"If you eat that now, it will ruin your supper later," I was told. I went ahead and ate it anyway. And it did, in fact, ruin my supper just a short while later. I could not eat my entire meal, and what I did eat did not taste as good as it should have. What I was told was proven true, and I should heed more of the wisdom that others try to impart.
"Two plus two is four." That was patently obvious. I had never known anyone to question it - not even the biggest class clowns or the smarty pants skeptics that raised objections to everything else in class. The facts of "two plus two" worked out in every equation combination I ever tried.
"Ain't ain't a word, because ain't ain't in the dictionary." Okay. I will try to stop saying it. Even if the fact that you used the word multiple times to prove it isn't a word does not make any sense to me, except in some sort of stupidly ironic way, I still understand what you're telling me. I should not use the word, because it is not really a word. And the proof that it is not really a word is that the established authority on what is or is not a word has been studiously consulted. The dictionary has spoken - or rather, remained silent.
And then one day, quite by accident, I found the entry to for "AIN'T" in the dictionary. I was looking up an unrelated word when I stumbled across it. "It has to be a mistake," so I consulted another dictionary, and another. Different editions of dictionaries, from different publishers, all listed "AIN'T" in plain black and white as a word.
It was an "informal" word, a "nonstandard" word, even "a vulgar contraction" according to an older reference. But it was a word, and it was in the dictionary. And my thoughts were all over the place.
In complete transparency, the first reaction of my seven-year-old mind was a smug self-satisfaction. I had to learn to fight that - it will never get me anywhere in life, and it is not attractive when I see it in others.
But I also felt a sense of freedom, of liberation, of empowerment. As a child, I could not have put it to these words, but I look back now and recognize what I was feeling. One simple dictionary entry reinforced to me what I'd always known, what I'd always been raised to believe: that I can think for myself, I can decide for myself, I can gather the facts for myself, evaluate them for myself, choose for myself a course of action, and then experience for myself the consequences of that choice, good or bad. In fact, I have a responsibility before God to think for myself, gather the facts for myself, and then decide for myself. I have a responsibility to "be fully persuaded in my own mind" about things.
Maybe I should not say "ain't." Maybe it makes me sound like an uncouth hillbilly. I understand the motive behind what I was told was a pure and good motive; but the fact remains that what I was told was not correct. It was little more nuanced, a little more in-depth, a little more complicated than the black and white it was made out to be. It's a word, it's just not an appropriate word in many situations. It's a lot easier to just tell a second-grader that "ain't ain't a word...."
In short, the day I found "AIN'T" in the dictionary was the day I realized that I am an autonomous being, not only capable of making my own choices, but responsible to do so. Responsible to investigate what I've been told by other fallible humans and not simply accept it on face value.
Today they say, "Trust the science." I do trust real science. But I don't have to trust what you tell me the science says. There is a difference. I can look into it for myself. In fact, I have a duty to look into it for myself and not simply blindly follow. Only infallible God can pronounce His Word and expect me to take it on face value.
You may be entirely correct. Or you may be incorrect, but have pure motives. Or you may have nefarious motives for telling me what you're telling me. I can't judge that, but I can look into the facts for myself.
What we see happening today is outrage at people who want to open the dictionary and see if what they're being told is correct, people who want to look into the facts for their own self. "You're not qualified to evaluate the information." I may not be a linguist, but I own a dictionary. And ain't is a word, and is found in the dictionary, and whatever else you're telling me is probably a little more nuanced than the black and white you're making it out to be. Quit condescending and treating grown adults like second-graders.
VM - 11-21-2021
