Heed the signs

Wise Words: heed

Did Tony Hayward, CEO of BP, fail to ignore the warning signs?

Think about it.

The person who wrote this caption for The Telegraph made a very common mistake. What the author meant was: "Hayward was singled out for ignoring warning signs." Wanting to emphasize Hayward's negligent behaviour, the author threw in a "fail". "Fail" is always a good word if you want to criticize someone, but it's wrong to use it here. 

With "fail", the caption now means the opposite of what the author intended. The author has put two negative verbs ("fail" and "ignore") together. And a double negative makes a positive, doesn't it? The sentence now means that Hayward tried hard to ignore the warning signs, but couldn't. How could anyone criticize him for taking notice of the warning signs? If only that were true. 

If the author wanted to focus on Hayward's failure, he should have combined it with a verb with a positive meaning. A better caption would have been: "Hayward was singled out for failing to heed warning signs." 

If you heed the warnings (warning signs), you pay attention to them — and take action.