On Evil Euphemisms

[RobNJ]

More thread necromancy

 

[rusmeister]

How about "I'm an A student" vs. "I generally earn A's."

Or, in its most common form, "But my kid's an A student..." with the implication that if I give them less than an A it is because I'm a bad teacher - my grading (my evaluation of their work) is no longer that, now it is a comment on their ontological being (my ability to recognize their inherent "A-ish-ness")...

Blech.

Well, I'd say that's a bad transposition of language, and symptomatic of the non-thought that passes in our society, but I wouldn't classify it as an evil euphemism.

I have an iPod, and being unable to pay for anything, I can only get what is offered for free. I downloaded a 5-minute brief sampling of a popular modern TV show (and I'd like to ask how popular it actually IS) called "Greek", and watched it on the trip to Moscow this last week. Frankly, I received a shock on the level of the shock I got in 1999 after 15 years of mostly TV-free life. To a person like me, who steps out of American life for a decade at a time, the rapid fall of public morality like that of a falling star is clear - the analogy of the frog in the pot of boiling water comes to mind here (ask if you don't know it).

One of the numerous terms used was "getting their gay on". Now THAT is an evil euphemism of the first order - the extreme casualization of sodomy as normal.

 

[MKJ]

How about "I'm an A student" vs. "I generally earn A's."

Or, in its most common form, "But my kid's an A student..." with the implication that if I give them less than an A it is because I'm a bad teacher - my grading (my evaluation of their work) is no longer that, now it is a comment on their ontological being (my ability to recognize their inherent "A-ish-ness")...

Blech.

You should say that - "My grading is not a comment on your child's ontological being". Might get some interesting replies.

 

[rusmeister]

inappropriate contentOGRAPHY

"writings/descriptions of purchased people (orig. slaves/prostitutes)

From @ 1880 - the late 19th century, like many of our modern evil euphemisms. Sure works at making something insidious sound harmless.

 

[rusmeister]

Sexual Orientation

I'm surprised this one didn't come up before.
As soon as a person with a mind free of our media and schooling thinks, it's obvious that there is no such thing. My grandparents called it simply "perversion". The language of "being oriented" a particular way is used to remove the stigma - which it has done, and thus Ms Dahl has a problem to deal with.
Being "oriented" means "being turned" - which is precisely what "pervert" means("vert means "turn" in Latin) leading to the obvious conclusion that it was also a euphemism in its origins. This seems to be a general problem of a sin which (I believe it was) the Apostle Paul said should not be named. Any euphemism seems to work towards its eventual approval. Just thinking of how it is referred to in the Bible and by the Church fathers - "abusers of themselves with (other) men" and "effeminate". Maybe others here can provide others.

The point I would stick to on this one is that it makes it sound like a perfectly normal and natural condition, which a person can't help and just ought to accept (ie, embrace). As long as it does that (and it most certainly does, and so it has been snapped up over a mere 25 years - one generation) it is an evil euphemism that the Orthodox Christian ought to avoid.

 

[MKJ]

inappropriate contentOGRAPHY

"writings/descriptions of purchased people (orig. slaves/prostitutes)

From @ 1880 - the late 19th century, like many of our modern evil euphemisms. Sure works at making something insidious sound harmless.

I'm not sure how this is a euphemism.

 

[Coralie]

I understood "inappropriate content-" as a linguistic element = "flesh", in the sense of flesh as a commodity or object. And isn't "inappropriate contentei"/"inappropriate contentai" = immorality or prostitution in Koine Greek?

So..."representations of objectified flesh" doesn't seem to be a euphemism to me either. It's pretty descriptive.

 

[rusmeister]

I understood "inappropriate content-" as a linguistic element = "flesh", in the sense of flesh as a commodity or object. And isn't "inappropriate contentei"/"inappropriate contentai" = immorality or prostitution in Koine Greek?

So..."representations of objectified flesh" doesn't seem to be a euphemism to me either. It's pretty descriptive.

