Sad to see the comments where so many people didn't get it. Speaking in a declarative tone about beliefs or ideas you have is good. It doesn't mean that you will never question those beliefs, or have a closed mind, it just means that you currently believe them. It is ok to use a questioning tone when you are genuinely uncertain. The trend has been to use a questioning tone even when making declarative statements which communicated that you don't actually believe what you are saying. It would be the equivalent of putting question marks at the end of every sentence. It will communicate to people that you have no true ideas beliefs or convictions and nothing to offer. Speaking in a questioning tone constantly doesn't indicate open mindedness, but empty mindedness.
I love this poem, another awesome poem by Taylor Mali. I love the way he breaks down the use of language in this one. It's so intelligent and thought out.
I am a corporate executive chef and I often cater meetings and listen in. People in the corporate world now, sound like frat boys and sorority girls instead of professionals. "So..." is how these people begin almost every sentence and the word "like" shows up everywhere. This dude is right.
I remember how I felt bad in middle school for showing more intelligence. I spoke properly, and someone would point it out as if it's unusual or looked down upon. It makes sense how one would dislike a smart person, because they can see the smart person as pompous. Many people who lack intelligence end up taking pride in the bad things they do. Truth is, no one should look down upon anybody. We're all humans, and we should all work hard at improving ourselves and help others.
Just when you thought it was safe to be a mid-ranged poet. Real words and thoughts have been reintroduced! Thank you Taylor Mali!!! It was more than necessary
this is so true in today's society. I am sad to say I have fallen victim to the 'like' s and ya know's etc, etc, that most of my age's population has turned to. This poem opened my eyes a touch
I'm a teacher at Vandegrift High School, and today the principal told me "from now on you need to say yes ma'am and just do what you're told" - it made me think of this video that I showed to my debate students. We loved your speech.
this is something i have both identified and am guilty of so it is great to hear someone talk about it on stage. the uk is somewhat less struck by this than the states, but unfortunately we're getting there
Mr. Mali is a Master and a Artist of the highest regard...We are lucky to be alive in the same season as this Exceptional Man of Poetry...Buddy Wakefield and him should do a show together and show the world Poetry...
This video has severely changed how I listen to speech. It now, even more than before, saddens me when sentences are littered with "like" and "literally". I wish everyone I had the pleasure of speaking to had seen this video, it is such a hard-hitting flick.
Umm, *HUGE* yes! Had a friend of mine get on this bandwagon a few years ago, and I wondered what had happened. Being aggressive to the point of attacking isn't good, but man, say what you believe, brother!
love this shit. i love the way he expresses himself. the point was well put on how to speak with conviction. i will accept the challenge to speak with conviction and to say what i believe in a manner that bespeaks the determination with which i believe it!!!
This video has definetly sent a message by its own generation for us to consider the way in which we are communicating in society today. Are we getting our messages across? Are we articulating well enough to create and sustain successful relationships in business, family or with our peers? These are questions this video poses and they are great questions which challenge us to look further at ourselves and our methods of learning.
I've lived in 6 different states, met people from all over the country from school/military, never have I met anyone like that. It reminds me of an 80s comedy movie character.
he is right. we have no conviction. we don't believe anything anymore, everyday we find out we were wrong about this or that or that older ppl have lied to us more than we thought.
1. yes 2. His sole was fried and served with lemon , his soul shows proudly threw his words 3. Points should be sharp and cutting and ,thus, most often brief not not dulled and belabored. 4. A pedagog perhaps but parish pedantic. This truth about wavering convictions rings loud and speaks to the majority and those whom have forgotten how to temper their words with conviction.
The gap between what we know and what we can know is so large now, and becomes so much larger every day, that the only proper method of communication is uncertainty. People can be proved wrong at any second, so they couch all of their statements in qualifiers as to not seem certain, because they aren't. We're finally beginning to understand how little we actually know, and it's reflecting on our daily speech. It's progress.
The rise in intonation at the end of a sentence is called the High Rising Terminal, or "uptalk". Language is constantly changing and uptalk is basically just a new adaptation it has taken on, for more reasons than hesitance. There some a fairly interesting articles about it if you google it.
I've always wished for a commanding voice and tone like his...he is the ultimate public speaker, it would be fucking awesome if I could learn to master elocution like he has, it is a vital talent that is often taken for granted. You could truly rule the world with such a skill.
This dude is way ahead of his time, the sing song cadence of authority people speak in nowadays is absurd despite the majority who do this being young and majority never having read an actual book in their lives. I find it hard to talk to anyone thats gone through the college education system today. They are intelligent people, and they treat modern science as a religion, but what they do not realize is, intelligence doesnt matter at all, and modern science is more of a bullshit cult than religion is. Intelligence is knowing all the facts. Wisdom is gradually understanding which facts matter more than other facts(Wisdom > Intel). High Consciousness is immediate understanding of which facts matter more than other facts(HC > Wisdom). Will is the ability to act in reality on those facts that matter (Will > HC). I got in an argument wit a freshly graduated comp sci student about how I thought Minecraft creator Notch is a genius. He said, 'I hate when people say that, hes not a genius, you can go on youtube and watch people make a minecraft clone from scratch in only 10 hours of coding', I said 'So what? You can ask any decent guitarist alive today to play a Jimi Hendrix song and they'll do it with ease, but it dont make them a genius like jimi hendrix, why is that?' Its the education systems intelligence/iq based definition of 'genius', in reality a genius is someone who tweaks a field of interest to create a knew field of interest, a genius is someone who is insanely productive, a genius is someone who understands how something works immediately (high consciousness) and immediately can act on it in reality (will). Shitposter in chief(djt), Elon Musk, Notch, Scott Adams, Mike Cerno..., Kanye, Alex Gay Frog Jones, Eric Dollard, Ken Wheeler, Owen Benjamin, David Goggins, noagenda podcast guys, Leonard Spooner, Vox day, Farakhan, Kissinger etc all are wrong about things. All of them are wrong...But they also all have little nuggets of truth sprinkled throughout their videos/actions, they have SPELLS OF TRUTH sprinkled into their videos/actions. The key and fun part is finding the spell...
