Saving the Lowercase

Hello, America. I am the lowercase “g.” After the holidays, I am usually a happy sort. Congress returns from vacation, and my humble, seventh-place self is thrust back into the spotlight by the reintroduction into the national debate of words such as “gun” and “gay.” I bask. Or, I used to. Now I wonder if my somewhat self-centered attitude about the substance of congressional conversation blinded me to what was to come. Something that could destroy me. And you.

It began in the 2008 presidential race, when, in debates and stump speeches, candidates began to assert they were “thinkin’,” “talkin‘,” and “hopin.‘” At first I could not believe they were dropping me. Me, of “gun” and “gay”! I explained it away as fatigue due to a contentious battle for votes, but after the ballots were counted, it continued.

And it has spread!

So with the New Year, I must face the truth. Politicians of all stripes are dropping me for a reason beyond simple weariness. I am still there at the beginnings of words, but not at the ends. And on this slippery slope—or “greasy grade”— how long can I last?

I am collateral damage in a political climate where those in charge suddenly fear any association with privilege; and I, not by choice, have come to denote something for which I never stood: elitism. By dropping me from the ends of words, politicians hope to seem more like regular people, or “folks,” as they are called now.

So why should you, America, a country tired from war or waiting in line at the health clinic, care?

Because politicians are trying to drop you, too. Politicians are not “folks,” but a small class of power elite. If they think that all they have to do to get you to stop noticing what they are doing is change their speech patterns and pretend to be “you,” they look down on you considerably. They are trying to pull something. Or, “somethin’.”

Lest you think your favorite politician is immune, please note that this is equal opportunity dropping from liberals and conservatives, latte drinkers and elk eaters, alcoholics and philanderers.

And who are these g-dropping “folks” our elected representatives assume will fall for their charade? Certainly, some Americans do let me tumble—in regional accents, heated business negotiations, army tanks. But that does not make them as backward as the apostrophe that has replaced me. And they never had today’s calculated political motivations behind them.

The most dangerous outcome of all this is that politicians stop finishing anything at all. If they cannot complete a word, how can they end an eight-year conflict that is now simply shifting to another desert? Or stop our nation’s economic decline? If this continues, twenty years from now our Afghan War veterans will return to a country that ‘Lets freedom rin‘ and refers to our first president as ”Washin’on.�...