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Literary World Stunned By Claims That Thousands Of English Words Have Gone Missing
The world of literature has been stunned by allegations that massive numbers of words have simply gone missing from the English language.
‘In the 1960s we believe there to have been at least one million English words,’ said a spokesman for the Queen’s English Society. ‘Dictionaries that are currently available, however, list just a few hundred. It would appear that words may have been systematically removed, year by year, and copies of earlier dictionaries destroyed.
Governments have reduced the public’s vocabulary to prevent them thinking too hard about controversial political decisions
The UK government has strongly denied that they have been part of any conspiracy. ‘As people get older, their memories are not so reliable,’ said a government spokesman. ‘It is completely ridiculous to suggest that any language could ever have had a million words in it. That would represent more than ten different words for every six hundred men, women and children in this country. Ask any younger person,’ he continued, ‘and he or she will tell you that the same ten words are more than adequate to equip everyone for life, twelve if you count “dunno” and “innit”.’
‘Language is vital for the process of reasoning,’ countered a spokesman for one of the groups campaigning for the alleged word loss to be investigated. ‘We believe that successive governments have been complicit in reducing the vocabulary of the public to prevent them thinking too hard about controversial political decisions.’
Activists allege that the systematic removal of words has been obscured by educational policies that have kept young people unaware of the previous depth and diversity of the English language. They claim that teaching of English in schools has deliberately left those under fifty years of age unable to correctly spell any of the words in their own vocabularies and so has prevented them from noticing when other words have gone missing.
They argue that English educational policy since the 1970s has not been, as previously thought, a product of breathtaking ineptitude and incompetence; instead, that it has been a deliberate and cynical plot to control the minds of the people.
Conspiracy theorists have pointed to unfamiliar words being accidentally used by politicians as evidence that more English words exist than are officially recognised. They conclude that these words must have been drawn from a secret source, not available to the general public.
‘There are no secret sources of words,’ confirmed the Prime Minister to the BBC. ‘After all, there was no literature to speak of before the 1970s. All the fantasy about the existence of earlier writers that the conspiracy theorists talk about, such as this fictitious William Shakespeare, is just a figment of somebody’s imagination that has been blown out of all proportion by repetition on the Internet.’
A difficulty encountered by such complainants, and indeed political activists pursuing any issue, has been in finding adequate language with which to state their cases. ‘For example,’ said the spokesman for the Queen’s English Society, ‘there are no specific English words for things that might be done by the state to help the poor, and there are no grammatical structures to describe “discordantia cum regimen”, as they say in Latin.’
The UK government has continued to try to allay fears about the alleged disposal of words. ‘If anyone should discover an old dictionary,’ concluded the Prime Minister, ‘then biblioclasm can be assured.’
Whilst this, of course, sounds reassuring, no one is quite sure what “biblioclasm” means.
Irish Woman Has Talking Vagina
Believe it or not, a woman from County Waterford in Southern Ireland has stunned the world by talking through her genitals.
Maeve O’connell 31 discovered her talent after visiting the fabled Blarney Stone which legend says will grant the gift of speech to anyone who kisses it.
Before the visit she suffered from a terrible stutter and other speech impediments and the visit was to be her last chance of a normal life.
However, it rained heavily the night before and when Maeve approached the stone she slipped up and fell from the castle walls.
Fortunately she landed on a group of elderly visitors who broke her fall (at the cost of their own lives) but on the way down it is believed that her vagina gently brushed against the Blarney Stone and was therefore granted the gift of speech.
According to the local TV station, who did a one hour special on Mrs O’connell’s unusual talent, she still has the stutter but can speak clearly and fluently from the other end.
A book deal is believed to be in the pipeline together with a string of TV appearances and she has even been invited to sing for the queen during her forthcoming visit to the Emerald Isle.
In preparation for the big day it is understood that she has been spending time with a local gymnastic coach who is teaching her to walk on her hands.
The Irish Tourist board are also believed to be selling tickets to anyone who’d like to kiss it.
Plan to Impregnate the Upper Atmosphere with Sun Block!
A radical new solution to global warming has been suggested by scientists working at the University of Sevenoaks.
The idea is to pump thousands of gallons of factor fifty sun block into the upper atmosphere thus protecting the planet from sunburn.
Various governments are considering the idea and what it might cost to implement, but in theory they think it is a very clever idea.
Critics of the plan have argued that Planet Earth may develop a golden brown tan which may lead to racial unrest among the other planets, but this is difficult to prove.
It is estimated that if waterproof sunblock is used it should last about fifty years, by which time we’ll hopefully have lots of new gadgets to sort the problem out with.
The only side effect predicted by the Sevenoaks team is that the world’s atmosphere might take on a pleasant coconut odour which may upset sufferers of nut allergies.
Green campaigners who complain about the use of smashed baby orangutan baby brains in the manufacture of sunblock have promised to disrupt any attempts to implement the issue.
