Posted on 07/31/2015 1:13:08 PM PDT by MinorityRepublican
4. Newspeak
Every society engages in euphemism and linguistic evolution, but is it used for good or ill? Confucius linked the misuse of vocabulary to the warfare and social breakdown of his day, and called for a "rectification of names".
In 1984, Orwell lays out in detail how language can be (mis)used to deceive and control the masses. In the real world today, political correctness and euphemism are both pervasive and pervasively derided.
George Carlin worked comedic wonders mocking our gutless linguistic evasions. But as funny as they are, they're not fictional: wealthy people are "job-creators"; when the government takes less money from people it's called a "tax expenditure" (if we don't make people perform community service, is that a work furlough?); and the massacre of 13 Army personnel by Maj. Nidal Hasan (while yelling "Allahu Akbar") is a case of "workplace violence."
If the fictional Orwellian Newspeak of 1984 makes us wince, how much more should the actual vocabulary of U.S. politics?
(Excerpt) Read more at mic.com ...
Our society is more like a blend of 1984 and Brave New World. We have some, but not all, elements of both of those systems.
THIS REALLY PISSES ME OFF. I have seen supposedly white collar, educated types doing this. It disgusts me.
Those who speak the truth are condemned or punished.
love the graphic
“During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.”
~~George Orwell
“It’s a beautiful thing, the Destruction of words. Of course the great wastage is in the verbs and adjectives, but there are hundreds of nouns that can be got rid of as well. It isn’t only the synonyms; there are also the antonyms. After all, what justification is there for a word, which is simply the opposite of some other word? A word contains its opposite in itself. Take ‘good,’ for instance. If you have a word like ‘good,’ what need is there for a word like ‘bad’? ‘Ungood’ will do just as well – better, because it’s an exact opposite, which the other is not. Or again, if you want a stronger version of ‘good,’ what sense is there in having a whole string of vague useless words like ‘excellent’ and ‘splendid’ and all the rest of them? ‘Plusgood’ covers the meaning or ‘doubleplusgood’ if you want something stronger still. Of course we use those forms already, but in the final version of Newspeak there’ll be nothing else. In the end the whole notion of goodness and badness will be covered by only six words – in reality, only one word. Don’t you see the beauty of that, Winston? It was B.B.’s idea originally, of course,” he added as an afterthought. (1.5.23, Syme)
By curtailing frivolous and “fighting” words, the Party seeks to narrow the range of thought altogether, such that eventually, thoughtcrime will be literally impossible.
“Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it. Every concept that can ever be needed will be expressed by exactly one word, with its meaning rigidly defined and all its subsidiary meanings rubbed out and forgotten.” (1.5.23, Syme)
By curtailing frivolous and “fighting” words, the Party seeks to narrow the range of thought altogether, such that eventually thoughtcrime will be literally impossible. The same goes for disruptive or subversive behavior.
“THIS REALLY PISSES ME OFF.”
The one that gets me is when people skip the middle syllable, such as di-ent (didn’t) shu-ent (shouldn’t). I hate that.
Don't forget "Atlas Shrugged".
The other was "Animal Farm."
She wants to be head pig and big brother rolled into one.
Can I axe u a question?
That one really grinds my gears.
Meh, I could never finish that book so I wouldn’t know. Kept putting me to sleep.
Would be a great catch phrase for an axe murderer though!
Just look at the illiteracy right here on this forum.
Then for than
Your for you're
Apostrophes at the end of every word that ends with the letter 's"
Americans are getting dumber and dumber.
Ditto. It drives me nuts. Being dumb is cool these days.
I HATE that! Or “ChilGREN” instead of “Children”.
“Oh no you di-ent!”
George Orwell’s 1984 was right on target...
One of Orwell’s most important messages in 1984 is that language is of central importance to human thought because it structures and limits the ideas that individuals are capable of formulating and expressing. If control of language were centralized in a political agency, Orwell proposes, such an agency could possibly alter the very structure of language to make it impossible to even conceive of disobedient or rebellious thoughts, because there would be no words with which to think them. This idea manifests itself in the language of Newspeak, which the Party has introduced to replace English. The Party is constantly refining and perfecting Newspeak, with the ultimate goal that no one will be capable of conceptualizing anything that might question the Party’s absolute power. The ever vigilant eyes of Big Brother are the Thought Police. The principles of doublethink. The best explanation of doublethink are examples provided by slogans. These are: WAR IS PEACE; SLAVERY IS FREEDOM; and IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.
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