Words! We need them! They serve a darned useful purpose,
allowing us to communicate quickly and efficiently even when dealing in complicated
ideas. Without words, the species wouldn’t be anywhere near as advanced as we
are.
But we’re killing them dead. We’ve already lost “literally”,
because people would not stop using it to mean “figuratively”. And I get it,
language changes over time. It mutates, morphs, turns askew, and twists back on
itself. But we are not obligated to stand by simply observe these changes.
Every day, I see people continuing to misuse words in order
to promote different agendas. For
example, I recently watched someone describe the road-blocking actions of
anti-Trump protestors as “terrorism”. Sorry, but any definition of terrorism
that includes that is a definition that means nothing. Since 9/11, as a
culture, we’ve watered the word “terrorism” down to the point of uselessness.
Take the recent standoff in Oregon. An untold number of people, largely on the
left side of the political spectrum, insisted on calling the occupiers
“terrorists”.
They were not terrorists. Nor were they simple protestors;
their stated willingness and attempt to use force pushed them beyond that
category. So they were closer to terrorists than the people blocking the
streets at the Trump rally, but still not quite actually terrorists. No, the
term I used for that group was “proto-traitors”. They were only a hair’s
breadth away from committing treason as defined by the COTUS.
But were they terrorists? No. Why? Because “terrorism” has a
meaning and their actions simply did not qualify; nor did the actions of the
road blockers. Perhaps if the occupiers had taken civilian hostages, things
might be different. If they had attacked the local town and residents, they
might have been terrorists. But their actions simply made them myopic
proto-traitors. Who needed snacks and got dildos.
Closer to terrorists are some of the people showing up at
Trump rallies and using violence on anti-Trump protestors. They are
legitimately using fear and violence in enforcement of a political belief
(though I think many are just there for the violence potential; I understand
that mindset pretty well).
But I’d hesitate to call even those people terrorists.
A lot of people like to use the word “terrorist” in
connection to many of the spree/mass shooters of the last couple years. And in
a couple of cases, it’s an acceptable use. But not every mass shooting is an
act of terrorism. Because what makes terrorism what it is, is not just action,
but intent.
The Ku Klux Klan was (is?) a terrorist organization. They
used violence, murder and fear with the goal of terrorizing certain
communities. Many of these mass shooters have no actual goal beyond murder and
posthumous fame. That’s not terrorism, that’s just sick, broken people
committing murder.
Many people, quite often young adults, will attempt to tell
you that words are violence. Because we’ve stopped caring that words mean
things, except for the words we hate. Words are not violence. Words can change
things, words can wound, and words can inspire violence, but words cannot, unto
themselves, be violence.
Because, Gods damn it, words
have meaning.
If we’re going to keep ignoring the meaning of words, infusing
them only with whatever definition suits the current conversation and agenda,
then the words become useless. But that is where we’re heading. In which case,
I propose, instead of slowly strangling each word to death, we kill them all at once.
From now on, we should simply converse with “dude”, using
the tones and inflections to convey whatever meaning we think is required.
In the famous words of Missing Persons,
Dude
Dude
Dude
Dude
Dude
Dude
Dude
