Richard Gere wins Plain English Foot in Mouth award (HOLD MUH GRAMMAR ALERT)

Ananova ^ | December 4, 2002 | Ananova

[MadIvan]

Richard Gere has won Plain English Campaign's Foot in Mouth award for the year's most baffling celebrity quote.

Gere won the 2002 award after telling a Sunday newspaper: "I know who I am. No one else knows who I am. If I was a giraffe and somebody said I was a snake, I'd think 'No, actually I am a giraffe.''

Funny, I always thought he was a gerbil - Ivan

Among the 10 winners of the Golden Bull award for outrageous gobbledygook include Halifax Insurance, Marconi, the Scottish Parliament and Waitrose.

The 'honours' are part of a ceremony to mark Plain English Day on Thursday 5 December. The Campaign, an independent pressure group, will also honour organisations that have written particularly clear documents during 2002.

One of the Golden Bull winners comes from a document for a bricklaying National Vocational Qualification, describing the act of laying a brick in a wall as: "..to install a component into the structural fabric".

The Scottish Parliament's winning effort is taken from Paragraph 59 of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act (2002), Part 5. It reads: "The Scottish Ministers may by order amend subsection (1) of section 57 or paragraph (a) or (b) of subsection (2) of section 58 so as to substitute for the number of years for the time being mentioned in the provision in question such other number of years (not being a number which exceeds that being mentioned in the provision as originally enacted) as may be specified in the order."

Campaign spokesman John Lister said the Golden Bulls were meant to be lighthearted. "These are simply the most ludicrous examples we have found during the year.

"Thanks to the success of our campaigners, most writers wouldn't dream of producing such incomprehensible documents.

"Stodgy, long-winded writing is still wasting time and money and cheating people of the chance to make an informed decision."

[MadIvan]

Richard Gere is being recognised for his inability to have a coherent thought. The man deserves no less. Though the gerbils may feel differently. ;)

Regards, Ivan

[MadIvan]

Bump!

[Saundra Duffy]

LOL!! By the way, where was PETA when this creep had a little live critter stuck up his butt?! Huh?!

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Hold muh gerbil alert!!

[Desdemona]

Richard Gere a gerbil? You know, there are some mighty big pythons out there who get hungry from time to time....

[MadIvan]

LOL!! By the way, where was PETA when this creep had a little live critter stuck up his butt?! Huh?!

Lest we forget the dangers of sticking live "little critters" up your bum:

The Dangers of Gerbils

Regards, Ivan

[Mo1]

FOFL ... OMG

[blackdog]

Did anyone see that South Park episode last week with the hamster? Disgusting, but totally hysterical and scathing of liberals. I have also never understood why someone would do that with a small pet without adhering to leash laws?

[ArrogantBustard]

Introducing William Jefferson Gerbil:

Caption: "I did not crawl up that 'man', Mr. Gere's bum!"

[RooRoobird14]

Gere won the 2002 award after telling a Sunday newspaper: "I know who I am. No one else knows who I am. If I was a giraffe and somebody said I was a snake, I'd think 'No, actually I am a giraffe.''

Funny, I always thought he was a gerbil - Ivan

LOL, as always MadIvan, you wield a wickedly funny pen. I'm still LOLOLOLING about the gerbil (I'd almost forgotten about that....)

[Hugin]

My all time favorite bureaucratic euphamism came from the National Transportation Safety Administration, "unplanned interface with the terrain", a.k.a. a plane crash.

[Billthedrill]

Did anyone see that South Park episode last week with the hamster?

Do you refer to His Highness Lemmiwinks, adventurer, and King of the Gerbils? Show some respect, man...

Yeah, in answer to your question, I saw it. About the time the folkie with the guitar was singing about brave little Lemmiwinks (who was, I believe, dodging diverticula in the descending colon at that point) I was beginning to wonder if the coffee lady hadn't slipped some LSD in my 'spresso again...

[MadIvan]

Richard Gere should be careful - the consequences for the gerbil of repeated insertion can be severe:

Regards, Ivan

[ArrogantBustard]

That would explain a fellow I went to University with. He could produce an amazing rasping roar and room clearing stench. And all this time I thought it was the Iron City Beer.

[AnnaZ]

Re: your link (The Dangers of Gerbils)...

 

OMG!!!!!!!!

 

"Armageddon!" LOL!

[TheBigB]

And yet he was able to sleep with this for several years...

[aruanan]

The Scottish Parliament's winning effort is taken from Paragraph 59 of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act (2002), Part 5. It reads: "The Scottish Ministers may by order amend subsection (1) of section 57 or paragraph (a) or (b) of subsection (2) of section 58 so as to substitute for the number of years for the time being mentioned in the provision in question such other number of years (not being a number which exceeds that being mentioned in the provision as originally enacted) as may be specified in the order."

What's so unintelligible about this? It's clear and specific. If you want to see real examples of writing that appears to mean something but means nothing or means something other than what the writer intended, read The Graves of Academe, or Less than Words Can Say, or The Leaning Tower of Babel by Richard Mitchell.

[MadIvan]

And yet he was able to sleep with this for several years...

Point of order: we don't know if he was merely playing at being married and retreating to comfort of his gerbils at night.

Regards, Ivan

[TheBigB]

Sustained!

[Happygal]

ARMAGEDDON!!!!!!