I show this to a lot of my friends who speak like that, sadly nearly everyone talks like this now-a-days though. Seriously everyone, speak with some damn conviction.
this was shared in my 9th grade english class and countless people didn't understand why the audience was laughing. This is basically common sense. Society today is filled with people that explain or talk about something as if it were a question rather than a statement. Saying "like" after almost every word and putting "you knows" to confirm the other person knows what your saying. At my age I do this(and that's ok) but I'm certain it won't last when in I'm in my 30's
And part of the problem with society today is that we don't believe in the concept of truth anymore. We're so wishy washy and "everyone has their own truth" that we don't even believe "our" truth anymore because there are so many other "truths". People who speak with any sort of conviction or belief are shot down because their ideals might offend some or another group and are therefore invalid to a discussion. We have become afraid to declare truth, even in the smallest of things.
LOL... Is it like bad to say i like this story? LOL i love this man! his poems are so real and wished he was my teacher when i was in high school and or college.
The double meaning is intentional - you must both "speak with authority", i.e. express the conviction of your beliefs in your own statements, and also "speak with authority" - to go beyond just asking questions to engaging authority figures and views directly.
One of the single greatest pieces of spoken word of the 21st century…and I don’t care if you agree or not. Speak with conviction 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼
We use to have to do a sketch in 5th grade and I still remeber a teacher saying that the year before a girl had used "like" over 60 times in 3 minutes. :)
(part 1) Sometimes, it is beneficial to speak with ignorance, because if one is willing take the criticism and learn from it, and later modify that opinion to make it like less vulnerable and keyed in with the information provided by others, the harder will it be for it to be doubted. And there are many ways an opinion can be strengthened and sharpened. And presented fairly too, no tricks or making analysis of it difficult.
We watched this video in my Communication Arts Class today. After the vid, the class talked about it, and my classmates couldn't stop saying "like" in their sentences :)
@c16sh1 I agree. I think another aspect of it is that teenagers were raised in a culture obsessed with political correctness. They are so afraid of being labeled --as racy, ignorant, pushy-- before they can finish their thought, simply because their opinions might open themselves up to someone else's derision. So they inject it with a healthy amount of uncertainty, and no one is offended and everyone stays happy.
This is awesome! Finally, another person who agrees with me. It seems that every time I sit next to a group of young women, they say the words "like", and "you knows?" every other words. Those are the women I don't date. lol
I like how you handled this respondent, very well in my opinion; it's difficult to deal with those that are like "you are this and you are that". I dislike aggression such as that shown by GrimmPumpkin..
@IHaveAPodXTLive I had to go back and listen to the video twice because I didn't think I had heard any aspersions cast upon any particular generation, let alone the younger one. As someone in the way older generation, I hear this kind of saying nothing from everyone around me, except for those in my mother's generation. Usually, when some one asks me, "You know?" I'm startled because, I'm still waiting for them to say something important. It DOES give us something to say when we forget.
I get very very vexed when otherwise intelligent people make the massive massive mistake of doubling many many adjectives/adverbs. It really really ticks me off so so much. Inanywayshapeorform, does it kindalike annoy anyone else, or am I basically the Lone Ranger on this one?
(part 1) It depends what arrogance and humility mean. I've a feeling those words can mean different things to different people and the dictionary only goes so far, not with the exactness that it can present objective proof of such concepts, the justification for why one is deemed eternally wrong and the other eternally right with real life examples of the operation and consequence of them.
People should be friends even if their philosophies conflict. This "I must be right" attitude sounds territorial, it doesn't matter for him what he believes exactly, just that he has the might to say "this is what I will believe"; and any one that comes to take his belief away is a rival. "Strength at which you believe it"; I could be wrong though, perhaps he is preaching that we should all speak the contents of our minds and be honest with a fearlessness that says "this is me". I'm uncertain.
well i dont know if anyone has noticed this but "the assault on human language" is also used whenever you don't capitalize, add caps, "rofl", etc. therefore we shouldn't be harsh on those who use "y'know, like"....just pointing out inconsistencies...oh and by the way, i use this slang because it's become natural for me from the environment in which i live in, not the education i receive which is adequate.
People talk like this, I believe, because education and conviction have been beaten out of them by Authority for a long time. We are so terrified to speak out and look like idiots that we prove it by relying on four letter words and questioning tones.
I believe he doesn't mean 'government' authority, or legal authority,, but the authority someone tries to exert by telling you something is so. Thus, you have to question the authority of someone telling you the sky is green, while exerting your own authority of what color you think it is.
"...I have nothing personally invested in my own opinions. I'm just, like, inviting you to join me on the bandwagon of my own uncertainty...?" Hahaha. Love it.
"It is not enough these days to simply question authority, you got to speak with it too." Oh sweet irony, possibly a taste on my lips alone. On our young speaker the irony seems lost, for in this world, it is fools who speak with authority that call the wise to question, and contrary, it is the wise who entice the fool to think on their own. Oh sweet irony.
Yet it's interesting how no one's afraid to communicate directly and with conviction in the online comments section of any website out there. As sad as it is that people speak with such timidity about ideas, the comments section of most major websites are what cause me to lose all hope in humanity.
