Watering down extreme words

 Hate is an excellent example. You are right, at one time it was reserved towards behaviours that were considered entirely unacceptable by society. With the advent of mass media, those who produce it were given complete control to indoctrinate it's adherents to 'new ways' of thinking and new beliefs. The media is the world's largest and most powerful PULPIT. As such, they took a population that adhered to Christian teaching and flipped it on it's head - promoting sinful behaviours as good and the gospel message as evil. Intolerance was redefined as hatred in the same process. And what has that produced? Two generations entirely indoctrinated to not only believe that sin and wickedness are "good", but that anyone (specifically a Christian) who shuns the behaviour is labeled as a "hater" because they do not tolerate the behaviour in their lives.

Kids, indoctrinated by anti-bullying campaigns, are herded into accepting any and all behaviours as "right" simply through fear of being labeled as a "hater or intolerant". It's social conditioning, and because it is conditioning, the kids will yell "I hate you" to a parent that tries to be authoritative. Everything becomes "hate" in their eyes if they are denied anything because their social indoctrination is teaching them, in schools and through media programming, "Do what thou Wilst" and that anyone who dares to call them on a behaviour is in the wrong. As the Romans, they are becoming so tolerant in their beliefs that they are becoming utterly intolerant to only one thing - the preaching against sin.

Those who produce the media are of the belief that our Creator is the evil one....that He is a monster....that He is a hateful God for demanding obedience. And tragically, the millions of descendants of Christian forefathers cannot fathom how they have been deceived by the one who is the father of lies and a murderer from the beginning. He has redefined tolerance as love and intolerance as hate, therefore becoming "god" in the minds and hearts of most. What's more attractive to someone caught up in sexual addictions? A god who says here's your prostitutes, your porn and your little kiddies, or a God who tells you of the consequences of these behaviours - the destroyed lives of women, children and families and the child sacrifice that results from the rampant sexual addiction? The former, of course, because his 'love' allows them to partake of the behaviours.

This is why Jesus warned us that the last days will be like the days of Noah, whereby hearts were continually doing wickedly.. How is that possible? When good is redefined as "hate/evil" and evil is redefined as "love/good". Those kids yelling "I hate you" to their parents, and the parents yelling "I hate you" right back, is only indicative of hearts completely grown cold because they've accepted a faulty definition of love and hate.

reply to post by Kandinsky

The use of the word retarded slung as an insult bugs the hell out of me as well. It might be because I have a cuz with down syndrome. I have caught myself doing it a time or two though. I always feel bad, because if I am angry enough to forget myself and call someone retarded as an insult, it is probably insulting to retarded people to be lumped in with them

reply to post by WhoKnows100


I have to say that I disagree with the christian slant brought up here, but I do however respect your opinion and thoughts, and also thank you for your contribution. If you wish to understand fully one of the many reasons I don't have much love for christians, and such, you can look up what they did to the native canadians(my ancestors). They did a whole lot of really horrible things. I also have much experience in my own lifetime with born again christians, where the whole church is a bunch of hateful, racist hypocrites. Unfortunately, some of them are also in my extended family.

reply to post by TKDRL


I know precisely what you mean TKDRL. However, when I was growing up, hearing a child tell thier parent that they hated them was nothing exactly unusual (I am twenty eight). Where I grew up, thug kids would pelt myself and my mother with small stones from the other side of the street when I was on my way to school, spit on people, casual violence amongst themselves and toward others was not unusual. This was not an environment in which I felt comfortable. I learned every swear word I ever heard at primary school, between the ages of five and eleven years of age.

I never used them outside of school though, because I had to make a clear line in the sand between what happened at school, and my life with my family at home. When I went to senior/secondary school, the levels of cursing and violence were greater, in both volume and severity. These things changed me. I was not, when a very young boy, a violent person given to rage or easily pressed into poor manners. By the time I left institutional education however, I had learned how to counter violence with greater violence, and how to cut a detractor off at the knees with a vile turn of phrase. I had to learn these things, because otherwise, I would have been little more than a smear up the walls of my high school, and that is no manner of embelishment. It was a dangerous place.

Bad language has entered my lexicon, my internal thesaurus via that insiduous method. I have learned control over my tongue, and my fists, tools I had used to defend myself back in the day, and can communicate without bad language and poor manners. However, I understand more about my history and the history of historical figures and social groups which I respect, and many of those had foul mouths! And you know, although I learned those words in harrowing circumstances, they are now as much a part of me as are the greys in my hair, the beard on my face. If they are scars from a past lived hard, then like all such scars, I like to wear them where they can be seen, because above all other concerns, this is the honest way to live in my opinion.

