How am I supposed to read this?

[kaigou]

More and more recently over the past year or two, there have been modern-setting stories (usually urban fantasy + humor/comedy) that incorporate pop culture. I have, somehow -- how, I don't know -- managed to inculcate a certain level of immunity to random Japanese like baka. I have also, somehow, managed to stifle the grimace down to a simple twinge when I see references to Sunnydale or Buffy or Anita or Lestat or any other mod-pop-cult iconage.

What I can not stomach is when authors use -- in dialogue, no less -- internet-based acronyms. Not because I don't know what DNF, or BFF, or OMG, or WTF means, but because I don't know how to read it. My brain suddenly splits into two separate voices.

“OMG.” She turned bright red. “OMG.” She covered her mouth. “OMG,” she said again, sort of muffled.

Me: *translates* "Oh my god," she cried. *thinks* Wait, did she actually say, "oh em gee," or did she say "oh my god"? Which is it?

And then I just come to a complete halt, because I can't hear the story any more. I can only hear this bizarre disconnect over whether the character said the phrase that's the meaning of the acronym -- "oh my god" in this case -- or if the character actually said the acronym, in which case wouldn't one write it as "oh em gee"?

And do you know ANYONE on this planet who says "oh em gee!" without a wink-wink nudge-nudge delivery? I mean, the only times I've ever heard someone actually say "oh em gee!" they said it in an identical cadence and expression as "gag me with a spoon" or "totally tubular", same as "oh-snap!", or even "eleventy-one!". It's a verbal wink, if not accompanied outright by an actual wink. It's basically saying, this-is-a-JOKE because I'm using silly netspeak only used by twits! Haha, so clever am I!

However, I have never heard anyone spell out WTF: what would that be? Double-you-tee-eff? That's five syllables to say what you could've said in three. Whut, whut?

I would really like to enjoy this story, because the pace is quick and the characters amusing and the UST is hot but seriously lacking in emoistic overdrive, which is a nice change. And I've managed to get halfway through riding hard enough on the characterizations that I managed to whiz right past the automatic flinches every time I get yet another heavy-handed pop culture reference shoved at me.

But when I got to that single paragraph, I'm afraid my brain broke for at least five minutes. I actually came to a complete halt, and had to go do something else, anything else, to manage to forget that I had just spent at least three minutes trying to figure out how I was supposed to bloody well read that. My usual speedy pace was gone, smashed up on the altar of Way Too Much Freaking Acronym Usage In One Paragraph.

I don't even know how to characterize it, for that matter. It tells me nothing. If someone were to freak out at whatever this character saw, in an adorably dorky manner of freaking out, then this would have worked just as well:

“Oh my god.” She turned bright red. “Oh my god.” She covered her mouth. “Oh my god,” she said again, sort of muffled.

I mean, the repetition still gives you the humor. It doesn't really tell me anything about the character (in a personalized sense) because that phrase, or a variant, is pretty widespread both as a phrase and as an utterance of shock. The characterization in this paragraph is relying solely on the description, which is fine in this case, because it's a short paragraph.

But if I'm supposed to 'hear' the character saying this, instead:

“Oh-em-gee.” She turned bright red. “Oh-em-gee.” She covered her mouth. “Oh-em-gee,” she said again, sort of muffled.

I still get the humor, and now I also have the strong suspicion that the character has the mental capacity of a toaster.

...Unless she's winking at the same time -- which means her overly dramatic reaction must be sarcasm, or self-mocking silliness, and neither fit in context of the following paragraphs.

Just doesn't work for me. All I end up thinking is: wow. Lazy writer, and what editor let her get away with that, or have people gotten so used to seeing the acronyms and thinking them, that they no longer hear them on the page anymore?

Comments

[nykeyoung.livejournal.com]

At least it wasn't LOL.

[ravensilver.livejournal.com]

Actually...

...my daughter did that just recently. We were talking and instead of *laughing*, she actually said *LOL*!

I then explained to her that I'm still her mother and a human being and would much more prefer to see her laugh than talk interneteese...

[l-clausewitz.livejournal.com]

The funny thing is that here in Indonesia many teenagers are using those netspeak acronyms in daily speech, though they usually spell them according to Indonesian pronounciation rules (so "WTF" is read like "way-tay-eff"). OMG is an exception because, unlike the other acronyms, it's actually pronounced "oh-em-gee" in the (American) English manner.

[scbutler.livejournal.com]

Bad writing is bad writing is bad writing. No one thought it through till you, which is a failure by the writer (and the editor).

[haya5h1.livejournal.com]

I remember sharing a suite once with a pair of girls who talked exactly like that one con... It was all lol and oh-em-gee, all weekend.
...wait, I THINK you were there too, it was when Duo and Sanzo first introduced us to Charlie and Candy Mountain.

[teeheeiambad.livejournal.com]

The only netspeak I use and don't mind if others use, in actual conversation, "TMI". Though, truth be told, I'm not sure if that doesn't predate wide net usage. It might.

[becauseimscum.livejournal.com]

and here I thought I was the only one bothered by this...

(although, I have to admit, I sometimes use "lol" in actual conversation. (in german, it would sound like "lohl", I guess) but I only use it to mock someone, or when I make a point of showing that something was definitely not funny.)

oh em gee, though, is beyond cruel to read.

[shiegra.livejournal.com]

I was laughing through this whole post. First in a sort of incredulous horror that any author could actually use something like that and still respect themselves in the morning, and then at the 'toaster' remark.

[maldoror-gw.livejournal.com]

Wait. Wait. You read this in a book? In an actual distributed and sold piece of literature that went through some kind of publishing process involving an editor and people with eyes and brains?

...I'll just go into that corner over there and despair about the future of our civilization's culture.

[ndgmtlcd.livejournal.com]

Imagine the fun when a literary translator has to turn that kind of English into something else.