Stop That

I was about to respond to the questions over yonder via comment, and then I had a feeling it could get lengthy, so I decided to just blog it.  :)

If you're too lazy to click, Ruth Ann said:

My question is this: do I completely eliminate them and exercise myself to do such or do I change all the "thats" to "the"? - because a lot of times it would work to say 'the' in the place of 'that'.

My answer:

Quite frankly - no.  I guess you could, but you don't need to.  The main idea behind removing that is to cut unnecessary verbiage. 

Contrary to what may be popular opinion, I don't have a personal vendetta against that.  It's an innocent word and can be quite effective when used well.  My argument is primarily with unnecessary words.  Granted, you don't want to slice everything out and end up sounding like a robot; description is an important element of writing, and a few extra words here and there serve to alter the rhythm of a paragraph, which in turn prevents the reader from dying of boredom.  But removing filler words and vague words only improve the flow of thought. 

And by "vague words," I mean those like so, very, really, little, pretty, etc.  They've been overused until they've lost their meaning.  We know really big is bigger than normal, but by how much?  There's no clear idea presented.  It's a similar case with pretty good.  I know I personally have used it to mean both less than good and more than good.  So how can this ambiguous phrase be helpful?

Consider the following sentence:

She knew that I really wanted to see His Girl Friday.

Sounds about average, right?  Like something you'd hear in everyday conversation.
Now compare it with this:

She knew I wanted to see His Girl Friday.

Same thought.  Same meaning.  Did we lose anything by removing that and really?  Nope.  In fact, it's starting to sound more like a purposefully written sentence than a handful of words thrown haphazardly onto a page.

So.  What you need to do is find the balance.  You don't want to sound staccato and lifeless, nor do you want to bog the reader down in a mess of muddy sentences.  Just be aware of what you're writing, and if you use a word like that or really, use it purposefully.  Know exactly where you're putting it and why and how it's going to sound.

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::steps off of soapbox::  You may now feel free to wage war in the comments.  :)