Category: language and politics

Like the law, politics is overwhelmingly about language.  Misrepresentation and euphemisms are rampant, along with many other devices to advance political agendas through the dishonest use of language.  This category will try to keep up.

Now, President Zero: The final devolution of Presidential rhetoric

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It's all too rare that political speech comes off as anything but "blah." It doesn't have to be that way.

This year, Presidential rhetoric switched 180 degrees, going from non-stop unfiltered narcissistic blather to…well, zero – and so quickly that it’s giving us language-watchers a case of intellectual whiplash.

 

When orators and [audiences] have the same prejudices, those prejudices run a great risk of being made to stand for incontestable truths.

Joseph Roux

All that is necessary to raise imbecility into what the mob regards as  profundity is to lift it off the floor and put it on a platform.

George Jean Nathan

Now, President Zero: The final devolution of Presidential rhetoric full post

(1137 words, 1 image, estimated 4:33 mins reading time)

Cancel culture comes for Dr. Seuss. What next?

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This is what the politically correct language police want: an eye into your head.

A free society does not ban or burn books. It does not attempt to control the language and thought of its citizens.

 

As we see censorship, it is a stupid giant traffic policeman answering ‘Yes’ to ‘Am I my brother’s copper?’ He guards a one-way street and his semaphore has four signs, all marked ‘STOP.’

Franklin P. Adams, Nods and Becks, 1944

The problem of freedom in America is that of maintaining a competition of ideas, and you do not achieve  that by silencing one brand of idea.

Max Lerner, Actions and Passion, 1949

Cancel culture comes for Dr. Seuss. What next? full post

(738 words, 1 image, estimated 2:57 mins reading time)

Latest language crime: “equity”

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A new brick has been added to the wall of politically correct speech: "equity" -- a euphemism for more (and unending) racial and gender preferences in pursuit of an undefinable and unattainable goal.

It takes courage and clear thinking to resist the liberal preoccupation with racial/gender preference and language control.

[In George Orwell’s 1984] Syme [a Party official] encourages Winston to recognize that the ‘whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought’.   He explains that ‘in the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible because there will be no words in which to express it.’  Syme refers to the fact that individual thought, rebellious or ‘unorthodox’ thoughts will be impossible and so, too, will the true concept of individual freedom.   Each concept will be expressed in just ‘one’ word.   Any ‘subsidiary’ meanings will be rubbed out and forgotten. (55).The party controls the mind through the control of language (Newspeak), the control of history (the past) and the control of war/ enemies, [via] the process of DoubleThink.

Latest language crime: “equity” full post

(908 words, 1 image, estimated 3:38 mins reading time)

The language of Fox News: Two views

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From mind to thought (and from there to the speech and auditory organs)
.

‘Why can’t human beings live simply and naturally?’  The trouble is that, as Susan K. Langer has said, ‘The symbol-making function is one of man’s primary activities. . .It is the fundamental process of the mind, and it goes on all the time.’

S.I. Hayakawa, Language in Thought and Action

 

If you are on a continuous search to be offended, you will always find what you are looking for, even if it isn’t there.

Bill Kellogg

 

The language of Fox News: Two views full post

(1122 words, 1 image, estimated 4:29 mins reading time)

Latest language abuse: “deprogramming Trump supporters”

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Deprogramming is a brutal concept. For one side in American politics to urge it on the other is deplorable. An alternative is compromise on the part of both sides, so that Americans learn to live with each other.

Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies.

— Nietzsche

We are so constituted that we believe the most incredible things; and once they are engraved upon the memory, woe to him who would endeavor to erase them.

— Goethe

To believe with certainty we must begin with doubting.

— Stanislaus I of Poland

Latest language abuse: “deprogramming Trump supporters” full post

(812 words, 1 image, estimated 3:15 mins reading time)

American chaos: Did Trump incite?

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A demagogue in a red tie spreads his arms in a gesture of love to his followers.

 

Where the laws are not supreme, there demagogues spring up.

— Aristotle, 4th c. BCE

The people are capable of good judgment when they do not listen to demagogues.

— Napoleon I (1814-5)

Demagogy enters at the moment when, for want of a common denominator, the principle of equality degenerates into a principle of identity.

— Saint-Exupery, 1942

 

The current chaos begins with words, or as Proverbs 18:21 has it, “The tongue has the power of life and death.”

