4. Is there a problem referring to the "plain-language movement"?

It seems to me that continuing to refer to the "plain language movement" raises 2 problems.

• First, as I mentioned earlier, there is a minor conflict of interest. Plain-language practitioners can end up sending a mixed message, something like: "Join the cause and … umm… err… use my services". One day, that conflict may turn out to hurt the cause.

• Second, and more importantly, I fear that the misconception that plain language is a movement impedes the acceptance, adoption, and implementation of plain language. Let me be frank about this, I think this is a problem for the plain-language movement and for readers and organizations everywhere—and … umm… err... a problem for my business too. (There's the mixed message again.)

People outside the plain-language world who see plain language as a movement usually have a closely related misconception, namely, that plain language is relevant only when writing to "retail consumers"—to the proverbial "mums and dads".

That misconception further impedes progress. For example, plain-language —whether we see it as a movement or an industry—had a major win in 1998, when the United States Securities Exchange Commission implemented regulations that required certain parts of prospectuses aimed at retail investors to be in plain language.¹⁰

A few months later I worked on an international prospectus for one of Australia's 10 largest companies. A team of US lawyers from one of the most prominent New York law firms worked on the documents. They told me about a US prospectus they had worked on a few months earlier in which shares were to be offered to retail investors. So they had prepared the relevant parts of the prospectus in plain language to comply with the new SEC requirements.

Then after the prospectus was more or less complete, their client company changed its mind and decided that the shares would be offered only to institutional investors. So the lawyers rewrote the plain-language document back into legalese. The mind boggles.