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George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

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Re: George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

#301

Post by swayvil »

JohnFen wrote: post #266
swayvil wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get what you mean. But we also have this thing called Science. Where a firsthand encounter with nonlinguistic reality is considered key. And Science has proven its power over and over. And you'd think that would impress people. Even if you lay the forms and products of our modern scientific culture aside. Just that philosophy. The supremacy of observation. You'd think it would lead to a momentary pause in the babbl…

I don't think that what you're saying and what I'm saying are mutually exclusive at all. Science is how we tease out truths about reality. Language is about how we communicate and is closely linked with cognition.

I didn't mean to suggest that they are mutually exclusive. Just that this sphere of language definitely has a limit. (Which leads to various important stuff)

Re: George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

#302

Post by rglover »

nightfly wrote: post #299
rglover wrote: post #293

Just went on a rant about "impostor syndrome" the other day and how it's just cope-language for people who know deep down that they don't actually provide any value (and aren't terribly interested in learning how to do that). Another one is "adulting" which is literally just taking responsibility for one's own life/actions post-adolescence.

I think this is the first comment on here I've wanted to just say "fuck you" to. There are lots of reasons for people to feel insecure, and this type of attitude doesn't help

You've proven Carlin's point.

Re: George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

#303

Post by seabass-labrax »

rhuru wrote: post #197
mbb70 wrote: post #24

One I recently heard was "conducting a rif" == "conducting a reduction in force" == "firing people". Soft language is alway to the benefit of the speaker, to assuage guilt or obfuscate intent. It's always to the detriment of the listener.

Reduction is a negative word. Could trigger the snowflakes at your office. I think the correct term is "reassessment of human resources" or "restructuring", it is a bit like guy who steals your car at gunpoint in SF but is kind enough to ask you your preferred pronoun.

Perhaps taking your metaphor a bit too literally, but interesting nonetheless: I don't live in a country where guns are either legal or common, but from my understanding of de-escalation advice, polite and careful interactions with criminals are recommended. Engaging in calm dialogue supposedly reduces the chance that the criminal will get scared and pull the trigger, because most people would rather be in the dock for theft than murder, as well as murder having greater moral implications.

Re: George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

#304

Post by seabass-labrax »

filmor wrote: post #22
harryvederci wrote: post #3

My favourite one in Dutch: People with a disability used to be called "handicapped". At some point, that was no longer acceptable. The correct term to use became "invalid". So it was better to say "that person is invalid" than "that person is handicapped".

Invalid is derived from Latin with validus meaning "strong" or "in order". The German and Dutch uses of the word are derived directly from invalidus meaning ~"weak" (maybe via French), while the English word (as its mostly used) is an English(!) negation of "valid", which leans on the "in order" part to get to "inappropriate" or "not correct".

'Invalid' (a weak person) is also pronounced with an 'ə' (in-vuh-lid) in English, whereas 'Invalid' (a improper thing) is pronounced with an 'a' (in-va-lid).

Re: George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

#305

Post by xkcd-sucks »

JoshGG wrote: post #134
tptacek wrote: post #128

Just for fun, from the first example: * Toilet paper -> bathroom tissue --- sure, a softening of the language. * Sneakers -> running shoes --- not a softening; sneakers aren't the same as running shoes, and "sneaker" was a regionalism (it's "gym shoe" where I grew up). * False teeth -> dental appliance --- a softening, though a welcome one in this case. * Medicine -> medication --- a softening (a nominalization of a…

Thanks this is pretty interesting! Re: “car crash”, crash is the correct “real language”. The use of “accident” implies a lack of responsibility and that car crashes cannot be prevented or reduced. That isn’t true. Many studies show that crashes can be reduced via better engineering, road design, etc. Calling it an accident definitely seems like softening the language. https://dmv.vermont.gov/enforcement-and-safety/l…

This point is repeated frequently in context of vehicle crashes, but are not all "accidents" similarly avoidable?

Re: George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

#306

Post by imgabe »

dopidopHN wrote: post #261
imgabe wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They would have used any and every type of antibiotic or other technique that resulted in being able to make more food, because they probably had personal memories of loved ones starving to death when there wasn’t enough food. I know for a fact they would do this because it is in fact what they did.

