Due to...

I am self-aware enough to know when an irritant is one of my own making. When I could choose not to be irritated but don’t because my perverse self gets more pleasure out of being irritated.

Example of what has been grinding my gears lately: The phrase “due to.”

More specifically, the absolute unnecessary and overuse of the phrase “due to” when the word “because” would suffice just fine. The more I hear it, the more it irritates me, and thus the more I hear it. It's a never-ending cycle, so I feel the need to tell you why.

I went to public school, and when I attempted to google why the phase “due to” and the word “because” were not interchangeable, my eyes glazed over somewhere between ‘subordinating conjunction’ and ‘adjectival phrase’. However, Google did confirm that modern day usage tends to treat the options as interchangeable:

1. I was late because my bus broke down.

2. I was late due to a broken-down bus.

Here's where we get to the part where I choose to be irritated:

“Due to” is a highfalutin use of the word “because”. Don’t ask me why it is or to explain it in grammatical terms. You don’t use the phrase “due to” when the word “because” will suffice just fine. Just don’t.

In my brain – which is admittedly a confusing place to be – the word “because” is the prefix to the simple reason why something happened. Example: “I was late to work because I forgot to set my alarm.” Nice and easy. I was late to work. Why? I forgot to set my alarm.

If the word “because” presupposes a simple reason, then, the phrase “due to” is far more nuanced and complex and should only be deployed if you want to sound like your secondary school loan balance is more substantial than your mortgage. Example: “Male drone bees are haploid due to having half the complement of chromosomes.” See? I really sounded smart there, didn’t I? Weren’t you impressed? I sure was. The word “because” really would not have carried the same weight.

<five minutes later, having pondered just how smart I was for coming up with that sentence>

Ok, fine. Do I intellectually realize that there is no loss in meaning if someone uses “due to” instead of “because”? I sure do. I even said so about five minutes ago.

Am I going to be unappreciative, rude, and unsupportive if you call me up to tell me you skipped your shift “due to” some dumb reason that could have cheerily been handled by the “because” work horse? I sure am.

In fairness, if you want to call me up and tell me you skipped your shift due to fluctuations in the time-space continuum having thrown the stability of the singularity into a precarious state, I’ll be a lot more impressed. I’ll also still write you up for being late to work, but at least I’m not going to be irritated over your use of the phrase “due to”.