Narz
keeping it real
I grew up listening to hip-hop & never heard the word 'woke'
"Wokeist" - When people talk about progressivism without acquaintance
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Narz
keeping it real
Tldw : 'progressives' might benefit from being more of a big tent party & less purity testy. Considering democracy is a popularity contest they might benfit from trying to be more popular.
Akka
Moody old mage.
Okay, we may have missed the earlier point when I asked for example. I wasn't specifically about "insults" by themselves. I was asking about examples of "the right" being able to warp language as you say. To change meaning for words to the general public that aren't specifically from the "woke" wing of the political spectrum.
Because I see many people making claims about it, but I still don't see such cases. Yeah, the right tried to make "liberal" an insult. It failed. It tried to make anyone left of Reagan a "commie". It also failed. Both are pretty ingrained in the right-wing lingo, but they didn't caught outside, and when someone call you a "liberal" or a "commie" as if they were insults, it tends to tell more about them than about you.
So I'm still asking for examples of this right-sponsored warping of the language that spilled over the general public.
I despise attempts at warping language. It's just underhanded manipulation and it's a textbook authoritarian cookbook. So here we are in agreement.
As for the right being able to direct the language, as above I'm not convinced and awaiting cases that aren't just restricted to the "woke" part of politics.
That part I completely agree. This is what I'm seeing happening in the language battlefield when it comes to politics.
The thing is though... I see it mostly precisely from the "woke" subset. All the overuse of the "*ist" and "*ism" words, that are so overused they lose all meaning and impact - I think it was even you who pointed at it ?
I also saw some regrets about this very behaviour during the recent French election, with people lamenting that there overused "fascists" so much, that basically it became neutered, and as such couldn't "scare" away people anymore when applied to Le Pen.
Sadly this epiphany doesn't seem to have started a real move of self-criticism beyond this very specific case, but it was rather relevant and revealing.
As pointed before, you do use "right-wing" (and "left-wing") despite these terms being even more vague, and yet you see what they mean. "woke" cover a subset that is pretty understandable to nearly everyone, it's about a subset of the "left" that is focused on social justice and identity politics. It's actually much less nebulous than many other words you use without problems.
This attempt to claim the word is meaningless while everyone actually understand what it covers, really feels like a pretext just to reject it because it carries a pejorative undertone. To me the main problem, going hand in hand with the whole "the right somehow manages to direct language" despite the lack of concrete example, seems like an attempt to not look at why it's specifically (and only ?) the words coming from the "woke" side that always seems to become pejorative.
Is that the flasher
EnglishEdward
Deity
@ Akka
Many words have very much changed their meaning in my life time.
Speaking from a UK English perspective.
Cash
This used to be paper notes or coins, but now many people regard
a prompt online bank transaction as cash, as opposed to credit
Cis
A word invented to be easily derogative, because certain people weren't happy with "normal".
Dead Cat
Used to be a dead feline, but now a red herring.
Democracy
That used to be about people voting for decisions, laws or representatives
or in juries; but in many places it is regarded as rule of law, charters of rights;
division of power, transparency, with the public voting bit almost forgotten.
Earnings
Income used to be divided into unearned income (rents and
dividends and capital gains) and earned income (wages);
but earnings is now used as a synonym for nearly all income.
Gay
Used to be being happy, jolly, lively.
Invest, investment.
It used to mean spend money or time e.g. in machinery or
land draining or etc. to obtain definitive productive benefits later,
but it has been co-opted by the capitalist right to include
property speculation and gambling with crypto-currency.
Nazism
Used to mean admirers and followers of Adolf Hitler, but it
is now used by many merely to emphatically refer to fascism.
Property
This used to be something one could pick up, walk over or be inside.
But lawyers invented intellectual property and financial instruments etc.
Pegging
Used to be with camping with tents, hanging laundry to dry or scoring.
Random
Used to be a number selected by chance, now often meaning a red herring.
Their
Used to imply plural or unknown ownership, but now used where gender/sex of owner is immaterial.
Wife
Always used to be female.
Woke
A state of being formerly created by amongst other things, alarm clocks.
Many words have very much changed their meaning in my life time.
Speaking from a UK English perspective.
Cash
This used to be paper notes or coins, but now many people regard
a prompt online bank transaction as cash, as opposed to credit
Cis
A word invented to be easily derogative, because certain people weren't happy with "normal".
Dead Cat
Used to be a dead feline, but now a red herring.
Democracy
That used to be about people voting for decisions, laws or representatives
or in juries; but in many places it is regarded as rule of law, charters of rights;
division of power, transparency, with the public voting bit almost forgotten.
Earnings
Income used to be divided into unearned income (rents and
dividends and capital gains) and earned income (wages);
but earnings is now used as a synonym for nearly all income.
Gay
Used to be being happy, jolly, lively.
Invest, investment.
It used to mean spend money or time e.g. in machinery or
land draining or etc. to obtain definitive productive benefits later,
but it has been co-opted by the capitalist right to include
property speculation and gambling with crypto-currency.
Nazism
Used to mean admirers and followers of Adolf Hitler, but it
is now used by many merely to emphatically refer to fascism.
Property
This used to be something one could pick up, walk over or be inside.
But lawyers invented intellectual property and financial instruments etc.
Pegging
Used to be with camping with tents, hanging laundry to dry or scoring.
Random
Used to be a number selected by chance, now often meaning a red herring.