I agree that it is not euphemism as such, and so would withdraw it as such. I think the thing that drew me on this one was its usage. If it were a legitimate term for something acceptable, it would always have been used. But it appeared, like so many words, in the 19th century - after the so-called "Enlightenment" (which I call the Endarkenment) and "Age of Reason", when it "became acceptable" (notice how we use that word instead of "moral/immoral") to depict nudity, under the new slogan "for art's sake" (think of the popularization of "French art" on Montmartre, such as depicted in the film "Titanic"). It was language that was seeking a specific word - one that was not understood as moral/immoral to describe what was becoming acceptable and has since done so, eventually achieving a status of legal sales (under the counter at first, and finally over the counter, as our "frankness" of sexuality became open.

But the overriding point of the thread I would still insist on above all - that we seek to understand the language we use, and to the extent that we are able, change language that works to approve ungodliness for that which condemns it and approves godliness. Not everyone will get that terms like "sexual orientation" really are
used to support ungodliness, and I imagine many of our church leaders do not get it, and so use it (or in some cases, may be compelled to use it by charity - but that would require an understanding that it is indeed an evil euphemism).
But if you are capable o thinking about it, and DO get it, then do what you can to discourage their use and encourage the use of language that does not sanitize evildoing.

Again, if anyone else thinks of a legitimate evil euphemism, you're welcome to post it!

 

[MKJ]

But it appeared, like so many words, in the 19th century - after the so-called "Enlightenment" (which I call the Endarkenment) and "Age of Reason", when it "became acceptable" (notice how we use that word instead of "moral/immoral") to depict nudity, under the new slogan "for art's sake" (think of the popularization of "French art" on Montmartre, such as depicted in the film "Titanic").

Not all language changes are an attempt to change moral attitudes. inappropriate contentography has always been a negative term. I suspect its origins are in another phenomena of the 19th century - the invention of photography.

 

[Coralie]

Not all language changes are an attempt to change moral attitudes. inappropriate contentography has always been a negative term. I suspect its origins are in another phenomena of the 19th century - the invention of photography.

I agree. Bizarrely, I did a cultural studies module on inappropriate contentography at university, and indeed we learnt that the word came into popular use because of photography (and the social reform movement, which sought to name what had not been named -- in order for the social evil in question to be easily identified and thus condemned and rooted out).

Very few words come into use as cultural weapons in and of themselves. They rather reflect changes brought about by cultural forces like immigration, literacy, epidemics, industrialization, war, colonization, scientific discoveries, etc. etc. So what I'm saying is... isn't it more effective to address the cultural changes, to understand the history of thought and culture, rather than to work backwards from linguistic changes?

Unless the aim is to pepper one's conversations with things like "I don't use that word [that you just used], it's evil"... which I doubt is the intention. As I understand it, you [rusmeister] are saying Orthodox Christians should interrogate their language for their own edification. Again, if that's the aim, wouldn't a comprehensive social/historical study be far more effective?

Or am i misunderstanding the intention again?

 

[rusmeister]

I agree. Bizarrely, I did a cultural studies module on inappropriate contentography at university, and indeed we learnt that the word came into popular use because of photography (and the social reform movement, which sought to name what had not been named -- in order for the social evil in question to be easily identified and thus condemned and rooted out).

Very few words come into use as cultural weapons in and of themselves. They rather reflect changes brought about by cultural forces like immigration, literacy, epidemics, industrialization, war, colonization, scientific discoveries, etc. etc. So what I'm saying is... isn't it more effective to address the cultural changes, to understand the history of thought and culture, rather than to work backwards from linguistic changes?

Unless the aim is to pepper one's conversations with things like "I don't use that word [that you just used], it's evil"... which I doubt is the intention. As I understand it, you [rusmeister] are saying Orthodox Christians should interrogate their language for their own edification. Again, if that's the aim, wouldn't a comprehensive social/historical study be far more effective?

Or am i misunderstanding the intention again?

Thanks, Coralie.
I've been saying all along that we should try to understand the language we use and how it works to approve evil. Sure, I can be wrong on inappropriate contentography, and am quite willing to drop it if that's what people will get stuck on. The thing I was thinking of there is what that stuff was called BEFORE its modern usage.

But comprehensive studies (which sounds like a formal affair)? Nobody's going to do that. So what CAN people do?

Well, I recommended reading GKC's essay at the very beginning of the thread. It's only a couple of pages; quite short (and if you're willing to read pages and pages by me, well, any page of GK's is worth ten of mine). Could I have a show of hands as to how many have actually read it? It's kind of useless discussing a topic if people skip the deliberation of the thesis and just say whatever they already happen to think. We're bound to run into misunderstandings like not knowing what my aim is and so on. So it would be good to read the OP and the essay. If you've followed the thread you'd note that I addressed issues like the necessity of using EEs out of charity, as well.

