I have lots of issues - BIG issues! - about issues. There seem to be more issues around these days than ever before. They are penetrating so many facets of life, that I'm beginning to have issues about where I'm going to find issues next!
Now to my mind, with its aforementioned affection for language and all things linguistic, an issue is associated with something going out, and there are three general areas where the word should be legitimately found. One is medical (as in St Luke 8:43), one is genealogical (as all over Debretts), and the other is in the realms of newspapers and magazines (which go out from the printers to the sales network).
But, almost overnight it seems, issues have become an epidemic. People are having issues about all kinds of things, and in many different ways. I get the impression that virtually anything can have, or become, or be made the subject of an issue: from the new proposals on NHS reform, to trains not running on time, to dog mess on the pavements (which is, of course, an issue, but not in the way the speaker usually means it!)
Issues are appearing in our newspapers, on radio and TV news bulletins, and all over the internet. I even found one the other day in a public toilet in a service station, where there was encouragement that any issues should be brought to the attention of the manager. I mused that any issue I might find in such places would be taken promptly to my GP!
Everywhere I go I encounter more and more issues. I ask myself who has banned problems; what has happened to good old difficulties, why have simple disagreements been outlawed and just which irresponsible discussion forum is to blame for the extermination of the last remaining topics, matters and themes?!
.... or am I merely making an issue out of a molehill?
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