Oy. Once again, the bludde boileth overre. Guess why? Never mind, it’s the Daily Mail again.
PICTURED: Moment Kaley Cuoco’s stunt double is RAN OVER by a car
Give me a minute while I get a fresh cup of coffee.
I’ve ranted before about the Brit tendency to misuse tenses, e.g. “he was sat there” instead of “he was sitting there”, and now we have the latest manifestation, using “ran” instead of “run”.
In this case, the problem stems from fucking illiteracy ignorance of what is being omitted from the sentence: “…stunt double is (being) run over by a car.” Clearly, saying “stunt double is being ran over by a car” jars the senses — or maybe it doesn’t, in the post-grammatical world we now find ourselves in.
Just for the record, “ran” in this example is a transitive past-tense verb, i.e. “the car ran over the stunt double” (although it really should have run over both the writer and editor of this article). Similarly, it can be used without an object (“the boy ran away”) unless it’s used in a different sense (the man ran the company — i.e. managed the company).
Of all the times to run out of fuel for my flamethrower…
Ben Lee Whorf, call your office. Soonester.
.
… and that passive voice…
Don’t get me started…
I’ve seen or heard a number run/ran errors recently. My pet peeve is the use of their in the singular. As I have related before, the first time I was really struck by this usage was in basic training 52 years ago when the Drill Sargent ordered everybody to drop out and check out their not his rifle from the armory. My internal brain was going. “Do you mean we all have to share one?” Discretion being the better part of valor, I kept my mouth shut. It wasn’t even to avoid bothering the ladies present because there weren’t any.
Q: Why can’t you run through a campground?
A: You have to “ran” because it’s past tents.
Go stand in the corner.
After posting that to raise grammar master Kim’s blood pressure, you might not arrive at the corner in tact.
Never seen a tact myself, nor do I know where it is, but there are lots of them in print journalism lately.
I’ve been accused on occasion of having a distinct lack of tact.
“…although it really should have run over both the writer and editor of this article…”
A good case can be made that collectively, throughout the industry, those two jobs are not worth one stunt double.
The past, present and future walk into a bar.
It was tense.
Mark D
The news readers (telly talkers) and the press in the UK have long since gone to the dark side of Saxon speak. All trying to be cockneys of high breeding. It is intentional, twist a knife in the Queen’s English for effect and to a degree, for brevity, they want 3 and 4 letter words in the headlines to grab attention of the short span man. “Body double in hospital” will be tomorrow’s headline.