Once we understand that our modern use of language supports the evil and helps it accomplish its purpose, we might want to think about these words and terms that have been foisted on us VERY recently. I happen to be old enough to remember when a lot of them were not used. But younger people are in real trouble because this language to them must seem like the air they breathe. How else WOULD one talk?

 

[Protoevangel]

Thanks, Coralie.
I've been saying all along that we should try to understand the language we use and how it works to approve evil. Sure, I can be wrong on inappropriate contentography, and am quite willing to drop it if that's what people will get stuck on. The thing I was thinking of there is what that stuff was called BEFORE its modern usage.

But comprehensive studies (which sounds like a formal affair)? Nobody's going to do that. So what CAN people do?

Well, I recommended reading GKC's essay at the very beginning of the thread. It's only a couple of pages; quite short (and if you're willing to read pages and pages by me, well, any page of GK's is worth ten of mine). Could I have a show of hands as to how many have actually read it? It's kind of useless discussing a topic if people skip the deliberation of the thesis and just say whatever they already happen to think. We're bound to run into misunderstandings like not knowing what my aim is and so on. So it would be good to read the OP and the essay. If you've followed the thread you'd note that I addressed issues like the necessity of using EEs out of charity, as well.

Once we understand that our modern use of language supports the evil and helps it accomplish its purpose, we might want to think about these words and terms that have been foisted on us VERY recently. I happen to be old enough to remember when a lot of them were not used. But younger people are in real trouble because this language to them must seem like the air they breathe. How else WOULD one talk?

I may disagree with Rusmeister regarding some of the conclusions he's made regarding a few of the words he's chosen, but it is good and right that he has been promoting this kind of critical thought regarding the language we use.

And also like Rus, I HIGHLY recommend Chesterton's brief article at the beginning of the thread.

 

[Coralie]

Yes, I've read the initial article and a lot of GKC including Orthodoxy and some essays I got from the GKC website. I've always enjoyed his stuff and got something from it.

I guess because I've always been a student of history and language and I've always thought deeply about the etymology and history of words that the backwards approach isn't appealing to me. I've learnt like that in the past, and I found wider reading way more informative.

I don't think there's any need to make a formal study at all. I've certainly never made one. I've just always read voraciously on any topic of human history that I can find, particularly social history. I think just taking words and attempting to "learn around" them may result in a skewed view of things...

It's not that I don't understand the premise of this thread, I just... don't think this approach is useful for me. Maybe other people enjoy it or get something from it. I got particularly confused with the inclusion of "inappropriate contentography" but I guess you withdrew that one, so, yeah.

 

[rusmeister]

Yes, I've read the initial article and a lot of GKC including Orthodoxy and some essays I got from the GKC website. I've always enjoyed his stuff and got something from it.

I guess because I've always been a student of history and language and I've always thought deeply about the etymology and history of words that the backwards approach isn't appealing to me. I've learnt like that in the past, and I found wider reading way more informative.

I don't think there's any need to make a formal study at all. I've certainly never made one. I've just always read voraciously on any topic of human history that I can find, particularly social history. I think just taking words and attempting to "learn around" them may result in a skewed view of things...

It's not that I don't understand the premise of this thread, I just... don't think this approach is useful for me. Maybe other people enjoy it or get something from it. I got particularly confused with the inclusion of "inappropriate contentography" but I guess you withdrew that one, so, yeah.

Well, my own path to "getting it" involved years of foreign language learning, then teaching English as a foreign language myself (professionally full-time, not overseas student dabbling), followed by several years of learning from Lewis and Chesterton, who pointed out to me what I already knew to be true from my language experience - but they connected the dots for me.

All a thread like this and essay like that could do would be to stimulate your thinking when you hear language that we normally take for granted. I wouldn't set any more haughty goals for it. To begin to question our language, particularly regarding how it expresses moral issues these days. The simplest test that anyone who reads can apply is to ask how our ancestors expressed these things, and when did people begin saying things like "have sex"? When you find that an approximate year or even decade can be fixed, you can begin to see how it crept along with the gradual changes in what society considers moral - um, what is "acceptable" (and 'what is "unacceptable" now may well be "acceptable" five or ten years from now - an ever-shifting standard. To the point where my parody article on animal-human couples might not seem so far-fetched. I was joking - but I can see that in ten years it might not be so much of a joke.

