The journalist's despite?

Language Log 2026-08-03

Summary:

According to a recent BoingBoing segment, Ballots for a special election in England's Clacton-by-Sea are the longest ever produced in U.K. electoral history despite¹ only one major party contesting the race. The footnote: 1. This is the journalist's despite, wherein the word implies disregard when there is in fact a blatant causal relationship. I'm puzzled by […]

Link:

https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=73957&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-journalists-despite

From feeds:

Gudgeon and gist » Language Log

Tags:

words

Authors:

Mark Liberman

Date tagged:

08/03/2026, 09:21

Date published:

08/03/2026, 07:00