against ellipses

~micro-move alert~

I loved ellipses until I started working in a fully remote organization a few years ago. Then I found myself experiencing the digital communication version of a mosquito bite, over and over. It took me a while to put my finger on it. Once I saw it, I couldn’t un-see it. 

In email and Slack I found myself annoyed or even outraged when a teammate would close a sentence with those dang dots. They were so hard to interpret! They felt slippery and suggestive and vaguely critical - passive aggression brought to you by e e cummings.

My sleep-deprived preferences from 2020 aside, if you find yourself closing out statements with ellipses, consider replacing them. If you want to convey uncertainty, use a question mark. Ask a question. If you want to make a suggestion, use a period. Make a statement. Have the courage of your convictions. 

Otherwise, you might just be relying on those dots to convey latent anxiety of your own that leaves your reader mostly powerless to respond…

-Eric