Bloggers in Fantasyland (A Quick Refresher in Punctuation and Correct Colon Use)
- Xristopher Bland
- May 31, 2018
- 2 min read
Few bloggers set out to give readers the impression that they’re writing from an imaginary land. Yet that’s the impression one writer unintentionally gave some while ago in a post for an online news service through incorrect use of the colon (“:”).
In a post titled “Just Build Trump’s Stupid Wall Already,” the writer tore into then-GOP frontrunner Donald Trump’s idea of building a wall along the American-Mexican border as a way of preventing illegal immigration.
Citing financial, logistical and political issues as clear evidence of the idea’s ludicrousness, the writer added, “Actually, there are a few other pesky details to work through. They come from a place I like to call: the real world.”
As an oft-misused punctuation mark, the colon has two basic functions:
To connect two independent clauses (sentences) when the second explains or expands on the first.
To introduce a list.
A few examples of the latter:
“I require the following cookie ingredients: butter, sugar, flour and chocolate.”
“Don’t forget the camping essentials: bug spray, water, matches and toilet paper.”
“I’m looking for an assistant with a specific skillset: research, data input and management skills.”
By incorrectly placing a colon after the verb call to introduce a list of one item (which is not a list), the writer had effectively written the following:
There’s a place I like to call once in a while. It’s called the real world, and it’s filled with pesky details, which may explain why I prefer to call rather than actually visiting.
Had the writer simply removed the colon, his sentence would have reflected his true intent to call Trump’s idea a foolish illusion.
With the colon in place, the sentence pretty much placed the writer in the same illusory location. And that’s pretty much never a great location in which to place your name, your reputation or your client’s reputation as a writer.
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