I've gone over some of this ground before, but readers come and go, and these things need to be said and said again.
1. 'Homophobia.' A phobia is an irrational fear. But one could be morally opposed to homosexual practices without having any fear of them, let alone an irrational fear of them. ‘Homophobia’ is thus a question-begging epithet. People who use it beg the question against their opponents: they presuppose what they need to argue for, namely, that there cannot be any reasonable moral opposition to homosexual practices. The tactic here is to psychologize the opponent so as to make it appear that opposition could only have an irrational origin in some psychological defect. Leftists and liberals use terms like ‘homophobia’ to close off debate and render genuine issues intellectually invisible. No doubt some lefties are just along for the ride linguistically speaking: they do not consciously aim at closing off debate; they parrot a term they have heard others parrot. I suggest they stop being linguistic lemmings.
Whatever one’s stand on this issue, it is a genuine one that ought not be occluded by the use of a silly PC expression. Note that I haven't taken any position on the morality of homosexual practices. My point is the more subtle one that the issue ought not be hidden from view by the use of a question-begging and question-burying epithet.
Conservatives need to be reminded that they only play into the hands of their opponents when they adopt such terms as ‘homophobia.’ When leftists hijack a semantic vehicle, conservatives should attempt to regain control, not go along for the ride.
2. 'Islamophobia.' Similar remarks are pertinent here. There is nothing phobic about opposition to radical or militant Islam. To fear it is quite rational. Militant Islam and Islam are presumably distinct. And I rather doubt that Islam as such is the problem. Still, someone (Robert Spencer?) who thinks that Islam as such is the problem cannot be accused of suffering from any phobia. So when I heard the liberal Karen Armstrong use 'Islamophobia' or a cognate during a C-Span presentation, my estimation of her dropped several notches lower.
3. 'Native American.’ I am a native Californian. That means I was born in California. Last time I checked, California was a state of the USA, though this may change. Given that ‘America’ denotes the USA, it follows that I am a native American. Why can’t our dear liberals wrap their heads around such a simple piece of reasoning? No doubt, ‘Indian’ is a misnomer; but to replace one misnomer with another is hardly progress. If you say that I can’t be a native American because my ancestors came from Italy, then I will point out that the ‘native Americans’ originally came from Asia across the Bering Strait.
4. 'Assault weapon.’ This is a question-begging epithet used by liberals to preclude rational debate about semi-automatic long guns. The latter, non-emotive, expression is the one that a reasonable person would use in debating such issues as whether to renew a law banning them. The liberal uses ‘assault weapon’ to appeal to people’s fear of being assaulted thereby rendering rational debate more difficult. The idea is to suggest that semi-automatic rifles could only be used to assault people. Their use in legitimate self-defense, not to mention such recreational activities as target-shooting, is thereby ignored. But why, our liberal friends querulously ask, would anybody need such a weapon? Well, suppose you live in a border town like Douglas, Arizona. Every night your property rights are violated by illegal Mexican aliens and OTM’s (other-than-Mexicans), a non-null subset of which are Islamic militants. The federal government, a legitimate function of which is border control, does little or nothing to stop the incursions. The handgun that an average American might use to defend his property and family might not be adequate in a situation like this.
Of course, the use of emotive language is not confined to liberals. Referring to a fetus as a ‘baby’ makes it more difficult to think clearly about abortion.
5. 'Undocumented Worker.' A fourth example of how Political Correctness interferes with rational thought and speech is provided by the substitution of ‘undocumented worker’ for ‘illegal alien.’ Note first that the two terms are not coextensive: an illegal alien need not be a worker; he might be a petty criminal or an ideology-fueled terrorist. And an undocumented worker might be a citizen who is a contractor or vendor not in possession of the requisite licenses to ply his trade. Second, there is nothing offensive about ‘illegal alien’: it is an accurately descriptive term. By definition, anyone who violates a law does something illegal, and anyone who comes from another country is an alien.
6. 'Immigrant.' The increasing use of 'immigrant' for 'illegal immigrant' is an obvious trick used by libs and lefties to confuse the issue. The problem with liberals (and also many libertarians and Wall Street Journal open-border types who think economic questions trump all others) is not that they are too stupid to grasp the distinction between legal and illegal immigration, but that they are out to win even at the cost of destroying the terms of the debate. They merit our contempt and vigorous opposition.
This is ground well worth going over again and again. Just because we don't have Big Brother's Ministry of Truth telling us "war is peace" doesn't mean we don't have to guard against an Orwellian corruption of the language. This is especially true of the language we use to discuss ideas, which must be capable of making the finest distinctions lest we surrender ourselves to ignorance, sentimentalism, and manipulation. Consider the term "global warming", loaded with political assumptions in favor of those who want to shut down argument against those assumptions. By all means, Bill, continue to sound the claxon against this abuse of the English language.
Regards, Bill T
One of the most absurd titles is American Theocracy.
Bill,
I suppose you are right: the claxon must be sounded, the drum must be beaten time and again. I'd like to hear some serious non-ideological discussion of global warming on the talk shows. But the only 'climatologists' who appear to be weighing in are the screeching Ann Coulter ( on H &C the other night) and Barbra Streisand (B. S.).
How about these terms:
"Pro-Life"
"Family Values"
"undercutting the troops"
The Right is just as bad as the Left, and neither should be confused with "conservative" or "liberal."
Yours, Ed Y.
You are going to have to do a lot better than this to show that "the Right is just as bad as the Left." And you can't just list some phrases; you have to explain what is wrong with them. What is objectionable in the phrases you list? Nothing that I can see.