Words like hate are tame, and have been since I was a child, certainly locally. That said, it must be recognised that some of the people I grew up with were doing narcotics by age ten, and had comitted serious assaults on people, myself included, that were called bullying but actually would have gotten them fairly hefty jail terms, had they committed them when they were adults. I suppose these things boil down to where one grows up, as to how impactful these differences are between the way things were, and the way they are now.

reply to post by TKDRL



Also, I am sorry you have had that sort of expirience with Christians TKDRL. We arent all jackbooted, genocidal maniacs. Some of us, still remember how to love people.

reply to post by TrueBrit


I know what you mean. In 8th grade I rained a world of pain onto some bullies, and it went all downhill from there. Funny, at the time I thought it was uphill, hindsight is 20x20. I got heavily involved with the "cool kid" culture once I hit high school. In 9th grade, I still had enough respect to keep my BS out of my house though, until I got expelled at least. After that I went "full retard" and never really stopped until I hit a crossroad in my early 20's and pulled a complete 180. I still try not to swear too much around the females in my family, but coming from a total lower middle class working family, swearing is like part of the language when it is just us men. It's swearing, but not like swearing at someone, you know? Dropping the F bomb after I shot my hand with a framing gun, is different than telling someone they are an effin ahole

reply to post by TKDRL


I think involuntary verbal responses to pain sensations are automatically ignored as totaly outside of ones control. That said, sometimes you have to call a spade a spade. I mean, lets face it, although there are other ways to say it, I do not believe that a phrase like "copulating sphincter" has quite the impact of its x-rated counterpart.

The word 'extreme' or 'extremist' is also annoying!

The control of 'language' and the labelling of phrases, words, etc as 'wrong' ''bad' etc is beyond Political Correctness.

In the modern world, Truth is labelled Lie, and Lie is labelled Truth. Anything that challenges the Politically Approved opinion is an 'extremist view' or 'extreme language'!

Language is being used to control people and people are allowing it because of their lack of understanding of the power of language.

However, speech and language ARE the very safety valves of a Free Society.

Take away Free Speech and Free Language you have have a Pressure Cooker society with no safety valve.

You might not like it and you might no enjoy it when someone 'lets of a little steam' but are you sure you prefer the alternative?

reply to post by TrueBrit


Hahaha, I bet it would cause a whole lot of confusion, most people would simply have no idea what you just called them

reply to post by Elliot


Let me see if I can explain it right...... Take the word hate. It is watered down to be used willy nilly, equated with annoyance really. Until someone with an agenda comes across your words, and wishes to use them against you. Someone is constantly saying hate, then says something like "I hate those mexicans", in the same casual way they say they hate cabbage. Someone takes those words, and twists the meaning back to the old use of hate, all of a sudden you must be a serious racist.

reply to post by TKDRL


You know, that aggravates me more than it should, the idea that because I have made the effort to precisely formulate my opinion, and deliver it in the finest possible language, it is likely to dissapear over the head of the target, like a well struck cricket ball. On the other hand, it is quite ammusing that some people havent the wit to recognise when they are being pwned like a boss.

reply to post by TrueBrit


Yep, it's pretty crazy. I have to type things at about a 5th grade vocabulary level when I post stuff on facebook. And it isn't for the kids on my list, it's for their parents. The kids are all pretty smart, most adults just don't seem to have the interest in reading and writing. I have been reading adult novels since fourth grade, and never stopped. The PA part of my family, I don't know what the hell they are trying to type most of the time, it sure as hell isn't english

I recently copy pasted someones sig here so I could text it to a friend of mine, its no longer copied, I tried... But it went something like this: It is no indication of health to be well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society.

I kind of thought that might apply here, though I'm sure most of you have seen this already.

Oh wait, I mean: Hey! Don't you try to tell me how to talk! You're a terrorist because you hate freedom, of speech! I hate you!! I totally agree with you about the hero thing though... People waaaaay exaggerate when they use that word. Just the other day I ordered a hero sandwich, it was barely 2 feet long! I said "C'mon!! THIS ain't no Hero!! I Hate you!!1!eleven!!" And walked out.

I was going to post about how language shapes our thought and perceptions of reality but I see someone already did.

OP: Great post, I totally agree with all your points.

But I think there might be something kind of subtle that is getting missed here. Consider this:

In most languages, there are words that are from, or stem from, other languages. Obviously English is a major example of this, but even other languages have that.

I am told that in German, new words have often been formed when the need arose, and that they were hilariously long and practical, in that Round Thing Which Sits Behind The Square Thing And Is Used For X (all one word) sort of way. I don't speak German so I don't know. Mark Twain has a very funny essay on trying to learn German I might add.

