They Sadly Died
Of late, whenever a newscaster announces deaths--a car crash, coronavirus, terrorist bomb etc.--they say that people sadly died. You might think this is a courteous show of feeling, but of course since 'sadly' has become de rigueur, it is nothing of the sort; it is only a cluttering of speech. The devil in me wants to ask, after the newscaster says thus-and-so many people sadly died of coronavirus, how many additional victims went out defiantly, angrily, or even jubilantly? Another devil in me wants to know, exactly whose sadness are you speaking of? The dead person's? The deceased person's friends and family? Seems presumptuous. Your own? Or is it impersonal, as in the 'sad fact of their dying'?
Written journalism has also caught the bug. Today I read:
When officers arrived they found two infants inside the vehicle, and they were sadly pronounced dead at the scene by emergency paramedics.
Well, you're right of course. But given that anybody's death is sad for someone or other, I'm inclined to give the newsreaders a pass. If there was someone whose death would not be mourned by anyone, that would also be a sad thing. It's just a courteous show of feeling as you say.
ReplyDeleteThe word 'sad' is really interesting since it used to mean full, like 'satt' still does in German, and gradually moved to the semantic space it occupies now via meaning heavy. (at least that is what CS Lewis says in "Studies in Words"). I guess if phrases like 'sadly died' just become pious formulas, then its semantic position will change again.
Didn't know that about the connection with the German word ..
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