from: Bloodstone43956@i-mail.irs
to: Raventrap39996@i-mail.irs
date: 7518.07686
My Dear Raventrap ~
After I sent my last I-mail, I thought of another angle on ways to distort communications. This technique works for any number of players, but is especially useful for turning political debate into an exercise in futility. It is, of course, the practice of re-defining terms. To quote one of the human demigods, Humpty Dumpty: “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean ~ neither more nor less.” If we can get our clients to adopt this ridiculous notion as a call to arms, the battle is ours. The practice of redefining words is particularly useful as a way to attack one’s opponents personally, to assassinate their character, so to speak, instead of engaging in useful dialog over issues that really matter.
For example, take the words “liberal” and “conservative.” Based on their dictionary definitions, offered in clear descriptive language, there is no need to get into a shouting contest about their meanings. Consider the following:
Liberal ~ One who favors proposals for reform or progress and is tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others. One who is open to new behavior, ideas, or opinions and is willing to discard traditional values; not being limited to or by established, traditional, orthodox, or authoritarian attitudes, views, or dogmas.
Conservative ~ One who favors or holds to traditional attitudes and values and is cautious about or tends to oppose change or innovation, typically in politics or religion. One who wishes to preserve tradition and social stability, stressing established institutions, and prefers gradual development to abrupt change.
There is little in these definitions to impel liberals and conservatives to battle for supremacy, let alone be at each other’s throats. Our mission is to change these definitions to make sure no agreement between the two will ever be found, to see to it that both parties, as individuals and groups, will be locked forever in a standoff, accomplishing nothing but the generation of fear, resentment, and animosity ~ a trifecta of wins for our side.
Now, Our Competitor intends both liberals and conservatives to have their say. In fact, he seems to think it’s a good idea for each human to adopt certain characteristics of each, just as His Son ~ “What’s His Name” ~ did.
Our Competitor’s Son was liberal when it came to encouraging His followers ~ always a nuisance to us ~ to find new ways of thinking and behaving whenever these ways would bring them closer to Our Competitor. But “What’s His Name” was conservative when he urged them to hold fast to whatever is “good.“ (I had to wretch a little as I wrote this.) According to Our Competitor, some old ways are meant to be discarded and some new ways are meant to be actively sought. The difficulty lies in understanding which is which. This is a grey area we can exploit, and an excellent place to start is revising the standard definitions of “liberal” and “conservative.” Here is what our Department of Destructive Definitions (DODD) has been able to come up with so far:
Liberal – one who is a collectivist, pacifist, communist, Marxist, globalist or socialist, believes in a “tax and spend” “big government” “nanny state” with “handouts” for those unwilling to work, believes in “baby-killing” abortion “on demand,” supports “death panels,” is either “Godless” or without morals, opposes business, gun rights, and the death penalty, wants “open borders,” is soft on crime, immigration, and terrorism, and is either a Muslim, a Jew, an evolutionist, or an atheist.
Conservative ~ one who is intolerant, greedy, obstructionist, racist, nationalist, or fascist, is either anti-science or anti-intellectual, is a “hawk” on war, proposes cutting social programs while coddling the rich and corporations, favors tax cuts for billionaires, opposes women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, and labor unions, supports the death penalty, is “pro-birth” and a “gun-nut,” believes if others are out-of-work, sick, or poor, it’s their own fault, and expects everybody to practice evangelical “fundamentalist” Christianity.
Do you see how the technique works? We’ve been able to conflate all sorts of labels and terms that are only tangentially related at most. We’ve also been able to incite our clients to accuse everyone in the other group of having the same values and beliefs. Using a well-known logical fallacy, we have been able to imply that agreement in any one area is the same as agreement in all areas. Basically, our definitions are variations on the old ad hominem attack strategy ~ if you can’t win by logic, attack your opponent’s character, values, and beliefs, using the most offensive emotionally-charged words and divisive over-the-top-generalizations possible. A bonus in this procedure is that each group will come to use the terms of our new definitions as insults, and there is no end to the fun of watching presumably “intelligent” beings hurl meaningless words at one another as if they actually meant something!
These “new” definitions can give us leverage in at least three important ways:
First, by characterizing each group as a vile opponent of the other, rather than merely representing a contrasting viewpoint to be considered, we can add fuel to the fire of discord ~ I won’t apologize for the pun ~ and make it very difficult for the two groups to find any common ground. In this connection, be sure to coach your clients to choose the most negative, emotionally-charged words to characterize their opponents while expecting their opponents to use more neutral, matter-of-fact words to characterize them. The hypocrisy of this technique is scrumptious.
Second, members of each group will feel compelled to become more reactionary ~ they might even become more like their new definition out of solidarity with other members of their group. So, even if either liberals or conservatives started out as moderate, or only nominally fitting the dictionary definition, over time they might come to fit our new definition. In short, they might actually come to believe they must “stand up” to the other side or “go down” in defeat.
Finally, even if a member of a particular group doesn’t happen to subscribe to all the terms of our definitions, he can still be accused of great evil in the eyes of his opponents. All it takes is one point of agreement and he will be regarded as “one of them.” Labels like these paint opponents with such a broad brush it’s well-nigh impossible to break free of them. Each group gets to feel superior, even as many members of each group feel unfairly accused ~ in a perfect storm of words. And as a bonus, anyone using our new definitions in an argument can change the meaning of his accusations at the drop of a hat, further confounding the entire exchange.
However, if members of these groups begin to realize our definitions are to put it bluntly, bullshit, the game is over for us. So, we must do everything in our power to keep our new divisive definitions out of their hands, even as we obliterate the plain old descriptive ones. Above all, we must not let our clients become aware Our Competitor wants them to hold some liberal and some conservative opinions, as well as think carefully about each of them, and to maintain civility and humility when discussing them with others. These are notions we simply can’t abide.
By distorting the meanings of common words such as these, we can stimulate a great deal of divisiveness and discord, indirectly promoting all sorts of malice, meanwhile preventing any changes for the better. Words are but one weapon in our arsenal, and they can be powerful indeed.
Your Devoted Cousin,
Bloodstone
MurrayWorks 