 

[MKJ]

While thinking about language is important, I would tend to be very careful about drawing conclusions without any real evidence. My own education is in classics, and although I'm by no means a scholar, I'm familiar with the requirements for this kind of language study, and what a philologist has to go through to come to conclusions that are accurate about word origins and relationships.

The problem is that without any actual evidence, it is very easy to miss the mark entirely and come to believe a made-up history of the language. The difference is, it's one we've made up to suit our own world view. I'm not sure that is any better than just accepting whatever language fads come along. One is akin to spiritual laziness, the other to spiritual hubris. Both lead to blindness.

 

[rusmeister]

While thinking about language is important, I would tend to be very careful about drawing conclusions without any real evidence. My own education is in classics, and although I'm by no means a scholar, I'm familiar with the requirements for this kind of language study, and what a philologist has to go through to come to conclusions that are accurate about word origins and relationships.

The problem is that without any actual evidence, it is very easy to miss the mark entirely and come to believe a made-up history of the language. The difference is, it's one we've made up to suit our own world view. I'm not sure that is any better than just accepting whatever language fads come along. One is akin to spiritual laziness, the other to spiritual hubris. Both lead to blindness.

I quite agree that histories can be invented. To me it is painfully obvious - now - that the feminist view of history that we are now bringing up children with - such as the idea that women were oppressed slaves who had to 'fight for their rights' IS such a made-up history, and IS blind. The test is (the broad canon of) literature and the common stories told by people throughout history - (here comes a shocker for some myths, legends and fairy tales. If the feminist version of history were true, then we would read nothing of Zeus, the mightiest of the gods, hiding from Hera, changing himself into a bull or cloud or whatever. The old man would NOT cow before the old woman and do her bidding in Pushkin's "The Golden Fish" (itself simply a written form of an old folk story). People would disbelieve NOT the fantastic elements of the stories, but the idea of a man cowing before a woman. It would be not mystical things that they know nothing about that they would reject, but the common behavior they know quite a lot about.

'Do you mean to say,' demanded Tarrant, 'that we can really be killed now by something that happened in the thirteenth century?' Father Brown shook his head and answered with quiet emphasis: 'I won't discuss whether we can be killed by something that happened in the thirteenth century; but I'm jolly certain that we can't be killed by something that never happened in the thirteenth century, something that never happened at all.' 'Well,' said Tarrant, 'it's refreshing to find a priest so sceptical of the supernatural as all that.' 'Not at all,' replied the priest calmly; 'it's not the supernatural part I doubt. It's the natural part. I'm exactly in the position of the man who said, 'I can believe the impossible, but not the improbable.'' 'That's what you call a paradox, isn't it?' asked the other. 'It's what I call common sense, properly understood,' replied Father Brown. 'It really is more natural to believe a preternatural story, that deals with things we don't understand, than a natural story that contradicts things we do understand. Tell me that the great Mr Gladstone, in his last hours, was haunted by the ghost of Parnell, and I will be agnostic about it. But tell me that Mr Gladstone, when first presented to Queen Victoria, wore his hat in her drawing - room and slapped her on the back and offered her a cigar, and I am not agnostic at all. That is not impossible; it's only incredible. But I'm much more certain it didn't happen than that Parnell's ghost didn't appear; because it violates the laws of the world I do understand. So it is with that tale of the curse. It isn't the legend that I disbelieve - it's the history.'

So the myths and folklore trump the invented history of a small group of literary people who sought to remake the world in their own image. I was especially stuck by how narrow the circle is in English literature of the turn of the 18 to the 19th century - Godwin - Wollstonecraft - Shelley - Byron etc, and how a few radical individuals had so much effect on shifting public morality then. Yes, the common man reacted to them and even drove some of them out, but the damage was done, the Pandora box was opened. (Although it WAS incrementally opened, of course)

So is there truth, then? Can we know it? Of course.

