Urgent = Not Urgent

19 June 2022*

A couple months ago, I signed up to be a poll worker for the August primary elections in Maricopa County, AZ. Recently, I got an official email saying that I needed to complete an online training course. It would take about 90 minutes so I got my coffee, hunkered down and finished in about 50 minutes. Woo hoo!

Just about that time I got a letter in the mail.

Figuring this had something to do with my election duties–maybe a confirmation of where I would need to report–I dutifully opened it, only to find a request to register to vote, along with a “survey” and…the inevitable request for a monetary contribution.¹

In effect: Urgent = Not urgent.

Now, I go to the mailbox nearly every day and, much as I complain about e-mail spam, I hardly ever complain about so-called junk mail I get through the U.S. Postal Service.

For one thing, it’s all paid for by the sender. For another, it sort of helps to subsidize the postal system that brings me the occasional paycheck as well as magazines, postcards and maybe even a valentine.

Actual letters I’ve received

Being an advertising maven myself, I shouldn’t be surprised to see that sometimes the direct mail pieces I see are stretching the truth a bit with their envelope copy. Famously, by now everyone knows that the legendary “You may already be a winner” really means: “You have a one in ten gazillion chance of being a winner.”

But I’m continually amazed at the ability of people (and not just advertisers) to print something that is not only a stretch of truth but usually the exact opposite. It’s like an Orwellian world where “yes” means “no” and “war is peace.”

For example, if you see an envelope that says  “Important” you can be pretty sure it’s only important to the sender.

“Open immediately” means there’s no need to open it, ever.

“Dated material”…well, is there anything that comes through the mail that isn’t dated? In this case it really means, “not dated.”

One of my favorites: “Check enclosed.” In my experience, anyone sending me a real check doesn’t advertise it on the envelope with a “Pay to _______” line in the plastic window.

“Free offer” equals “not free.” “Personal and confidential” means “not personal and very much not confidential.”

What got me thinking on this was that a few years ago I attended a new aerospace trade show overseas. Most aviation shows attract a mixture of people “in the trade” as well as people who just like looking at airplanes. In this case, the show organizers were promoting the concept that, unlike Paris, Farnborough (U.K.) or Singapore airshows that have “public days” for sightseers, the general public was not invited to this event—therefore, all the visitors would be potential aviation trade customers.

However it turned out that spouses, kids, neighbors and buddies could get in simply by getting their exhibitor dad, mom or neighbor to sponsor them—and were duly given badges that said “trade.” Thus, at this show “trade” literally meant “not trade.” (Everyone else had an actual company name on their badge.)

Here’s a recent example from the Internet: “Erase your debt, you pay nothing.” Of course anyone who buys anything from an unsolicited e-mail is a moron. Worse…a blight on us all, because all it takes is one responder from the 10,000 e-mails they send out to make their day worthwhile.

Thus there is a sort of Gresham’s law of postal delivery: Bad mail drives out good mail and junk language drives out sensible language.

 

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* adapted and updated from my original 2019 article: “Reflections on opening the mail: Why things mean the opposite of what they say,” 1/22/19

¹ My new rule of thumb for political emails is: No matter what the stated purpose is–a poll, a petition, endorsement appeal–if there’s a request for money…it’s really a fundraising tactic in disguise

Side note: yeah, that’s me a few years ago at a public air show at Luke AFB outside Phoenix. And who doesn’t love seeing small planes swirling around?