it's really weird how in a sub about books, people are equating this to 1984 and it saddens me that people don't know (don't seem to want to?) how to critically read a source. Despite the incendiary tactics of the article, this IS NOT 1984 for many many reasons.

The only time I remember the country being united was one of the worst days in our history. Isn't that the saddest thing ever????

So you think a style guide to writing and using language that is preferred by some groups, is equal to the structural hegemonic oppression of by a fascist surveillance state? I think you missed some of the points of the book. Ever read Gramsci?

You really missed the point of that book

Apparently... a style guide = BAN, OPPRESSION, PC CULTURE, WOKENESS ...

100% agree with this. I read it in full and I was confused by that excerpt he rewrote. It encapsulates the whole spirit of the article: "being purposively obtuse about language change".

It just reeks of right wing propaganda, because I have read several fiction books recently with topics that have content warnings and more equity language and the impact of the horrible actions is not lessened by the language use, because the authors are good writers and not relying their plot on lazy stereotypes/language.

These style guides appear to be written by people who eschew etymology, and may have read some George Lakoff without comprehension. While we should absolutely reflect on the metaphors and power dynamics intrinsic to our vocabulary, if we can no longer use "stand together" or decry "blind avarice" because not everyone has working legs and eyes... we may as well give up and go back to pointing and grunting.

People shifting all the blame on men.

Which is funny, because people will blame everything on how women are socialized to be different from men. Well who does all the child rearing? Apparently women. So Women, more than men, are socializing men and women to be different way more.

So how is it that toxic traits arise from socializing, and aren't women's fault? Are we finally ready to admit that men and women are different, and it's not from socializing?

Toxic femininity is the MRA way of saying internalized misogyny — women slut shaming each other or being classist, ableist, or racist, etc. But the worst offenders are TERFs, SWERFs, and tradwives — and before someone jumps down my throat about the tradwive thing:

1. There’s a difference between a SAHM, homemaker, and tradwife

2. The tradwife ideology was originally popularized by white supremacists. Google it.

3. If you don’t believe in the TERF to Nazi pipeline, you may wanna go take a look at J.K. Rowling’s twitter account. Or google the names of any diverse character in Harry Potter — IE the only Irish kid is only good at blowing things up (that’s a reference to the IRA) and the one major Black character is named Kingsley Shacklebolt which translates to, “King of the jail,” or “King of shackles.” Again, google it.

played out

people think that some words, including the words kill, suicide, murder, etc make them get hidden in the algorithm

there's also other common ones like sex being s3x or seggs, for the same reason

I don't know if anyone actually knows it those words hurt your discoverability or if it was just a hoax and people follow it because the algorithm is our almighty lord and we must follow its commands or else we will be forsaken by its light.

“person of straw composition”

"Strawman" is offensive to scarecrows

So, someone talking about which words they prefer to use now equals "BANNING WORDS"?

Maybe go to a doctor if words cause physical distress. Also do you know why that language evolved on tiktok?

You wanna define that phrase?

Ever read 1984 by George Orwell?

Reclaiming words back is what is needed. Black people did that with the N-Word, for example, so it can be done.

It's just that we're all so damn passive and apathetic that it takes a long time to even notice that the angry and the motivated with agendas have reworked words in a negative manner that we suddenly go "wait, now I don't want the language to evolve!" which it inevitably does and you can't stop it. But, you CAN become more aware of how language is evolving and adopt and evolve yourself.

Having guides like this helps us to evolve into people who are concerned with equity and inclusion instead of mean-spirited bullies treating people poorly who have already been treated poorly so we don't have to change.

Ignorance and ego are the primary problems of human life, and they always have been. Combined, they form a conservative impulse that doesn't help anyone and is too easily manipulated by those same people with negative agendas.

It's sad that a move toward compassionate inclusive language results in a conservative anti-change approach that is based on a fearful thought too often based, sadly, on a projection of one's own outlook.

But it IS true that language is the first principle from which archetypes and mythology are created, and those who seek to stifle change so they don't have to feel uncomfortable are always engaged in a kind of warfare because fear cannot see outside the framework it has constructed for itself.

The War On Sensemaking has gone too far, now. Being sensitive, open, AND strong is all possible when you live with integrity instead of fear. Indeed, it is us who are inclusive you will turn to in order to alleviate your pervasive and intrusive fear, once you grow a little.

Claiming morality when speaking immorality is a good way to hide your weasel words, but won't fool everyone, unless that group is trained to only ever extract an anecdote from a story, and reduce all discourse to such bad faith tactics.

In a story, things have an arc, and they don't always end up where you think, and too often we consider writing and discourse now to be merely a large collection of anecdotes, and refuse to be changed by anything; which is, again the conservative impulse.

Guerilla marketing tactic

Yo nice comment

I'm 40 and can't think of a single national conversation that I would describe as honest or good faith.

Someone posted an archive link below and they argue instead that so called forced inclusive language is bad because it doesn't help anyone, a prisoner suffers no matter what you call them, and people are reactionary, citing the extremely mixed acceptance of latinx and similar terms among Spanish speaking groups. Nothing really about the euphemism treadmill.

I don't know. I was skimming shortly into it, but it seemed like a lot of words to say, "I'm upset that some people get upset about language and are FORCING others to accept their language by... writing guidelines." Like, I get the whole toxic positivity argument. I agree with him on the notion that "saying X is blind to Y is insensitive to actual blind people" is one that I don't particularly care for. Not because I want to be a dick to blind people, but because the meaning isn't pointing out a deficiency in blind people. It's used in a sense of being the opposite of seeing something. I digress.

My big issue is that in order to engage with his argument I first have to accept that this is a widespread and pervasive problem in the first place and, honestly, I don't think it is. Conservatives have been complaining about PC language basically since they coined the term and probably before that as well. He seems to have an allergy to engaging with any of the actual arguments though. For example, I don't remember him mentioning this part about prisoners: The point of naming prisoners with person first language isn't to lessen their suffering, as if anyone advocating for it thought the change would do that; it's to humanize them to hopefully get others to empathize with them and support reform that would hopefully benefit people in prison and the general public. Turns out, a lot of people equate "prisoners" with "criminals" and those are loaded words. They make people more likely to view them as an other by discounting their personhood. By providing his strawman "calling them a person in an incarcerated facility doesn't lessen their suffering" argument in place of an actual advocate position, he shows that he only wants to argue with the blanket concept and not engage with why some groups advocate for these changes.

He also rewrote part of a 2012 non-fiction piece with what he imagines the inclusive version would look like and it's very clunky and uses more words you see. So in this imaginary world where he was forced to rewrite it, the prose is not as brief or elegant because he was forced to reword "...had Hindu parents" as "...whose parents were of Hindu descent..." CheckMATE, language police!

What's his evidence besides? Who's rounding up writers and speakers, throwing them into the vocabu-gulags? Style guides and guidelines. Guides that, by and large, say something about how some people are sensitive to certain language and to be mindful of that.

So he's an asshole ranting about inclusive language but doing it in a way that's slightly more intellectual than your standard 14 year old on the Internet by dressing it up with contemporary references and about 3000 words too many.¹ However he's still forgotten to include any actual opposing positions, instead substituting his own easier to counter arguments. If only there was a word for that.

¹ I'm not word counting it.

Imagine a marketing campaign that gets everyone talking about your product, engaged with it on an emotional level, gets airtime even on strict non-advertisers like the BBC, and it does not cost you a penny in advertisement costs.

I would attribute this partly to a rise in toxic femininity and the tendency to infantilize adults.

Mini-Truth anyone?

Double Plus un-Good.