The test is the actual history. What has actually happened in terms of morality? How did this come to pass? It is 'plain as a pikestaff' and requires no degrees or special study to see that people have been brought around to believe very nearly the diametric opposite of what their great-grandparents believe - a VERY short time (even a century is far too short) for such rapid acceptance of things as easy divorce, public nudity (I'm reminded of the Gilbreath's account of the young people fighting for increased body exposure on public beaches).

So we come back to "sexual orientation" as a brand-new term, one that was NEVER used - when I was a child it was UNHEARD of - and yet now is all over the place. Everyone has swallowed it. How has this come to pass? What does it enable? Where is the blindness and who is missing the mark?

(A consideration of the machines of rapid dissemination - public schooling/"education" and the media give huge hints on how a people can rapidly be bamboozled and taught how to think and in what terms - the very opposite of their slogans of training critical thinkers.

 

[rusmeister]

Gender dysphoria

Caught today in a news article about Chaz Bono.
Went to Wikipedia - yup, they now have an article about it. Honestly, anyone can now make up anything they want and once on Wikipedia, it looks like genuine knowledge.
One phrase at Wikipedia was a real killer, but I can' do the necessary tab shifting on this Safari browser.

 

[MKJ]

Gender dysphoria

Caught today in a news article about Chaz Bono.
Went to Wikipedia - yup, they now have an article about it. Honestly, anyone can now make up anything they want and once on Wikipedia, it looks like genuine knowledge.
One phrase at Wikipedia was a real killer, but I can' do the necessary tab shifting on this Safari browser.

Hmmm. It's a descriptive term as far as I can see. How would you think it is appropriate to describe people who report this kind of issue, in a way that would be precise?

 

[rusmeister]

Hmmm. It's a descriptive term as far as I can see. How would you think it is appropriate to describe people who report this kind of issue, in a way that would be precise?

Of course it's descriptive. All euphemisms are descriptive. But they happen to be false descriptions. "Boyfriend" is similarly a false description, for the person in question is neither a boy, nor (merely) a friend.

"This kind of issue" is a feeling, which can become obsession, that one "should have been" born the other sex. This is distinguishable from genuine hermaphroditism, which is a genuine physical abnormality, like being born with no eyes, so I'm not talking about hermaphrodites.

A feeling, even a persistent one, is not justified merely because one has it. If I have a persistent feeling and desire to have been born at the end of the eighteenth century, should we )if we could) then bend our technological capabilities to grant me that wish and fulfill that desire?

Such a feeling is unfortunate - but so is the desire for other good things misapplied, like alcoholism or same-sex attraction - which this feeling is obviously connected to. They grow from the same limb of falsehood. There is not one person here who, had they been born fifty or a hundred years earlier, would have taken seriously a claim of "gender dysphoria". Have you read Chesterton's essay at the beginning of the thread?

Chesterton is pretty clear about the penchant for taking Greek - or any foreign language - terms to make something wrong sound acceptable. And this is done all the time. It was done with "homosexual" - and now people accept open sodomy in our society. It is being done with "polyamory", and in less than a decade we will see open approval of polygamy. Finally we will find medical terms for pedophilia (itself a euphemism, as it merely means "the love of children"), and inappropriate behavior with animals (likewise) being a nameless monstrosity, something the apostle Paul affirmed the existence of, and they will gradually receive approval (I said GRADUALLY - in the case of 'pedophilia' it will start with lowering the age of consent, at first to 17, then sixteen, eventually down to puberty).

The assumption encouraged in the modern media is that whatever a person wants to be, that's what they are. A truth is taken - that we can affirm or deny our passions and align ourselves with or against them (the latter may be called "theosis"), and twisted so that it is the affirmation that is the good that people see and the denial that is bad. In the film "The Iron Giant" we see an illustration of "You are who you choose to be" as a choice against the passion, in "The X-Men" we see it as for the passion. (If that seems esoteric and out of the blue, wait for my upcoming post on "the X-Men!"). And so we see a girl get a bizarre operation by twisted doctors, who learned nothing from Dr Frankenstein and then the media cheerfully refer to her as a "he", merely because she was given hormonal treatments and had an appendage added, as if sex was a merely physical reality. Or vice-versa (a boy calling himself a girl and having himself mutilated and hormonalized).

