The “Recession” Affair | Hacker News Reader

The “Recession” Affair

en.wikipedia.org

29 pointsakolbe11 comments

When politics starts changing words and definitions to manipulate people, sides or groups is when I stop participating. How can I participate in the process if I cant even communicate ideas because the meanings of the words are changing to fit one side or another.

Simple, just redefine "participation" so you don't have to communicate. All you need to do is passively enjoy the continuing changes and comply with the unwritten, ever shifting rules to be a good "participant".

Besides, why would anything need your communication? It's not like you're a "stakeholder" is it?

When it comes to governance and politics, everyone is a stakeholder because we are all part of the same system

Can you please present evidence that a definition was changed?

This wikipedia infight on the recession page has nothing to do with redefining its meaning.

TFA is about evidence of efforts to change the definition of a word which is both prescriptive and descriptive. Please fulfill your own need for evidence without interjecting this where a valid conversation already exists.

Language is very powerful and if you can control the language you can control thought. Coherent deep thought may not even be possible without language, or at least not to most people. Governments always wanted to control language.

Here are a few changes I've noticed:

"pro life" vs "anti abortion rights" (adopted by NPR recently)

"woman" to include biological men

"quantitative easing" (us) vs "currency manipulation" (them)

"Illegal alien" vs "undocumented worker"

And let’s not forget the big one, “racism,” whose creeping semantic expansion by academics and Tumblr users has consumed and confused Americans since the Obama years.

plusungood bellyfeel

>How can I participate in the process...

My approach is to simply avoid the redefined/trigger words. I noticed that one of my favorite YouTubers always talked about "the current public health emergency" to route around triggers (and censorship)

The analogy I've used in the past is that there's a company, EvilMarketing.com, which makes up these terms as weapons in a culture war. A war designed to distract the majority of citizens while actions contrary to their interests are taken elsewhere.

Please also be aware of Emotive Conjugation[1], where words are chosen to push narratives.

  [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotive_conjugation

A recession was never 2 periods of GDP drop. It was taken in the context of everything. Also what's the point of the word if 2 slightly negative quarters don't impact much at all?

What's the point of the word? It's to define the state in a boolean or absolute sense regarding a qualitative measure. It's about like using the word "retarded" to describe someone whose development has been... slowed. Albeit technically accurate to a pedant, we use the term to mean something different & more precise.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com