In today's world, we have a constant need for new words such as in the technology (and techno-biology) sector. When this happens, usually the people involved with that development simply come up with a word, that gets published, and we use it from then on.

Existing words in any language are often used for multiple things which have barely anything to do with one another.

Now in some fields, such as metaphysics and I'm referring here to discussion areas with say, chakras and psi as topics, one of the most common problems is that they seriously lack language. What language does exist, is barely and even horribly suited for the task at hand. One is stuck either using a word which carries so much baggage and other-meaning that it's worse than wrong, or using a word which is intentionally wrong but differently-used for the application, or greatly stretching the possible meaning of an existing word. Or, the only language is in some ancient language, which is (a) not spoken by the user so when used, usually wrongly anyway, and (b) often suffered exactly the problems we have now (paragraph below), but we don't really grok that here in the future.

Language exists to communicate about a "shared experience" reality: when you have an experience nobody else has shared, there is no language, no words, that you can use to describe what you truly experienced, because there is no meeting in the middle between you. For example, I could tell you that when something is perceived via the ajna chakra, you get "perceptual effects" such as "bluer than blue" but that is a lousy way to describe it, because from a logical, shared-experience language, nobody else is going to understand that; in fact nearly all misuse of words to describe something which has no words, result in "logical" contradictions on several levels. Of course, people who have had such an experience will immediately recognize it, even with those wrong words. Then others come into some discussion and the think everyone is talking complete nonsense, it doesn't even make sense. That is because the words are being used differently and the shared-experience element is a requirement for understanding their 'new' meaning.

OK now I'm finally getting to the point, all that was prep.

In our culture in the last century we have had so much change that it's mind boggling to consider. And part of this change includes a huge number of more subtle experiences, individually and as interaction with those around us, which do not have existing words. Our culture as a whole is getting phenomenally more complex and the subtleties invoked are exponential.

Imagine trying to explain to someone what a 'meme' was a couple centuries ago. Or de-explain what you really mean by something going viral.

Meanwhile, changes in culture and technology have led us -- hilariously -- back to where we began in places. For example: in the old days, they thought if you got the flu, you were infested by demons, and they bled you. Now, with the 'enlightenment' of science, we know that it's all about molecules and that molecules are in fact a sort of biological self-contained information unit. You could fairly say that a virus is a message inside a messenger. The word daemon originally meant messenger, right? So... we are still infested by demons when we get the flu. Except now we have a radically different understanding of it. And one reason we don't use those words anymore is because now many of them have "baggage." It doesn't mean 'messenger' anymore, or even 'that thing everyone knows about but only some people encounter usually in the night,' but rather 'that silly idea religious nuts rave on about.' The literal meaning of the words didn't change, but the baggage 'context' of how they're interpreted did. Trivia: in metaphysics, it's said we "catch an idea" not a cold, which is true in the above sense, though perhaps incomplete for explanation.

I think the problem is we are not inventing enough words to cover subtle cultural changes in experience. So people are re-using, wrongly-using, stretching, substituting, words because they lack what they need.

How did they invent such words way back when? Why don't we now?

reply to post by TKDRL


Hi there.

I completely agree. One word that is overused in my opinion is the simple word "love".

It seems the more its used, its value lessens.

I love pizza. I love beer. I love watching football... etc.

Is it the same when you say that you love someone, despite freely saying how much you love cookies?

I know that the context of the conversation needs to be taken into account and how the word is said, but to me, if you reserve those key words, for those key moments, they have more meaning.

Its also the same with swear words. When I'm out with friends, we casually swear in our conversations (Holy moly!! I have no manners!!!) and this has slowly worked its way into conversations with others. The odd swear word slipped into a sentance now seems to be the norm.

Whether its justified as banter, explaining how bad/good your day was etc.

eee.

How else to say how much you (love, adore) pizza? Here is a good example of where we lack a word.

I try to tell my 17 year old that epithets are uncreative and do not need to be inserted into every sentence, but so far I am not winning that battle.

Also, english really sucks for much of what I often want to say but this area is one: it has almost no neutrals.

For example if I say, "I don't really like it/him," it is not interpreted to mean, "I have no positive emotion toward it/him," it is interpreted to mean, "I have no positive emotion because I have a negative one."

There's also no word for neutral genders when referring to living things. When it is not a he, or a she (and btw there are a few genders other than this and we lack words for those too), one ends up saying "they" but that isn't correct either.

reply to post by RedCairo


Yep!

There are a few missing words.

I rememmber when I was in school, we where told to try and not use the word "like".

