How do you eat crackers? Part 3: Fayeleiagh is a rizzler for Christ

And that is so essential to our ministry

Just one more thing…

If you’re here, you probably already read Part One and Part Two. If not, probably do that. Or don’t. I’m not your mom. At least I don’t think I am. The early 2010’s were kind of a blur.

SO, just to blister through a little summary: if you’re “padding” your speech—and what’s wrong with a little padding, in moderation?—with stuff like "right?", "alright?", "y'know?", "ja?", "Innit?", "knowwhatimsaying?” etc. you’re being normal. And it’s different from leaning on an “um,” “uh,” or “like”-style filler word (although most of of the time, who cares about that either?). Yes, all of these words fill the pauses in sentences, so that you don't sound like you're reading off of a teleprompter, but for the latter, padding is only the secondary purpose. The primary utility of “Right?” etc., is to actively engage with the person or people you're talking to: "hey, I'm talking to you, not at you."

If it grates when someone says “right?” in the middle of sentences, but you’re fine (or don’t even notice) when someone does the same thing with “y’know?”, it’s probably because you just don’t like the sort of person that says “right?”, namely, professional libs.

In a ringing endorsement of this misplaced anti-PMC sentiment, someone on my normally quite sane writers’ listserv was so maddened by a speaker saying “right?” during a talk, they sent this:

I'll never forget listening to a [REDACTED] talk at the old Verso loft years ago, I think for a [REDACTED] launch, and I remember this tic driving me crazy.

[REDACTED] is one of the smartest people I know, so our faves are def not immune...

If the purpose of eliminating "filler words" is to give someone's words more authority, it sounds like this speaker wasn’t handicapped by them.

Because you didn't say "Y’know, I thought he really had his shit together, but then he said ‘right?’ so much that I assumed he had a traumatic brain injury and was about to whip off his shirt and throw it into the audience like former Tampa Bay Buccaneers wide receiver Antonio Brown, before running down the hall to the Verso Loft freight elevator, only to one day tweet about fucking Ben Roethlisberger’s sister 15 years ago.”

(Doing my damnedest here to get everything taken down for copyright violation)

No, you did not. You listened to his talk, and you still walked away thinking he was one of the smartest people you know.

So then... maybe fuck off?

He’s not giving the goddamn Lyceum Address, so why would you give a shit unless it reminds you of something or someone you don’t like, or maybe just don’t respect?

You even say he’s still one of your "faves," a juvenile and parodically feminine term for an adult man to use unironically, so maybe keep your eyes on your own paper when it comes to what sounds annoying.

And you know what else?!? Later on in that thread, he essentially repeated what I had just said, only a few messages up, with:

I think one other element is that it's something you say when you're speaking to someone you do not believe possesses the full capacity of reason. Children, for instance:

"We don't touch the burner in the kitchen, right?" "We always look both ways before we cross the street, right?" Etc.

I doubt he even saw what I wrote,¹ and I couldn’t reasonably expect him to. We get a lot of emails on that listserv, and no one, including me, has time to read them all. The truth is, if it was anyone else who missed my email and essentially restated what I just said, I wouldn’t care.

You see, I’m being petty, because I don’t fucking like this person. Not because he says “faves,” or because he whines about how people smarter than him don’t always sound the way he thinks smart people are supposed to sound, or even because he ignores what I write and then restates the same thing like it’s his own novel observation. I don’t like him because he sucks for far greater reasons than are worth going into here.² So all that other little stuff grates even harder.

I'm not immune to a little healthy pettiness. But I’m not Rebecca Solnit, and I don’t mistake irritation with domination or extrapolate little slights into the source of my contempt for him. This is just him being a bedwetting little shit, so I hate the way he eat crackers.

And to play Bedwetter’s Advocate, saying someone is your “fave” is how people talk now, no matter how revolting I find it. Later, the original poster considered a line for an essay on the subject:

Out of joint with the world but still called to pontificate about it in public, [they are] bound to commit symptomatic parapraxes, of which “right?” seems to be the most intrusive.

At least that’s where I’ll land until I get inundated with clips of MAGA people speaking this way.

“Parapraxis” (which I had to look up), basically refers to a Freudian slip that amounts to a social blunder. But that’s not at all true, since the original poster’s entire point is that “right” is an increasingly ubiquitous tic in the PMC context, and that this tic is considered not only appropriate, but damn near a cultural standard; if it was a gaff, everyone everyone at that Verso event with the bedwetter’s “fave” and everyone watching those Zooms from Part One , would leave thinking, “Damn, that bitch sure says ‘right?’ a lot.” But they don’t. ‘Cuz that’s how they all talk.

