Writing for a Global Audience

The trouble when you delve into the recesses of your memory in search of a half-remembered phrase or definition is that you can’t be sure that you’ve remembered it correctly. For example, I dimly recall that a definition of a “gentleman” ran something like this: “a gentleman is someone who never unwittingly gives offence”. But does that mean that he sometimes deliberately offends people? Should the definition therefore be: “a gentleman is someone who never wittingly gives offence”? But in that case, does that mean he is so lacking in the social graces that he sometimes offends people without aiming to do so?

Is this leading anywhere? Well, I don’t have strong opinions on many subjects but I would hate to use a blog as a means of paying off old scores or setting out to hurt anyone (deliberately causing offence) or to think that something I have written has caused unhappiness to another (unwittingly giving offence). If one wants to attack a “private person” one should do it in private. I know it sounds incredibly conceited but I think that, as soon as one decides to write a blog open to the general public, even one as little read as this one, one is to some degree honour bound not to venture into certain areas. We are after all writing for a global audience!