American chaos: Did Trump incite? full post

(969 words, 1 image, estimated 3:53 mins reading time)

Riots in DC: the power of conflicting narratives

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Liberals may find fault with this American icon, but which of them coud have done what he did? Does any modern politician have his wit, diplomacy, tenacity, and, very important, his eloquence?

 

On Jan. 27, 1838, Abraham Lincoln spoke before the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois, about “the perpetuation of our political institutions.” During that address, he said:

“At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.”

Lincoln’s message: no other nation is strong enough to destroy America.  We would do it to ourselves.  And it’s happening.

Riots in DC: the power of conflicting narratives full post

(1090 words, 1 image, estimated 4:22 mins reading time)

P.c. atrocities roll on; linguists still silent

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The babble of political correctness

In the interests of political correctness Congress wastes our tax dollars scrubbing gender from its legislation. “Amen” is deemed to contain the offensive “men.” Why don’t other linguists speak out against this insanity?

Amen. < Old English, from ecclesiastical Latin, from Greek amēn, from Hebrew ‘āmēn ‘truth, certainty’, used adverbially as expression of agreement, and adopted in the Septuagint as a solemn expression of belief or affirmation.

[The version I learned in Hebrew School:] The Talmud teaches homiletically that the word amen is an acronym for אל מלך נאמן (ʾEl melekh neʾeman, “God, trustworthy King”), the phrase recited silently by an individual before reciting the Shma. (Wikipedia)

P.c. atrocities roll on; linguists still silent full post

(867 words, 1 image, estimated 3:28 mins reading time)

UNIFORMITY = DIVERSITY: Modern Newspeak hits Orwellian rock-bottom

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Political language abuse has changed little since Orwell described it in "1984." But the Internet has made it much more effective.

 

“There was truth and there was untruth, and if you clung to the truth even against the whole world, you were not mad.”

“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”

“Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it.”

— George Orwell

UNIFORMITY = DIVERSITY: Modern Newspeak hits Orwellian rock-bottom full post

(1267 words, 1 image, estimated 5:04 mins reading time)

On slogans — especially the one that dominates our lives

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Slogans, even if vague or meaningless, can serve as a rallying-cry for wars, consumer products, countries, and much more.

One of the countless slogans by which we live.

 

 

“Man is a creature who lives not upon bread alone, but primarily by catchwords”

-Robert Louis Stevenson

(NOTE: a catch-word is technically what we today would call a “pull-out quote”; I’m using it in a broader sense here, to refer to slogans, mottoes, taglines, and catch-words.)

I keep quoting Stevenson because his observation is so true and has been for a long time.  We love slogans even more than we love narratives and conspiracies…because slogans are the verbal equivalent of Paxil and Wellbutrin.  They encapsulate whatever some leader or group of people decides is the best summary of what the product, movement, party, etc., is all about, while they make us feel good about it.

On slogans — especially the one that dominates our lives full post

(1803 words, 1 image, estimated 7:13 mins reading time)

The welcome end of Presidential tweeting

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It's all too rare that political speech comes off as anything but "blah." It doesn't have to be that way.

Politicians commit various language abuses considered “BS.” “Alternate facts” is the latest.

 

“Nothing is so unbelievable that oratory cannot make it acceptable.”

— Socrates

“It is terrible to speak well and be wrong.”

— Sophocles

 

Those of us who have worked first-hand at speechwriting (my experience was corporate, not political) understand what goes into a CEO/senior management speech, how it is assembled, how it must touch the audience or articulate a particular point of view or policy.

The welcome end of Presidential tweeting full post

(840 words, 1 image, estimated 3:22 mins reading time)

Angry periods: P.c. virus spreads to punctuation

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Punctuation marks can convey emotions. But the idea that periods mean anger or irritation is just another conceit of the snowflakes and language police.

Written language contains many information signals beside letters and numbers. Here are a few.

A period is to let the writer know he has finished his thought and he should stop there if he will only take the hint. Art Linkletter, A Child’s Garden of Misinformation (1965)

To a generation of children who are trained to be sensitive to an ever-increasing body of words deemed offensive because of their perceived meanings, who are “triggered” by these words and need “safe spaces,” it is, for  the P.c., just a small jump from reading new meanings into words…to reading new meanings into marks of punctuation.

Angry periods: P.c. virus spreads to punctuation full post

(1105 words, 1 image, estimated 4:25 mins reading time)

Triumph of the TelePrompTerTM: What has it done to public speaking?