If I take "gender dysphoria" and translate it I get "grammatical gender - bad feeling". Now setting aside the problem of everybody forgetting that even their parents said "sex" rather than "gender" - a fad of the last twenty-five years - I'm still left with saying that a person has a bad feeling about their sex. How in the heck does that work out to a boy being a girl, merely because he thinks, wishes, feels and desires to be? Since when can we change absolute physical reality merely by desiring to do so? We are not merely material - where is the operation on the soul that is so desperately needed, for it is clearly not the physical reality that is wrong, when a person genes are definitely xx or xy, but a sickness of the soul. And for that we need the Church, not a medical (physical) doctor, and for the person who suffers from such a desire an effort, a struggle, that may or may not be lifelong, is called for. Our feelings cannot be cured by medical doctors - the ones that purport to do so have stepped outside of their field of competency. The real cure and comfort is in Jesus Christ.

We have learned to do a great many clever things. The next great task is to learn not to do them.

GK Chesterton

 

[Dorothea]

Of course it's descriptive. All euphemisms are descriptive. But they happen to be false descriptions. "Boyfriend" is similarly a false description, for the person in question is neither a boy, nor (merely) a friend.

"This kind of issue" is a feeling, which can become obsession, that one "should have been" born the other sex. This is distinguishable from genuine hermaphroditism, which is a genuine physical abnormality, like being born with no eyes, so I'm not talking about hermaphrodites.

A feeling, even a persistent one, is not justified merely because one has it. If I have a persistent feeling and desire to have been born at the end of the eighteenth century, should we )if we could) then bend our technological capabilities to grant me that wish and fulfill that desire?

Such a feeling is unfortunate - but so is the desire for other good things misapplied, like alcoholism or same-sex attraction - which this feeling is obviously connected to. They grow from the same limb of falsehood. There is not one person here who, had they been born fifty or a hundred years earlier, would have taken seriously a claim of "gender dysphoria". Have you read Chesterton's essay at the beginning of the thread?

Chesterton is pretty clear about the penchant for taking Greek - or any foreign language - terms to make something wrong sound acceptable. And this is done all the time. It was done with "homosexual" - and now people accept open sodomy in our society. It is being done with "polyamory", and in less than a decade we will see open approval of polygamy. Finally we will find medical terms for pedophilia (itself a euphemism, as it merely means "the love of children"), and inappropriate behavior with animals (likewise) being a nameless monstrosity, something the apostle Paul affirmed the existence of, and they will gradually receive approval (I said GRADUALLY - in the case of 'pedophilia' it will start with lowering the age of consent, at first to 17, then sixteen, eventually down to puberty).

The assumption encouraged in the modern media is that whatever a person wants to be, that's what they are. A truth is taken - that we can affirm or deny our passions and align ourselves with or against them (the latter may be called "theosis"), and twisted so that it is the affirmation that is the good that people see and the denial that is bad. In the film "The Iron Giant" we see an illustration of "You are who you choose to be" as a choice against the passion, in "The X-Men" we see it as for the passion. (If that seems esoteric and out of the blue, wait for my upcoming post on "the X-Men!"). And so we see a girl get a bizarre operation by twisted doctors, who learned nothing from Dr Frankenstein and then the media cheerfully refer to her as a "he", merely because she was given hormonal treatments and had an appendage added, as if sex was a merely physical reality. Or vice-versa (a boy calling himself a girl and having himself mutilated and hormonalized).

If I take "gender dysphoria" and translate it I get "grammatical gender - bad feeling". Now setting aside the problem of everybody forgetting that even their parents said "sex" rather than "gender" - a fad of the last twenty-five years - I'm still left with saying that a person has a bad feeling about their sex. How in the heck does that work out to a boy being a girl, merely because he thinks, wishes, feels and desires to be? Since when can we change absolute physical reality merely by desiring to do so? We are not merely material - where is the operation on the soul that is so desperately needed, for it is clearly not the physical reality that is wrong, when a person genes are definitely xx or xy, but a sickness of the soul. And for that we need the Church, not a medical (physical) doctor, and for the person who suffers from such a desire an effort, a struggle, that may or may not be lifelong, is called for. Our feelings cannot be cured by medical doctors - the ones that purport to do so have stepped outside of their field of competency. The real cure and comfort is in Jesus Christ.


GK Chesterton

Excellent!