"Since you don’t know what Fascism is, how can you struggle against Fascism? One need not swallow such absurdities as this, but one ought to recognise that the present political chaos is connected with the decay of language, and that one can probably bring about some improvement by starting at the verbal end. If you simplify your English, you are freed from the worst follies of orthodoxy. You cannot speak any of the necessary dialects, and when you make a stupid remark its stupidity will be obvious, even to yourself. Political language — and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists — is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind. "
Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
Never use a long word where a short one will do.
If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
Never use the passive where you can use the active.
Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.
George Orwell: Politics and the English Language
If you’ve ever taken a look at the rhetoric surrounding the concept of a ‘just war’, you’ve seen that the jargon hides some barbaric concepts. Its second point flat out denies redress of grievance for wrongs committed by entrenched governments except, perhaps, through courts and other organizations also controlled by them.
The term ‘enemy combatant’ was coined expressly for the purpose of avoiding compliance with the Geneva conventions on war.
The Geneva Conventions govern the humane handling of prisoners of war. So the US put another label on them. Voila … no more Geneva Conventions of War.
That is the sort of ‘justice’ smaller entities can look forward to from larger ones. So pervasive is US influence that, while the whole world should be allied against it for such flagrant disregard for human rights and international law, it is nearly silent. There will be no ‘justice’ for those held at Guantanamo Bay.
Where peaceful and honorable co-existence is impossible, war is inevitable. Yet, by definition, only a ‘recognized’ entity can wage a ‘just war’.
What is a ‘peace maker’ or a ‘pre-emptive counterstrike’?
‘Peace makers’ are heavily armed forces sent into an area to bring the ‘peace’ that comes from killing, imprisoning or otherwise silencing what may, in fact, be legitimate opposition to an oppressive regime. If that oppressive regime will keep the oil flowing, the ‘peace maker’ will bring a rain of violence on its opponents. The challenge in Iraq is in finding a puppet government that will keep the oil flowing and thus avoid the charges of undeniable imperialism that will otherwise follow.
A counterstrike, by its very nature, is a reaction to an actual strike. It is not defensive, it is retaliatory. In the current war-dealing rhetoric the term ‘pre-emptive counterstrike’ has been invented to make one act of aggression sound like a response to another — which never actually occurred. Under the doctrines of ‘just war’ a strike is permitted whenever it seems likely, in the view of either side, that the other is preparing to launch an attack.
Given that satellites operated by the United States can spot even a very few individuals gathering together, the US can look forward to long guerilla wars from here on out.
You might want to look into the concept of ‘double speak’.
January 24, 2008
Bill Canaday at 10:30 pm ¤ Only one comment floating so far