Equivocation: Not Sure, but This Is Probably the Thread to Ruminate On It

I use “seems” too much

Bad one for me too: "seems like," "feels like," "possibly," "maybe," "not sure, but," "I'd have to check," the list is endless.

i feel like being full of doubt in a doubtful reality is not a bad thing. a lot of people upthread are right about the different rhetorical ways this works, it's not all the same thing

As could only be the case, I land somewhere in the middle. I don't want to eliminate that altogether from things I write, because yeah, it reflects the way I view the world, and if I do have any kind of a written voice, that's part of it. I just have to be mindful of not overdoing it.

i don't know about anybody else but i get irritable and nitpicky and bored with my own narrative voice all the time

(suddenly imagined a chorus of voice going "yeah we get bored of it too you bloviating cunt) :D

(Very meekly) I may have the opposite problem, that I barrel ahead in the face of overwhelming evidence that nobody likes what I write more than I do.

ah fuck 'em clem, fuck 'em all

Yes, yes, yes--including, and most of all, those fucking Beatles.

Huh ... hmmm ... idk?

My sense of "equivocate" is that it describes a situation where one is expected to have certainty, for example in answering the question "would you like eggs and toast this morning, or prefer pancakes and sausage?", and one's answer avoids committing to either choice.

In situations of complexity, where one's knowledge is incomplete and a spectrum of possibilities seem to apply, I try to qualify my language to admit that my conclusions are tentative or reflect nothing more than an opinion based on a limited sample of pertinent experience or facts. I wish more people would explicitly acknowledge this when stating their thoughts on complex issues, because it means they see the limits of their own thinking and leaves open the possibility of learning new facts and changing their minds. That's something I value and try to adhere to.

Fairly or unfairly, I think Obama was/is thought of as an equivocator. He rarely says this is so; he shades and hedges and qualifies. Drives many people up the wall. It's part of why I gravitated towards him--NV's "being full of doubt in a doubtful reality." (No need to chime in, Morbius--we know, he never equivocated about drone strikes.)

Trump, of course, is at the other end of spectrum. Not a trace of uncertainty in every ridiculous thing he says.