Although, I just said that I hate the over use of the word love, saying I like pizza is good enougth for me. Or I enjoy pizza. Pizza is fabulous. Maen Pizza am Pendigedeg!!(Pizza is Fantastic - In Welsh)

Also, concerning the neutral genders thing, id try and address the person by name.. which I kinda learnt from work.

I work in maintenence and had to attend a property. A man answered by sticking his head out of a window and shouting "I'll let you in when I'm dressesed". Anyway, when he opened the door he was wearing a dress. My paper work stated a Miss something as being the tenant. So I generalised and said, are you the tenant of this address to try save making an idiot of my self. And the tenant introduced himself as Miss.

Its a situation where you can't really, or don't really know what to say.

Anyway, language is ever evolving and new words are added to the dictionarys as they become popular.

eee.

It's the nature of language. It's fluid rather than static, it will always morph over time. All it takes to prove that is to examine examples of Old English against modern English. Keeping that in mind, it's only logical that some words would gain alternate meanings over time, or an entirely new one. I think a your example words (especially hate) are in that transitional phase, where they are no longer as strongly connected to the meaning you associate it with, but are gaining other negative associations to varying degrees. English is not exactly the most literal language on the planet, it's to be expected that our words can and will have multiple meanings and that it takes an understanding of the language & cultures that speak it to understand the context of the uses. I can say that I hate oppressive ideals, and mean it true to the word. I can also say that I hate Brussels sprouts and mean it in an equally true fashion. The overall context is to denote a very strong dislike of something, the degree of which can vary.

Words like "terrorism" or "extremist" aren't really all that that different to me compared to prior years. By that, I mean in the general populace's lexicon. They do have political leanings now, however. Had we not been bombarded for over a decade with political justifications for applying them to everything under the sun that might be construed as maybe, possibly, slightly anti-American, they would still have the meaning they did all those years ago. I wouldn't call that a cultural change of the definition, but a politically motivated manipulation from the government.

As for swears/curses/cussing, well, I do find them to be very useful. To me, they are the best possible words for expressing emotion unquestioningly in conversation. I know everyone has differing standards for using swears in conversations, but I do find it fairly easy to discern what emotion in being conveyed by the rest of the sentence.

reply to post by TKDRL


First things first. I am quite drunken at this point in proceedings.

Next, I have to point out, that the only way to improve the general reading level of the populus, is to post at your highest level of comprehension. No one learns anything by reading words that they are totally familiar with. Parents of children ought to have more understanding and basic grammatical skill than thier offspring. If they do not, then the fact of the matter is, that something drastic, and deeply troubling has happened to our species. Yes, I learned all the swears under the sun at school, but my reputation as the walking thesaurus (back in the day, when I was at school) was earned due to the input of my mother, and by way of masses of bible study, as well as vast accumulation of grammar and spelling from reading huge volumes of hard sci-fi, the bible, and indeed reading the Oxford dictionary from end to end, for fun.

Nothing can be gained on the species wide scale, by dumbing down. If your facebook pals are intellectual non-entities, then do what you can for them, by posting at your highest reading and writing grade. Make the suckers think for the love of all thats good, and improve things with your every post. TKDRL, I respect the crap out of you, your contributions to this site ought to be a segment of legend, but for Gods sake, either let them understand or perish on thier own merits, I beg of you.

Generic response I give to people in game chats: Words are merely symbols that represent concepts. So long as the concept is understood, the details don't matter.

Now as for profanity, that's a fine example of the changes in "meanings" of words. As I understand it, profanity is used to convey a strong sense of emotion to something. Often this is associated with something taboo. Why things are taboo is a bit more than I care to type right now. But the idea is that using a taboo reference will show someone there is strong emotion associated with that word or phrase.

Then we add in the natural defiance shown by teenagers and many adults. Often open defiance of society is merely an attempt to create the illusion of self worth. If one cannot define themselves within society, they will define themselves by being outside of it. Instead of fame, they seek infamy. In that attempt they often choose to over-use profanity. In their own circles this continues until those words lose all meaning due to familiarity. The comedy bit by the late Bernie Mac is a good example. This in turn leads to them finding more extreme and vulgar references to use on each other that also become so common that they too lose meaning. Then those people attempt to use their common language spoken within their circles in "normal" society and are shocked that people are affected by what they consider "only words". 4chan is a fine example of this concept spiraled out of control.

One problem is that they consider themselves enlightened by rising above mere words affecting them, but they've also lost a very important part of "normal" communication. They can no longer easily convey strong emotion through words. So in an attempt to be "better" than others, they have instead limited themselves and have to work harder to communicate strong emotion.

Society, in attempting to encourage "freedom of speech" and emotional coddling has created the current problem with people turning from seeking fame, or at least a pecking order of sorts, to seeking infamy to set them apart from being "just as good as everyone else".