If Only

Weaponising Englishness

Photo by IJ Portwine on Unsplash

Unbeknownst to her, Michelle Scorziello’s article about the micro-aggression of the adverb ‘only’ (written on cheques after the amount in words), made me think actual micro-monetizable thoughts for which I plan to be paid pennies on the minute come month-end.

Obviously, given the financial upside, I couldn’t wait to share them with you, even at the very real risk of incurring her displeasure at such rude and uncouth material about her homeland.

In short, I believe the baked-in hostility she discerns in the word ‘only’ is part of something much deeper — a uniquely English mentality that delights in just such things — sardonically and by the subtlest means calling a cheque recipient’s good faith into question, as well as many, many other low-grade injuries; equally pernicious, equally hard to prove.

In cheque slander alone, we’re talking about a multitude of micro-aggressions over the 300 years or more of writing and receiving cheques. A trillion papercuts to a billion eyeballs, as it were. I’d go so far as calling it the cuttingest aggression of all — passive aggression — from…