May I have a word or two, please?
Government control of language curtails our ability to oppose government actions
I have ascended via deceptive, illicit, and immoral means to Potentate of Word Availability. I will use my autocratic power to determine what words you cannot use in your daily life. I will decide what words you cannot write or speak. I will use a thorough vetting process to determine the verboten verbs and nouns. I alone will decide how you will communicate.
I place upon a dartboard tags bearing the 500 most commonly used English words. I toss darts at the board to select the words to be silenced. The darts fly, one after another, striking the board.
Thunk. Love. Thunk. Laugh. Thunk. Understand. Thunk. Friend. Thunk. Sad. Thunk. Read. Thunk. Believe. Thunk. Live. Thunk. Feel. Thunk. Happy. Thunk. Peace. Thunk. Hope. Thunk. Love. These and other words will no longer be available to you.
Your speech will be vetted. Your emails will be inspected by AI. Your phone calls will be surveilled. People will be ordered to report those who use the forbidden words. Written works such as books, news reports, songs, and love letters will have forbidden words ruthlessly excised.
Forbidding words chills communication. Clarity relies on having the full dictionary at our disposal. Excising a word or tearing out a page may ensure what I mean is not what you heard or read. Ask: If the Potentate of Word Availability succeeds in removing these words, how will your relationships with loved ones, friends, colleagues — even businesses or governments local, state, or federal — be affected?
Well, it’s happening … for real.
The federal government has removed hundreds of words and phrases from websites, reports, and official materials. And we, the electorate, need those words and phrases. We need to be able to contest actions of government. If government denies use of certain words or phrases, how will we contest a government action related to those words or phrases?
We need science-based. And evidence-based. And climate change. How about diversity? Or equity? Or inclusion? What about female, feminine, or fluoride? Or trans, transgender, or transexual? Please, give me back unconscious bias, environmental justice, and racial inequality. How about BIPOC and Black?
The most recent actions by the executive branch (and the meek acquiescence of Congress) reminds us that politics has degenerated into the desire to acquire and maintain the authority to control the meaning of language.
Government has arbitrarily rid itself of words the governed need to communicate with the government. It hurts us because words are the basic units of meaning.
Politicians (mostly Republicans, but a few Dems are complicit) and their uberwealthy supporters are hellbent on gaining the authority to control language.
That’s what modern power has become: the ability to define a word, and to prevent others from doing so. Politicians rarely make coherent arguments anymore; they instead try to co-opt the meanings of words. That’s why debates have been nonsensical: Politicians may utter the same words as you and me, but the meanings they assign to those words are vastly different.
Consider immigration. Is it defined as meaningful opportunity for those abroad who refuel the American melting pot, or is it defined as an external threat to American jobs and waning whiteness?
Even the word America has fueled political attempts to define its meaning and exert authoritarian influence. Gulf of Mexico? Nope. Gulf of America.
Simple aphoristic phrases have devolved into linguistic battlegrounds. Your favorite politician (hell, almost every politician) tells you this: “I just want to do what’s right for the American people.”
Look at those words. Right. American. People.
Who defines right? The winners do. Who defines American? The winners do. Who defines people? The winners do. Winners rule, because negotiation and compromise have become defined in modern politics as weaknesses. And that gives the winners the power to control language by denying us access to words we need to communicate clearly as well as contest that language control.
Politicians, especially the current president, know this. So they use words as cudgels to hammer or punish opponents.
Words matter. The ability to assign meaning to a word matters. When I ask my sophomores what a noun is, they reply, “Oh, it’s a person, place, or thing.” I must remind them a noun is the name of a person, place, or thing. Naming something is a reflection of power.
That means a federal official can point to a desperate twenty-something foreign-born man and his wife and children who are legal residents, call them terrorists, and unlawfully deport them without due process.
2026 is coming. Elections (I hope) still have meaning. No matter who wins, the political war over who removes or redefines words and how will continue to intensify. Will voters elect politicians with sufficient backbone to reinstate the words and meanings taken from us?
h/t groundreport.in