Their
Used to imply plural or unknown ownership, but now used where gender/sex of owner is immaterial.
Wife
Always used to be female.
Woke
A state of being formerly created by amongst other things, alarm clocks.
The "right wing" is a large part of the general public, right? It's not some fringe element - this kind of language is used across the right-of-centre spectrum, and even happily by liberals that have an axe to grind with those left-of-centre. "woke" is used in tabloid papers that a bunch of regular folk read daily. "cancel culture" also. Jeremy Corbyn was portrayed as a Communist (however dramatically overstated the comparison might have been, the point is it was made) by our main state-funded broadcasting body (the BBC), some years back.
You can't ask for examples that have spilled over to the general public, and then discount them because they're primarily used by "the right".
Actually, it's merely the Latin opposite to the "trans" prefix, which is in no way derogatory unless you assume "trans" to be. Certainly not "invented" in the slightest.
Unlike "normal", whose opposite state is "abnormal", which would be a rather derogatory label to apply to trans folk (if "cis" folk are "normal" as you're suggesting).
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I did not realise you are older than the Statute of Monopolies (1624), the Statute of Anne (1710) or the Amsterdam Stock Exchange (1602).
Akka
Moody old mage.
Wat ?
Sorry guys, but at this point this is just nonsensical, you're flip-flopping from "the right" as a manipulative force which manages to twist the general discourse, to "the right" as being the general discourse itself and as such any term used by "the right" being part of the main discourse, but "the left" on the other hand can't affect the general discourse, so it would mean "the left" is not part of the general discourse, despite this contradicting the very concept that made "the right" the general discourse itself to begin with. WTF.
Make up your mind, it feels that, in full reverse illustration of the thread, the words and concepts and themes are redefined on the fly from post to post just so the premise of "we're victim of the right manipulations on language" stays fulfilled.
I didn't say anything about what "the left" does, or doesn't do. I said nothing about "the right" as a "manipulative force", either. You wanted examples of "the right" redefining phrases that then made their way to the general public. I gave explanations as to how this happened.
One thing Edward did get right is that language changes over time. Always has done, likely will always continue to. That doesn't mean that language can't be changed in a manipulative or coercive way. A different example of this can be seen in the US (and sometimes elsewhere), where the media really tries its best to avoid saying "a police officer shot someone", using torturous language like "police's firearm found itself discharging in public" or the like. That's an attempt to coerce language (to pre-emptively absolve blame / misrepresent what's happening). The media impacts how people perceive events (by definition), so I don't think I'm stretching here.
(edited for clarity, mainly the last paragraph)
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Oh you're older than Chaucer hey
EnglishEdward
Deity
Ah ha, as expected it is the usual culprits jumping on my reply to @ Akka
English isn't Latin and referring to English people by Latin terminology is often derogatory.
I remember being told In one thread that cross dresser was alright but transvestite was not.
Not necessarily so.
I wouldn't refer to an Olympic runner as a normal runner, but I wouldn't refer to an Olympic
runner as an abnormal runner as both terms would be incorrect and IMHO rather rude.
Looked at first URL only.
When I was young, most people referred to those things as Patents and as Copyrights.
I don't recollect the more general grouping term Intellectual Property being used then.
I dare say it may have been used by American lawyers, but not by ordinary English folk then.
I dare say it is possible to argue with "their" that modern English has reverted to medieval English.
Certain English words e.g. skillet were retained in the USA after being largely abandoned in England,
but when I was young "his" and "hers" were used wherever possible rather than "their".
But I dunno what happened downunder.
What I have noticed in my general reading, see book thread, is that in many books "their" has often
replaced almost exclusively replaced "his" and "her" in reference to single people of known sex/gender.
Thing is languages change, and it is often for political reasons.
English isn't Latin and referring to English people by Latin terminology is often derogatory.
I remember being told In one thread that cross dresser was alright but transvestite was not.
Not necessarily so.
I wouldn't refer to an Olympic runner as a normal runner, but I wouldn't refer to an Olympic
runner as an abnormal runner as both terms would be incorrect and IMHO rather rude.
Looked at first URL only.
When I was young, most people referred to those things as Patents and as Copyrights.
I don't recollect the more general grouping term Intellectual Property being used then.
I dare say it may have been used by American lawyers, but not by ordinary English folk then.
I dare say it is possible to argue with "their" that modern English has reverted to medieval English.
Certain English words e.g. skillet were retained in the USA after being largely abandoned in England,
but when I was young "his" and "hers" were used wherever possible rather than "their".
But I dunno what happened downunder.
What I have noticed in my general reading, see book thread, is that in many books "their" has often
replaced almost exclusively replaced "his" and "her" in reference to single people of known sex/gender.
Thing is languages change, and it is often for political reasons.
I never realised the term came to be used so late, and more in the US than the UK, at least by percent of words written. Though we hardly write about copyrights?
Spoiler NGrams for IP in british and american english :
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EnglishEdward
Deity
@ Samson
Thank you for the graphs.
I was replying from personal memory which apart from being different to others is of course fallible.
Thank you for the graphs.
I was replying from personal memory which apart from being different to others is of course fallible.
Hygro
soundcloud.com/hygro/
yeah why?
Cloud_Strife
Deity
What do you mean "Normal"? Are trans people not normal?
Hygro
soundcloud.com/hygro/
I have neuroatypicality, am I normal?
Cloud_Strife
Deity
haha imagine being trans or gay and not normal
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