Plain English - Why Not: Difference between revisions

Plain English - Why Not (view source)

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-I used to believe that lawyers ''deliberately'' avoid writing clearly. Legalese protects their privileged position, keeping non-specialist challengers out, and bamboozling their customers into believing they need legal advice to progress the simplest commercial opportunites.
+Some say that lawyers ''deliberately'' avoid writing clearly: [[legalese]] protects their privileged position, keeping non-specialist challengers out, and bamboozling their customers into believing they need legal advice to progress the simplest commercial opportunites.
-But I’ve changed my mind.
+But it's more complicated than that. True, some practitioners don’t use plain English because they ''can’t''.  But for most, legalese arises as an unwanted by product of advising and negotiating legal agreements.
-Most practitioners don’t use plain English because they ''can’t'' — they are not competent enough to express themselves clearly.
+For every lawyer likes to [[add value]]. She ''needs'' to, to justify that hefty fee. So looking at a draft and saying, “don’t sweat it, client, it’s fine” hardly passes muster.
-Lawyers ought to be the most expert of all users of the English language, and they are schooled in an English dialect from which they really can't escape. This isn't just how they talk: they speak in the same way.
+{{seealso}}
+*[[anal paradox]]
 {{plainenglish}}