Off the top of my head, I can only think of one example of linguistic distortion on the Right comparable to the ones on the Left: 'death tax' as a substitute for 'estate tax.' The former is misleading since it suggests a tax on dying when it is a tax on an asset transfer on the occasion of dying when the assets are above a certain amount.
Your last sentence is empty verbiage unless you explain how you are using your terms.
It is true that birth control devices and practices are designed to prevent births of humans. But to prevent births is to control the number of births. Granted, one cannot control a nonexistent birth, but one can control the number of births.
Please go easy on the corrections. They waste bandwidth.
True, but I'm doubtful that those seeking birth control devices have the common good in mind. Moreover, the fact that a "birth control" device controls the overall number of births is but a consequence of the fact that it prevents a particular birth. Referring to such a device as birth control is, in my opinion, like referring to murder as population control; it confuses the specific act with the consequence.
The question is not about the common good or the motivations of particular people. The question is solely whether 'birth control' is an "outright lie" as you quote Chesterton as saying.
To put it in a less extreme way, the question is whether 'birth control' is an expression clear-thinking people should avoid in the way they should avoid expressions like 'homophobia.' I don't see it. Consider a large poor family. The parents practice contraception to prevent further births. Their aim is to control the number of children in their family and they do this by preventing the births of further children. practicing contraception, they practice a form of birth control. Where is the difficulty?
The issue is not the morality of contraception. I leave that undecided. The issue is whether 'birth control' slants the issue or begs any questions. 'Homophobia' does since it implies that anyone opposed to homosexual behavior is in the grip of a phobia when this is not the case. 'Birth control' does not as far as I can see.
Bill, here's a pithy version of the vanished.
"Pro Life" only means "antiabortion to get votes." The Right has no interest in anything else and is not goint to mess with abortion in any substantive way. Back in the 1970s Henry Hyde used to attach his amendment to riders. Imagine a Constitutional Amendment giving the governments the power to regulate or outlaw abortion. Yet in the six years of untrammeled Bush power it never even came up for a vote.
"Pro Life" is a patently insincere device to dupe gullible people into voting for a candidate. And if Mitt Romney can flip flop on the issue, what value does the phrase have?
"Family values". What are they? We are never told. The phrase is the flip side of "homophobia." The Left uses the phrase to silence people opposed to certain so-called gay rights issues. The Right uses it to rally people opposed to those so-called rights. So who can tell us what 'family values' are? Maybe the coiner of the term--was it not the thrice-married, twice-divorced, confessed adulterer Newt Gingrich?
"undercutting the troops." If you criticize the Bush plans for Iraq and demand an end to the war you are "undercutting the troops." Yet the majority of Americans want our involvement ended; should our elected representatives ignore this? In American political theory the people are sovereign;there is no justification for the government ignoring their wishes. So we see this empty phrase thrown around to distract from that fundamental fact.
The Left is not liberal; it supports continued government erosion of liberty through higher taxes and more regulation. The Right is not conservative; it erodes our national inheritance through high deficits (both federal and trade), neglect of energy conservation, malign neglect of the environment. They are equally destructive or our political life.
More later. I hope this is a start.
Yours, Ed Y.
We'll just have to disagree on this. But I never quoted Chesterton.
Your argument against the terms "pro-life" and "family values" is that politicians backing these positions are not sincere. How does a lack of insincerity make these terms deceptive or invalid?
As for "undercutting the troops", I'll grant you some running room on that. Because no one seriously believes that curtailing the war in Iraq means leaving our troops there to fend for themselves, the phrase creates a confusion between the mission and who executes it. Withdrawal from Iraq would surely undercut the mission of pacifying the country, but not the troops who would hardly be "undercut" by following their orders to leave.
So I don't like the phrase "undercutting the troops" in defense of the mission in Iraq, because it sentimentalizes the troops and implies they are victims, when in fact they have been dogged volunteers doing a job few of us these days is willing to do.
Regards, Bill
Thanks for response. As per your first para, I would say that insincerity by a claimant puts the claim on the same level as the attack words of the Left. To say "you are a homophobe" is no different from saying "I am for family values," except that the first is used as an attack while the second is used a sort of defense.
I find it dangerous to use any term that is empty of substance. If the Right did substantial things in support of life (greater tax deductions for adopted children as opposed to one's own children) or in support of family values (like defining what that means, to begin with) then I would have more respect for them. It seems to me that the Right (Limbaugh, Hannity, O'Reilly, Coulter, et hoc genus omnes) is not much different from the shill shills of the Left. They ape the manner and leave out the substance.
Yours, Ed Y.
2. Disallowing comments from a particular person, or deleting an offensive, off-topic, or otherwise substandard comment, has nothing to do with censorship. People who think otherwise confuse censorship with lack of sponsorship. I am under an obligation not to interfere with anyone's exercise of legitimate free speech rights. But I am not under any obligation to aid and abet anyone's exercise of free speech rights, legitimate or illegitimate.
3. The Comments area is not an open forum for anyone to say anything about any topic. As the name implies, it is primarily for commenting on the author(s)' posts. But to comment on them, one must have read them. And if I have spent three hours on a post, a reader will not understand it in thirty seconds. Secondarily, the Comments area is to facilitate civil discussion between and among commenters as long as the discussion remains on-topic.
4. Some undesirables: The skimmers, those who cannot read but only read-in. The sophists who, abusing argument, argue for the sake of argument. The ideologues, those who are out for power, not truth. The uncivil. The illogical. The politically correct. Worst of all, perhaps, are those who exemplify the anti-Socratic property: those who think they know what they don't know. If Socrates was famous for his learned ignorance, these types are marked by their ignorant unlearnededness.