23rd Annual SF_Express "Stamp Out Respective/Respectively" Campaign

This doesn't have to be a long ongoing thread, but I bring this up every now and then because I'm on crusade.

Following paragraph was in a decent story in my local paper today:

"The young men are named after their respective fathers, both of whom died within the past month."

I don't blame the writer, because this is SOP in this paper. Might be one editor who believes in it and has preached it down the line. Maybe it's a lone copy editor.

There is zero (no wiggle room) reason for "respective" to be in that paragraph, placed very high in the story.

"The young men are named after their fathers, both of whom died in the past month."

"Respective" is a pace- and writing-killing word, and if it were up to me, it would be out of the dictionary.

I'm unlikely to have that power, but I'd ban it from newspaper and website writing except for such narrow exceptions that I can't even think of any examples right now.

Carry on.

 

I respectively agree.

 

Damn you!

 

I had that epiphany not long ago -- and then the had-it-drummed-inro-me habit came back, and I let it go through in copy. Thank you for bringing me back to my liberated self.

 

One editor at a time, if that's what it takes.

 

I dunno, S_F. Unless the writer clearly pointed it out, how can I be sure that the kids' weren't named after each other's fathers?

 

I thought about that, but feel the gains made by eradicating it will far outweigh any possible downside.

 

You are correct, of course. Just scraping for loopholes.

 

Any connection to the oft-misued hopeful/hopefully?

 

Hopefully.

 

After this campaign, can we work on stamping out 'irregardless'?

 

Hopefully, and the nonexistent irregardless, are both problems, but I'm pretty much a one issue campaigner right now.

I read a story last year, and it was really good. And the lead referenced something about "driving down the road to his respective house" or something, and it killed the mood. It literally killed a good story. It's that critical.