr. Jeffries is one who believes that Trump’s posts helped incite the Jan. 6 riots, he should know better.

Words matter Mr. Jeffries. You can’t take it back whether you delete the post or not. You said it, you must have meant it. How far will you go to “stop them?”

And, Example 2B, on the other side, just as bad or even worse, Elon Must replied to an X post about the attempted assassination Sunday with this “And no one is even trying to assassinate Biden/Kamala.”

Words matter Mr. Musk. Don’t condemn anyone for their inciteful comments if you are going to post that. And don’t state you thought it was funny because you are not a comedian. You said or typed what you typed. You meant it.

Words matter.

Example 3, a personal example. A few years ago a friend was remarking about a typographical error in the paper and remarked that maybe they needed a better editor or something to that effect. I noted that I was the editor and the friend tried to cover and apologize. They said what they said. They meant, whether it was directed at me or not.

Words matter.

Now on this latter example. I took the words to heart and looked at how I was editing, asked an employee to also proofread the stories and I try to take more time editing. Yes, typographical errors still occur, but we are trying.

So, we know that words matter and that words can result in positive change even if the words leading to the change were not positive.

However, I would be hard pressed to find anything positive about Mr. Vance’s comments on us childless cat ladies (I love my two orange tabbies by the way) and Mr. Jeffries’s post.

The next time you are about to speak or post a “truth” remember words matter and be prepared to stand by those words if you are called out on them.