<p>10) The reason the tent fell over was that we did not anchor the center pole. </p>
<p>a. Original phrasing
b. because we did not anchor the center pole
c. we did not anchor the second pole
d. for our not anchoring the center pole
e. because of our not anchoring the center pole</p>
<p>Underlined portion: from ''that'' to ''center pole''.</p>
<p>I narrowed it down to choices A and B. Why is the correct answer A, and not B?</p>
<p>“The reason … was because” is a complete grammatical abomination. This is SAT Writing A, B, Cs. Remember, the phrase can be expressed in two distinct ways:
1- The reason was that…
2- Something happened because of something.</p>
<p>But it can never be in the form of the following, due to redundancy.
The reason was because…</p>
<p>Oh I see! Thanks! I didn’t know that ‘‘The reason was because’’ is redundant, but I agree now :)</p>
<p>What’s the difference between A and C? Is “that” always used with “the reason is/was”? Why can’t we omit “that”?</p>