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Why do people vote for a Presidential candidate who has plagiarized all his life and has as much originality and authenticity as the guy in the picture?

 

Here comes the orator, with his flood of words and his drop of reason.
Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard’s Almanac, 1735

[Disclaimers: I am not a conservative, a Republican, or a supporter of Donald Trump.  This is about the relationship of a speaker to his speech.]

The ubiquitous double screen has triumphed in Presidential politics. We now have a candidate who is totally reliant on script, whose public speaking skills do not enable him to compose and deliver an organized, coherent 30-second answer to a substantive or policy question.

Triumph of the TelePrompTerTM: What has it done to public speaking? full post

(785 words, 1 image, estimated 3:08 mins reading time)

“Alternate facts”: Latest language crime

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Politicians commit various language abuses considered “BS.” “Alternate facts” is the latest.

 

You are entitled to your opinion. But you are not entitled to your own facts.  (Daniel Patrick Moynihan)

Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence. (attrib. James Madison)

Just the facts, ma’am.  (Jack Webb as Sgt. Joe Friday, Dragnet)

“Alternate facts”: Latest language crime full post

(1222 words, 1 image, estimated 4:53 mins reading time)

Gender-neutral “they”: Let it start here

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An actual scan of an original copy of "Nash's Synthetic Grammar of the English Language"

A grammar book from the 1870’s shows language changing and sheds light on a contemporary language controversy.

 

 

Many languages. . .have no gendered pronouns.  English needs a gender-neutral singular pronoun, and as Winston Churchill said about democracy as a form of government, “they”  is the worst option, except for all the others.

-Anne Fadiman, Harper’s, August 2020

 

Language changes, perhaps in response to social pressure or a communicative need – or for no functional reason at all, as with hone in on replacing home in on, mainly, I guess, because the two sound alike, hone connotes focus and sharpness, and people forget what the home in home in on  means.

Gender-neutral “they”: Let it start here full post

(1435 words, 1 image, estimated 5:44 mins reading time)

Political correctness — ubiquitous and relentless

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The babble of political correctness

Politically correctness attacks the teaching of English. Be afraid.
Be very afraid..

“The truth is what most people believe.  And they believe that which is repeated most often.”

-Josef Goebbels

“[The English language] becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts… if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.”

George Orwell

Political correctness — ubiquitous and relentless full post

(875 words, 1 image, estimated 3:30 mins reading time)

Warning: political correctness is an attempt to control you

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Who dares to be the red person in a homogeneous sea of blue think-alikes?

Who dares to be the red person in a sea of blue think-alikes?

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.” “The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.” “The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master—that’s all.”

— Lewis Carroll

“Offending and being offended are now the twin addictions of our society.”

— Martin Amis

Warning: political correctness is an attempt to control you full post

(997 words, 1 image, estimated 3:59 mins reading time)

Pronouns and gender politics

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The babble of political correctness

Gender politics pervades language, and it’s getting even harder to know what’s “correct.”

Tens of thousands of years have elapsed since we shed our tails, but we are still communicating with a medium developed to meet the needs of arboreal man. . . We may smile at the linguistic illusions of primitive man, but may we forget that the verbal machinery on which we so readily rely, and which our metaphysicians still profess to probe the Nature of Existence, was set up by him, and may be responsible for other illusions hardly less gross and not more easily eradicable?

Pronouns and gender politics full post

(1188 words, 1 image, estimated 4:45 mins reading time)

Overwhelmed by political BS

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Politicians commit various language abuses considered “BS.” Biden is a prime example.

Politics, as a practice, whatever its professions, has always been the systematic organization of hatreds.

Henry Adams, 1907

The politician is an acrobat.  He keeps his balance  by saying the opposite of what he does.

Maurice Barres (1896-1923)

Political BS, a noxious blend of mendacity, manipulation, and meaninglessnss, is all around us, as it has been ever since we invented politics.  So let’s try to understand what it is, the better to identify and resist it (this is knowledge that all middle-school graduates should have, but it is in the interests of the ruling classes that they not have it).

Overwhelmed by political BS full post

(1094 words, 1 image, estimated 4:23 mins reading time)

On the retarded “retard” taboo

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From mind to thought (and from there to the speech and auditory organs)
.

 When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less. ‘ ‘The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things. … ‘The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master — that’s all.”

–Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass

 

On the retarded “retard” taboo full post

(828 words, 1 image, estimated 3:19 mins reading time)