This is the lingua franca. He is in Rome, doing as the Romans do. He is speaking the Native Tongue.

(Also, I’m sorry, using a word like “parapraxis” is a way weirder deviation from the common tongue than “right?”.)

The contemporary professional speaker, professor, rapper etc. favors a less formal, more conversational relationship with their listener, or at least the affect of one. Even religious leaders have jumped onboard. If you’ve been to any large-ish middle-American Protestant church in the last 25 years (or just seen Kelvin on The Righteous Gemstones), you may have noticed the “Hey guys, let’s all just keep it real and kick it with some scripture” style of preaching has made its way into the pulpit, especially in the newer youth ministries. I assure you, Pastor Zach does not talk like that when he's ordering dinner, but he might use a little of it when he’s giving a sermon on saying no to drugs. You talk different to an audience than you do in a conversation, even when, as is increasingly common, you’re trying to make an audience feel like it’s a conversation.

People also almost always write different than they talk (and thank God), but while refined writing is still practiced, informal language has become increasingly acceptable in creative and professional writing as well. For example, I just typed “write different,” instead of “write differently.” I might use the adjective and not the adverb in person, but it looks kind of weird or sloppy or uneducated or stylized (for a charming little colloquial wink, if I do say so myself) when it’s in print, doesn’t it?

And I have no idea whether you agree with that or not, because writing, by its very nature, is one-sided! Maybe you nodded, maybe you shook your head, I have no idea! I can’t even see you! We’re not really having a conversation at all! I’m talking at you, you’re reading it, and I couldn’t really check in, even if I wanted to! It’s awesome, I can say whatever I want, and you can’t say anything back! Or you could, but I would only notice if I wanted to! Because you’re not even here!

Speaking isn’t like that; you can’t just pretend no one is there.

This is particularly true when answering a question from an audience or classroom. As a professor friend of mine put it, “How is someone really supposed to answer a question? You just start talking, like a psycho?” Think about it: if you were to answer a question from a student or audience member without any preamble or acknowledgment whatsoever, you’d sound condescending, annoyed, maybe even aggressive, if not toward the questioner, then to parties not present, with whom you must have some kind of long-standing beef that everyone can gossip about and speculate on later.

Try it. If you don’t get what I’m talking about, I will write, direct, shoot and star in a video to demonstrate. Hand to god.

Speaking of which, if Pastor Zach was asked a question during youth group, he might reply with something like, “that’s a great question, Jayleiagh,” while pointing to her in recognition, and proceed to incorporate the rest of the youth group in the conversation before giving an answer of his own.

PASTOR ZACH: Who here has had to explain to friends that they don’t do poppers because they follow Christ?” [He raises his hand, so will others] Alright, Fayeleiagh, tell Jayleiagh—tell all of us!—about your experience!

FAYLEIAGH: I just told them if I ever open my asshole with inhalents, it will be for the man that God sends me to marry. And the vibe was mad skibidi-slay etc.

PASTOR ZACH: Fayeleiagh, that is so rizz. Did everybody hear that? Fayeleiagh is a rizzler for Christ, which is so important when you minister to fam; they have to know that simping for Jesus is lit, and prayer hits different when you’re sober. You can also remind them that the Bible doesn’t say anything about computer duster, which is a better high anyway, and doesn’t imply extra-marital sodomy!

At the very least, you need to nod to indicate you’re not ignoring them. Or a serial killer. Looking back at what little video there is of me, I generally, smile, say “yeah,” nod, and start out my reply with “So.” That seems like a pretty low-effort minimum to sound relatively human.

More importantly, can we just agree that people like this are terrifyingly inhuman?

We’ll talk more about this “English and Speaking Skills Coach” in our final installment… and this bitch will have you begging for Pastor Zach.

1. A few days earlier, in the same thread, I said:

Maybe I’m off, but it does feel a little like “gentle parenting.” Or as we used to call it “raising children to be shitty little tyrants.”

Or maybe like that thing where you give a three year-old the illusion of having a choice While giving them all the reasons you’d prefer them to make one or the other.

Maybe if it’s academic and origin, this is sort of an extension of the infantilization of students and academia in general?

“OK, so we know when we get there we’re not gonna have time to go to the bathroom, right? So I know you say you don’t have to go now, but we know that it’s gonna be a long time before we get to the playground right? And we have to remember that from last time, right?”

2. Even my bitching has its limits.