Or; they would have space out the animals. Allowing them to shit not on themselves and the one next to their anus. And tadam. You don’t need antibiotics. It’s the filthy condition we produce our meat into that require that. And those technics are not mandatory to produce that much meat. This is needed to producing at a certain price, on a schedule. it’s not really about starving to death anymore. But rather cranking…

Producing food at the right price and on the right schedule is important. It is no good to produce food people can’t afford or that bankrupts the producer. It is no good to produce food only after people are starving and riots have broken out. What kind of profit margins do you imagine food producers are making? This is not Google where they sell little ads at a 30% margin. It’s a commodity business with a lot of competition.

Re: George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

#307

Post by DavidWoof »

tptacek wrote: post #128

Just for fun, from the first example: * Toilet paper -> bathroom tissue --- sure, a softening of the language. * Sneakers -> running shoes --- not a softening; sneakers aren't the same as running shoes, and "sneaker" was a regionalism (it's "gym shoe" where I grew up). * False teeth -> dental appliance --- a softening, though a welcome one in this case. * Medicine -> medication --- a softening (a nominalization of a…

> Car crash -> automobile accident --- a softening

It's not. Accident is actually the older term. Cars have had accidents since their inception. Using the "crash" sound to refer to the accident itself didn't catch on until the 1940s (might be a war thing, I'm not sure).

Re: George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

#308

Post by mcpackieh »

SenAnder wrote: post #216
lc9er wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's soft language for 'civilian casualties', even though it can include other things like property destruction.

Which term would you use to distinguish between deliberate and accidental civilian casualties?

The difference between deliberate and accidental civilian casualties is not clear cut. For instance, what do you call it when you intend to attack the enemies soldiers with a bunch of bombs but you know a certain percentage will fall on civilians and you accept that inevitability and proceed anyway? Is that deliberate? Not quite, because it wasn't your intention. Was it an accident? Not really, because you knew it was going to happen and did it anyway.

Or what do you call it when you are deliberately targeting some civilians (factory workers perhaps) but you know they share their homes with children? Do all of the civilians killed count as deliberate, or only some portion of them?

Also, how do you determine intent? Suppose the official paperwork says "we're going to target this residential neighborhood because they have military-relevant cottage industry blended in with the population", but the men actually carrying out these orders are saying and thinking "burn them all, this is payback." Do you go by the intents stated on official records, or do the intents and feelings not committed to official records change the matter? It's the kind of thing that ends up getting debated by historians for decades.

Re: George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

#309

Post by seabass-labrax »

theodric wrote: post #231
Waterluvian wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something I was rather ignorant to for the longest time was how fascism can exist at both ends of the spectrum. My last day on Mastodon was the day a few people ganged up on me quite aggressively for not putting Alt text in an image. Tolerance isn’t acceptance. It’s letting things you don’t like exist without making a big fuss over it. You can dislike certain speech patterns without having to go on a crusade against…

It turns out you can put whatever text you want in the alt text field and it won't get clocked by the scolds because they don't actually care enough to check. It's enough that it appears compliant in a surface-level audit. However, there is an issue suggesting adding an automated scold in the Mastodon client (and Megalodon already has such a scold, plus a (!) of shame on images without alt text) https://github.com/ma…

I don't have impaired vision, but I use alt-text to save bandwidth on metered internet connections. For instance, if there's alt-text that says "stock image of happy traveller", well, I can probably do without that until I get a better internet connection, whereas if it's "bus timetable for this stop", it might be worth me turning on images to see that despite the cost.

Re: George Carlin's "Soft Language" (2019)

#310

Post by mikrotikker »

jpcfl wrote: post #269
rhuru wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reduction is a negative word. Could trigger the snowflakes at your office. I think the correct term is "reassessment of human resources" or "restructuring", it is a bit like guy who steals your car at gunpoint in SF but is kind enough to ask you your preferred pronoun.

> steals I believe the correct term for this is "reallocation."

Or "reparations"
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