Euphemisms Schmeuphemisms

No one has been fired from a job in years. Nowadays, corporations right size their workforce by downsizing and RIFing (Reduction In Force) and even unassigning their workers.

Crabby Old Lady thinks it is bad enough to be out of a job without some misguided human resources (that means “personnel” these days) person thinking it is less painful by another name. And let’s get this straight: Crabby is unemployed, not displaced.

Regular readers already know of Crabby’s personal campaign for the acceptance of the word “old” instead of such cutesy replacements as golden-ager and third-ager, and she’s not too fond of senior citizen either though she grudgingly accepts senior. But these circumlocutions – call them euphemisms, political correctness or more sinisterly, Newspeak - are more widespread than in Crabby’s little blog world of aging.

Workers are no longer employees, they are associates, particularly when referring to lower-level jobs; the man or woman selling something in a store is now a sales associate, unless they are behind the counter at Starbucks and then they are partners. Janitors are building engineers and secretaries are administrative assistants, frequently shortened to admins which has become more demeaning than secretary ever was.

The vocabulary of the workplace has passed Crabby by. At her last place of employment, a vice president took her aside to explain that the words challenge or issue should be used in place of problem. Crabby still believes, however, when the website servers go down or revenue has dropped, it’s a problem. Challenges are met and issues are discussed, but problems can be solved.

The problem with euphemisms, whether politically correct or otherwise, is that they are misleading. They obscure meaning, are a form if disinformation and those who wield them want others to believe something that is not true. Here are some of the more common euphemisms in use today:

The U.S. Department of Defense was, until after World War II, the Department of War, a more precise description.

Collateral damage obscures its real meaning: civilian casualties – that is, dead people.

Ethnic cleansing is no less than genocide.

There has been a, thankfully, not-too-successful movement afoot to use homicide bombers in place of suicide bombers. In that way, readers are less inclined to think about someone who so believes in a cause, he or she is willing to die for it.

And make no mistake, Patriot and Peacekeeper missiles rain down death and destruction.

When a real-estate agent tells you a house is a fixer-upper, run for life. It is a money pit.

Pre-owned vehicles are used. Someone else owned them before you did.

Gaming has overtaken gambling, the better for states to promote acceptance of their lotteries, slot machines and casinos.

Shrinkage, in the new language of retail, is shoplifting.

Not so long ago, undocumented workers were called illegal aliens. Whether you believe they should be deported or not, the new phrase papers over their real status.

Substance abusers is the current polite description of drug addicts, though smokers are allowed now to be called nicotine addicts.

Mobile homes, if you have forgotten, were once trailers though neither has ever been easily movable.

The rainforest, when Crabby was kid, was the jungle. Where, she wonders, does George live now?

It is politically incorrect these days to call the underprivileged poor, but how much easier it is to ignore them with their new academic designation.

The differently abled, visually impaired and hearing challenged used to be crippled, blind and deaf, though you will be shunned today to use those politically-incorrect correct descriptions.

The pro-life folks seem to have a slight, semantic edge on pro-choice advocates, but it would be more honest to use anti- and pro-abortion. If you listen carefully next time the subject comes up on CBS News, you will see they have taken a different approach from most news organizations in referencing the opposing sides: abortion rights and anti-abortion rights.

Some of the above are amusingly transparent, but acceptance of the innocuous leads to confusion of the facts on important issues of public policy. Crabby considers political correct euphemisms to be nothing less than propaganda and those who insist upon them are seeking power over our thoughts.

George Orwell understood what happens to a society when the Thought Police take over.