Stanley Fish on education, law and society.

“I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!” That famous declaration by Howard Beale in the movie “Network” is the implicit and sometimes explicit message of the many hundreds of responses to last week’s column on phrases and announcements that make your heart sink and make you want to commit mayhem.

“Rage” was a word often used as readers accepted my invitation to add their own (non) favorites to my small list. By my count, the top preferred un-preferred phrase was “No problem” in response to “Thank you” (disliked either because it suggests a problem caused by you will be graciously ignored or that no problem existed when you know it did). That was followed by “Batteries Not Included,” “Are you still working on that?” (asked by a waiter who wants to get rid of you), “For your convenience” (always a preliminary to inconvenience), “Have a nice day” and one I did cite, “Your call is important to us.”



Many more posters than usual signed their own names rather than using initials or pseudonyms. I take that to be an indication of the strength of their feelings; they wanted to acknowledge and own their personal anger.



One respondent requested a list of phrases we love to hear. That was hard (what does this tell you about life?), but I did come up with a few: “You are right,” “It’s a girl,” “It’s a boy,” “Great job,” “No charge” and “Sunshine all day.” Sunshine came into my day when a bank executive e-mailed me to say that he has sent the column to his branch presidents in the hope that it would help employees “avoid making people feel the pain associated with the examples you cite.” Makes you believe in journalism.

Here is a selection by me and the editors of comments that hit the mark.

Where to start! The Victorians thought they were living in the great age of cant; their jaws would drop in sight of the vast stinking swamp of it we wade through every day.

— Posted by PL



My favorites… “I don’t mean to be rude,” when you know full well they are going to be. Also under that heading comes, “I don’t mean to criticise” or…”I don’t mean to be nasty.” And of course that is exactly what the offender does.

— Posted by Dina Dellit



It seems that irritating utterances make up ninety percent of human interactions whether verbal, written or virtual. The to-be-continued is especially annoying with the weather report on any television station. The announcer invariably says something like: “Category 5 hurricane on its way, see what it does to your weekend weather later on in this program.”

— Posted by Anita



My favorite: “The doctor will be with you in a minute.” Not true. Never has been.

— Posted by David S.



There’s one expression that really, really irks me, and I doubt it ever arose through any sort of design, although I suspect it may have evolved from an older expression that tends to irritate me as well.

“It’s all good.” I consider this phrase to be the evil offspring of “Have a nice day.”

I am always tempted to reply, “No, it isn’t,” and “Make me!” or much cruder words to that effect.

— Posted by Geoff from Ohio



“This is a courtesy call…”

I absolutely want to strangle telemarketers or service providers who interrupt my life with their ‘courtesy calls’. The real courtesy would be not to call in the first place, or not to label it as such.

— Posted by Abbie



“Thank you for calling. Your call is very important to us. All of our associates are busy serving other customers. Please stay on the line and your call will be answered in the order received”.

Translation: “We’ve put you on indefinite hold, and won’t tell you where you are in the queue or your expected wait time. We don’t want to spend a lot of money on staff since that cuts into our profits. So you get to listen to prerecorded music with frequent repetitions of this message until you get frustrated and hang up. If you do get through, you’re going to talk to someone sitting in a call center halfway around the world who will spend the first five minutes verifying your identity. We know that we have no competition, so you’re going to have to deal with us on our terms. Sucka!”

— Posted by Bluevoter



My computer has several times told me: “You have committed a fatal error and your computer will shut down immediately” I cringe waiting for the Internet Police to break down my door and violently haul me off to cyber prison.

— Posted by George Millington



“Access Denied: You Do Not Have Permission to Access This Site” to a web page that you have been patiently hunting for. You feel like you’ve inadvertently stepped into someone’s private office with nefarious intentions.

— Posted by Jeanne



When the boss says, “My door is always open.” If it were, we wouldn’t need to be told. It’s really just his/her way of saying, “I’m intentionally unapproachable, but on record for stating otherwise.” It provides plausible deniability.

— Posted by dg



“You’re getting defensive.”

and [its] partner in crime:

“You need to calm down.”

— Posted by Jacob Gerber



I’m going to let you go now.” Naked deceit and hypocrisy. Translation: “I’m sick of talking to you and I want you to get out of my face but I’m too much of a rube to know how to do it gracefully so I’ll pretend I’m doing you a favor because I think you’re stupid enough to believe me.”

— Posted by Tom



“Teachable moment.” This phrase smacks of condescension.

— Posted by Drew



“Take care.”

Parting words that suggest that the world is a sea of malevolence, and whether man made or natural, bad things are headed your way. And from our brief encounter I can see that you are vulnerable, and nothing and nobody will help you see the threats or help you once you have been struck — not even the person who invokes this horrible phrase — which underscores how little regard this person has for you – all said as though it is vaguely benevolent.

— Posted by Ben



Any sentence that involves my so-called patience: “Thank you for your patience” et al. I’m not patient, I’m not being patient, and I’m not about to start now.

Also, “No problem” means “There’s no need to apologize.” It does not mean “You’re welcome.” When a waiter or any person working in any kind of service industry says “No problem,” I always think to myself “well, I’m glad it’s not a problem since it’s your freakin’ job to do this for me.”

— Posted by David



In a restaurant, while having a good, and perhaps intimate, conversation, a waiter comes over and says, “Is everything all right?” The correct answer would be, “Yes, it was, until we were interrupted.” Of course, that would lead to an apology, which would further delay our conversation. [Why do restaurant owners require waiters to infuriate their customers with that inane question?]— Posted by Ken



The phrase at the top of my “most annoying” list at the moment is anything done “to perfection.” Grilled to perfection … broiled to perfection … pan-seared to perfection. This construction is so terribly overdone (as opposed to rare, or even medium rare) by those who write menus and otherwise promote restaurants that it might actually be pushing me away from the items described. Just do what you have to do to my food (I must trust you, or I would have gone elsewhere to eat) and be done with it. And please don’t stop aspiring to perfection, but also cease trying to convince us that you’ve reached it.

— Posted by Fr. Laird MacGregor



“My name’s Chuck and I’ll be your server tonight.”

Would someone PLEASE tell the Chucks of the world that we’re aware of what his function in the restaurant is and that it doesn’t include intruding on our evening by imposing his acquaintance on us — as though we’d come to the establishment to make friends rather than have dinner.

If we needed Chuck’s help at some point when he is absent from our table, it would be easy to summon him if we knew his name from a name tag or a button that had “23″ on it. Are we forever doomed to the phony-egalitarian bonhomie of the You-can-call-me-Chuck, who will doubtless ask someone “Are you still working on that?!?” during the meal, or can we perhaps have a dinner we’re paying for (and paying him to serve) in relaxed anonymity?— Posted by Titov0



Whenever I read “In order to serve you better…” in a letter from a bank, utility company, etc., it’s time to run for the hills. You know you’re about to pay more for reduced service.

— Posted by P. Gabriel



“Oh, have you lost your luggage?” From the agent at the baggage service counter. My response: “No, the airline has lost my luggage.”

— Posted by Ron

