Hero
Does it bother anyone else that people play fast and loose with terms? It gets more extreme as time goes by...my guess is that the overstated terms lose their punch as they are used more frequently, so they have to get more outrageous to mean anything over time.
Take the word "hero", for example. Everyone is now a hero. It gets applied in all kinds of situations that are far from heroic. If you go hiking by yourself, don't take any communication device, get trapped by a large rock and have to amputate your own arm using a dull pocket knife in order to save yourself, you are not a hero...lucky to have survived, but not a hero. Any situation where you save your own ass does not qualify as heroic, especially if you got into that situation by being an idiot.
Taking a wrong turn in a war zone, being captured by the enemy and then being rescued a week or two later by someone else does not make you a hero. Call me silly, but not being able to read a map doesn't sound heroic at all. You might use the word "hero" to describe the rescuers, but definitely not the rescued in this case...in my opinion.
I realize those are old examples, this is about my thousandth time being irritated by it so I have a few stored up.
More recently, President Bush (W.), when making a speech praising the capture of some alleged terrorists, said, "this nation is at war with Islamic fascists."
I hate when people resort to the dictionary in an argument, but, in this case it's better to make sure everyone is on the same page. So, from dictionary.com, here's a definition of fascism:
That definition could apply to several governments that I can think of at the moment, but I don't think that the people Bush was referring to would qualify. Once again, this is part of the "repeat it until they believe it" brainwashing the US government favors in the mass media. It is also, in my opinion, an attempt by the US government to magically turn anyone they want to attack into Nazis and relive WWII in the press...they already have a script for that one, so adapting it would be easy enough.
I'm going to do another thing I hate...quote somebody. Here's a snippet from an essay titled "Politics and the English Language" written in 1946 by George Orwell which you can read here.
Mr. Orwell could have written that today...it's worth reading the whole essay.
We are fed a steady diet of meaningless crap that changes interpretations as it pleases the storyteller. Nebulous bad sounding labels are put on anyone that the government wants you to hate and nebulous good sounding labels for themselves. After you've seen the fourth or fifth interpretation/repetition of an event, the cycle is hard to deny.
Of course, television is proof that America loves being told the same story over and over again...hell, movies, books and games too. The audience doesn't want anything new, they want the hot wife married to the goofy husband, the sexual tension between two characters that lasts for five seasons until they get married in the series finale and the smart worker with a dumb boss. It's like television writing hasn't progressed since "I Love Lucy". They want commercials to reinforce every stereotype, men who can't figure out how to wash clothes, clean anything or take care of their kids. It's easier to just let the car steer itself by following the grooves cut in the road, I guess.
History does seem to repeat itself, but the loop is getting shorter...and simpler.
Take the word "hero", for example. Everyone is now a hero. It gets applied in all kinds of situations that are far from heroic. If you go hiking by yourself, don't take any communication device, get trapped by a large rock and have to amputate your own arm using a dull pocket knife in order to save yourself, you are not a hero...lucky to have survived, but not a hero. Any situation where you save your own ass does not qualify as heroic, especially if you got into that situation by being an idiot.
Taking a wrong turn in a war zone, being captured by the enemy and then being rescued a week or two later by someone else does not make you a hero. Call me silly, but not being able to read a map doesn't sound heroic at all. You might use the word "hero" to describe the rescuers, but definitely not the rescued in this case...in my opinion.
I realize those are old examples, this is about my thousandth time being irritated by it so I have a few stored up.
More recently, President Bush (W.), when making a speech praising the capture of some alleged terrorists, said, "this nation is at war with Islamic fascists."
I hate when people resort to the dictionary in an argument, but, in this case it's better to make sure everyone is on the same page. So, from dictionary.com, here's a definition of fascism:
"fas·cism
often Fascism
1. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, stringent socioeconomic controls, suppression of the opposition through terror and censorship, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
2. A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.
2. Oppressive, dictatorial control."
That definition could apply to several governments that I can think of at the moment, but I don't think that the people Bush was referring to would qualify. Once again, this is part of the "repeat it until they believe it" brainwashing the US government favors in the mass media. It is also, in my opinion, an attempt by the US government to magically turn anyone they want to attack into Nazis and relive WWII in the press...they already have a script for that one, so adapting it would be easy enough.
I'm going to do another thing I hate...quote somebody. Here's a snippet from an essay titled "Politics and the English Language" written in 1946 by George Orwell which you can read here.
"The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies ‘something not desirable’. The words democracy, socialism, freedom, patriotic, realistic, justice have each of them several different meanings which cannot be reconciled with one another. In the case of a word like democracy, not only is there no agreed definition, but the attempt to make one is resisted from all sides. It is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it: consequently the defenders of every kind of regime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using that word if it were tied down to any one meaning."
Mr. Orwell could have written that today...it's worth reading the whole essay.
We are fed a steady diet of meaningless crap that changes interpretations as it pleases the storyteller. Nebulous bad sounding labels are put on anyone that the government wants you to hate and nebulous good sounding labels for themselves. After you've seen the fourth or fifth interpretation/repetition of an event, the cycle is hard to deny.
Of course, television is proof that America loves being told the same story over and over again...hell, movies, books and games too. The audience doesn't want anything new, they want the hot wife married to the goofy husband, the sexual tension between two characters that lasts for five seasons until they get married in the series finale and the smart worker with a dumb boss. It's like television writing hasn't progressed since "I Love Lucy". They want commercials to reinforce every stereotype, men who can't figure out how to wash clothes, clean anything or take care of their kids. It's easier to just let the car steer itself by following the grooves cut in the road, I guess.
History does seem to repeat itself, but the loop is getting shorter...and simpler.
posted by itsjustme at 1:52 AM
2 Comments:
OK, another good post!
Mindless agreement time...
Orwell... Genius
I hate the term Democracy. It's overused and misapplied in nearly all situations including in reference to the U.S. We're a Republic dammit!
Fascism, if I hear that word again in reference to anyone except The Nazi Party of Germany circa 1930's, I swear I am going to start pummelling people. Its meaning has been forgotten and so is that fact that everyone at the time though it was a great idea.
I do disagree with quoting and definitions, I think they... well... help define and clarify things... yea...
Weird
The reason for my aversion to quotes is the number of idiots that I've met that think quoting someone makes them smart. Sort of like how schools don't care if you can think for yourself, they just care that you can repeat what you have memorized.
As for using definitions, pretty much the same reason. Once again, in arguments, some idiots I have met have attempted to steer the argument by busting out the dictionary to try to find a definition that supports whatever crap they are trying to pass off as fact.
I don't think it's always bad to quote someone or use a definition, I just have the image of those idiots in my head. One of my personal psychic wars, I guess.
You're right though, there is a time and a place where they are appropriate and useful.
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