Why use auxiliary verbs when clarity does not requires it?

Question

An editor corrected my sentence by adding (being), why would she do that? The edited sentence became: led to trouble with the police and being taken to an orphanage. I don't like it. It adds nothing to the meaning.

Answer 1

"Being" is quite necessary and the sentence doesn't have a complete meaning without it. Someone was taken to the orphanage: "being taken" conveys this idea. But there is still something missing - who was taken to the orphanage? The person who caused the trouble. So the sentence should read "... led to trouble with the police and his being taken to the orphanage." Even your editor isn't quite perfect.

I am an editor.

Answer 2

I have to disagree. The original sentence was grammatically incorrect, and in fact had no meaning.

Assuming the beginning of the sentence was something like "John's actions", try missing out the intervening clause:

"John's actions led to taken to an orphanage".

Clearly this makes no sense, so the 'being' was necessary.

In fact I would go further, and add a few more words as well:

"[John's actions] led to trouble with the police and ended with him being taken to an orphanage."

I have to say, editors usually know what they're doing when they correct writers' text. This is because the writer always knows what they meant, whereas the editor is coming to the text fresh. In my years as an editor, my principle was: if I can't understand it on first reading, it needs to be rewritten. It's my job to read stuff until I do understand it, whereas the eventual reader won't have the same patience - if he can't see what you're saying, he's most likely to simply stop reading. Then all your hard-crafted language will be for nothing.

Answer 3

"This led to taken to an orphanage" is gramatically wrong.  That's why the "being" had to be added.

Answer 4

Although you have made it difficult by not giving the whole sentence, I would say that the word 'being' is necessary here because it would not make sense to say 'led to taken to an orphanage', which is what would have been implied in your original sentence.

Answer 5

English is rare.. i dont know.. spanish is easierr