{"id":25969,"date":"2020-07-13T03:19:00","date_gmt":"2020-07-13T00:19:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/the-speech-police-go-after-the-peanut-gallery\/"},"modified":"2020-07-13T03:19:00","modified_gmt":"2020-07-13T00:19:00","slug":"the-speech-police-go-after-the-peanut-gallery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/the-speech-police-go-after-the-peanut-gallery\/","title":{"rendered":"#The speech police go after the peanut gallery"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#The speech police go after the peanut gallery<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n Recently, I came across a piece in The Philadelphia Inquirer that laid out four racist words and phrases that should be banished from the English language. It began like this: \u201cEditor\u2019s note \u2014 Please be aware offensive terms are repeated here solely for the purpose of identifying and analyzing them honestly. These terms may upset some readers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Steel yourself, brave reader: These were such terms as \u201cpeanut gallery\u201d and \u201ceenie meenie miney moe.\u201d<\/p>\n

The same grammarian who authored the piece had previously confronted the \u201cdeeply racist connotation\u201d of the word \u201cthug,\u201d noting that President Trump \u201cwasn\u2019t the least bit bashful\u201d when calling Minneapolis rioters \u201cthugs\u201d in a tweet, despite the word\u2019s bigoted history. In 2015, President Barack Obama referred to Baltimore rioters as \u201cthugs,\u201d as well. He likely did so because \u201cthug\u201d is a good way to describe rioters.<\/p>\n

Attempting to dictate what words we use is another way to exert power over how we think. Few people, rightly, would have a problem with referring to the Charlottesville Nazis as \u201cthugs.\u201d Only the \u201cprotester\u201d who tears down a Ulysses S. Grant statue or participates in an antifa riot is spared the indignity of being properly defined.<\/p>\n

The recent assaults on the English language have consisted largely of euphemisms and pseudoscientific gibberish meant to obscure objective truths \u2014 \u201ccisgender,\u201d \u201cheteronormativity\u201d and so on. Now, we\u2019re at the stage of the revolution where completely inoffensive and serviceable words are branded problematic.<\/p>\n

CNN, for instance, recently pulled together its own list of words and phrases that have helped bolster systemic racism. Unsuspecting citizens, the piece explains, may not even be aware they are engaging in this linguistic bigotry, because most words are \u201cso entrenched that Americans don\u2019t think twice about using them. But some of these terms are directly rooted in the nation\u2019s history with chattel slavery. Others now evoke racist notions about black people.\u201d<\/p>\n

CNN tells us the term \u201cpeanut gallery\u201d is racist because it harkens back to the days when poor and black Americans were relegated to back sections of theaters. Now, I hate to be pedantic, but \u201cpeanut gallery\u201d isn\u2019t \u201cdirectly rooted\u201d in \u201cchattel slavery.\u201d As CNN\u2019s own story points out, the cliche wasn\u2019t used until after the Civil War. For that matter, few of the words and phrases that CNN alleges are problematic are rooted, even in the most tenuous sense, in the transatlantic slave trade.<\/p>\n

Not even the word \u201cslavery,\u201d which is a concept as old as humankind, is in any way uniquely American. Yet, last week, Twitter<\/a> announced that it was dropping \u201cmaster\u201d and \u201cslave\u201d from its coding, to create a \u201cmore inclusive programming language.\u201d Only in this stifling intellectual environment is striking commonly used words considered \u201cinclusive.\u201d Other tech companies are following suit.<\/p>\n

We should feel no guilt using the word \u201cmaster.\u201d Her performance was masterful. She mastered her instrument. The score was a masterpiece. Even CNN concedes that \u201cwhile it\u2019s unclear whether the term is rooted in American slavery on plantations, it evokes that history.\u201d<\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t unclear, at all. The etymology of the word \u201cmaster\u201d is from the Old English and rooted in the Latin magister, which means \u201cchief, director, teacher, or boss.\u201d \u201cMaster\u2019s\u201d degrees were first given to university teachers in the 14th century in Europe.<\/p>\n

Until a few months ago, the \u201cmaster bedroom\u201d evoked visions of the larger bedrooms, and the Masters Tournament evoked images of golfing legends like Tiger Woods, winner of four titles. Simply because the Nazis used the word \u201cmaster\u201d in their pseudoscientific racial theories doesn\u2019t mean I am offended by the postmaster general<\/a>. We\u2019re grown-ups here.<\/p>\n

Or we used to be.<\/p>\n

Honestly, I\u2019m disapp<\/a>ointed that CNN missed the commonly used \u201cblackmail\u201d \u2014 a word that appears in 439 stories on their Web site. The phrase was first used to describe protection money extracted by mid-16th-century Scottish chieftains. Maybe Scots should be offended.<\/p>\n

In and of itself, depriving Americans of \u201ceenie meenie miney moe\u201d \u2014 a phrase with an opaque and complicated history \u2014 isn\u2019t going to hurt anyone. But allowing ideological grievance-mongers to decide what words we\u2019re allowed to use, well, no can do.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf thoughts can corrupt language, language can also corrupt thoughts,\u201d Orwell famously wrote. Every time some new correct-speak emerges, CNN and all the media will participate in browbeating us into subservience. Progressive pundits will laugh off concerns about the Orwellian slippery slope.<\/p>\n

If we allow the seemingly innocuous attempts to control words and thoughts go uncontested, more-nefarious control will be a lot easier in the future.<\/p>\n

Twitter: @DavidHarsanyi<\/em>\n <\/div>\n

\n

If you want to read more Opinion News<\/a> articles, you can visit our General category.<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

if you want to watch Movies<\/a> or Tv Shows go to Dizi.BuradaBiliyorum.Com<\/a> <\/span> for forums sites go to Forum.BuradaBiliyorum.Com<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“#The speech police go after the peanut gallery” Recently, I came across a piece in The Philadelphia Inquirer that laid out four racist words and phrases that should be banished from the English language. It began like this: \u201cEditor\u2019s note \u2014 Please be aware offensive terms are repeated here solely for the purpose of identifying…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25970,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[37624],"class_list":["post-25969","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-the-speech-police-go-after-the-peanut-gallery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25969"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25969\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25970"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}