Pathetic Appeals

Emotions have the mysterious capacity to create meaning from the meaningless. Pet peeves are a prime example of strong emotional feelings transforming and manifesting our opinions into critical observations. In Geogg Nunberg's article on linguistic pet peeves he discusses personal pathetic appeals to specific vexations. We all have things other people say or do that make us annoyed; some more than most, but it's our idiosyncrasies and pet peeves that make us who we are.

From reading the article I get a sense that pet peeves stem largely from a personal identification with a theory or ideology that you nurture in your bosom and make your own. When submersed in an environment which relentlessly bombards you with information it becomes increasingly difficult to have unique pet peeves. In class we've talked about the rhetorical climate of politics and how it's currently in a rut of pathetic appeals. The current political climate is the result of monoculture in ideology which results in mimicked pet peeves, rhetorical appeals, and any other ubiquitous characteristics of our society. In the article the esoteric code of grammar was brought up as an ideology people have created - a kind of monoculture where they have rooted countless pet peeves against outsiders.

We are living in the age of globalization which means the esoteric circles are getting broader and less defined. Suddenly it's possible for my emotions regarding a subject to be the same as someone elses halfway across the world and not just those within a monoculture around us. Pet peeves can be taken lightly but when an entire community is irritated and annoyed by the same things you get something like our political climate. Emotions make us unique but they also are the only thing that brings us closer together to create an empathetic world and a changing world. For these reasons I disagree pet peeves are personal in the sense that they are unique, but instead are characteristics identifiable of anyone who chooses to adopt them.

Many times pet peeves assert an ethical standard or moral correctness to life. The degree to which those conventions are accepted by others is a way to distinguish the petty from the meaningful. It is also a way to criticize those conventions and possibly create a movement to change them. Politics is a good example of this; a lot of people think that after Obama was elected he neglected to take his opportune moment to get health care and other reforms passed. In other words he didn't take advantage of peoples' heightened emotional state to get things done in Washington. I think it's our responsibility to use our emotions more wisely to find meaning in things bigger than the correct use of the word gingerly.