Certain phrases and words in common use today contribute to widespread feelings of futility. It’s a despair we can’t afford. Here are three examples.
1. Chaos
When I think of chaos, I picture a herd of cattle in a stampede or refugees fleeing a city along a road to safety as troops push through in the opposite direction. Physicists talk about the chaos that followed the big bang before the basic elements got to work on making a foundation for matter. We might reasonably ask whether the chaos continues, considering that the word has become inseparable from the second Trump presidency.
But for those of us appalled by Trump’s policies and actions, “chaos” must be the most unhelpful of all possible characterizations. Chaos is too wild and crazy. When chaos reigns, we can only wait for its energy to deplete and die away.
The accepted definition of “chaos” is: “a state of utter confusion or disorder.” (Collins Dictionary.) But it has become an all-encompassing word for situations we dislike and don’t understand.
There are other words that might seem, at first glance, to have equally broad definitions, but that allow for the possibility of correction and reversal. Here are examples, each followed by a comment:
- Trump’s tariffs have created “uncertainty.”
“Uncertainty” can be overcome with clarity.
- Mass firings have led to institutional “destabilization.”
“Destabilization” can be corrected with strong and committed leadership.
- Loss of thousands of employees are bound to cause “disruption” in services.
Services can be restored after adequate hiring of qualified people resumes.
- The response of Democrats reflects a “lack of cohesion.”
Democrats can restore their discipline of recent years and organize their way back into cohesion.
- Shifting policies toward Canada and other countries result in “unpredictability.”
Unpredictable policies can be superseded by responsible planning.
We can feel a situation is chaotic. That’s an emotion, not a description, never mind a prescription. When we feel helpless, we panic. We must react to Trump’s actions and policies soberly, beginning by using more accurate words.
2. Who versus that?
Which sentence would you prefer?
People who live in cities.
Or
People that live in cities.
“Who” reinforces the statement’s feel of humanness, while “that” makes people abstract. Yet lately, whether in conversations or when reading, I’m hit with “people that.”
“People that” accommodates the Trumpian determination to make us think of government not as an organization of real people serving real people, but as a body of faceless bureaucrats who don’t matter and whose clients’ lives aren’t devastated when services are discontinued.
3. Fulsome
For one who grew up with “fulsome” meaning excessive and offensive, as in “fulsome praise,” it is frustrating to have it used as if it meant full or complete. Today, “fulsome praise” is likely to mean “complete praise,” when the word once conveyed contempt.
I’m on thin ice here because it turns out “fulsome” meant “abundant” as far back as the thirteen century. This is where those of us who feel we’re arguing for accuracy risk actually complaining about how words change meaning over time. Yet the definition “insincere” is so much more compelling than the pedestrian “complete.” Think of Trump’s public meetings with cabinet members and foreign dignitaries and the admiration they are forced to feign.
Actions may speak louder than words, but words make actions feasible. The more our words magnify our sense of helplessness, the more harm a would-be autocrat can inflict. The more impersonal the language we use, the less power we feel we have. The blander the definitions we choose, the more corruption feels like an abstraction.
Notes
Some of the examples in this post emerged from my conversations with Perplexity.AI. Now, a fellow language and grammar obsessive could accuse me of mayhem. How could I claim to have conversed with a—a what?—a machine? A cloud? It’s a reasonable question.
I’ve explained my concerns about other words in previous posts. “Fab Vocab” (2015) addresses, among other things, how “awesome” disparages Beethoven’s 9th symphony. In “Disability and Censorship” (2021), I argue that a vocabulary police damages more than promotes the interests of disabled people.
Great post!
Another thing that drives me crazy (I know, I’m overstating this!) are phrases such as “My sister and me loved this movie,” or “Can you go to the store for Jeremy and I?”
Both careful writing and careful speaking are a thing of the past.
As an enjoyable blogger, you, Mr. Spratt, are a welcome exception.
Thank you for responding. I agree, good grammar is a laudable aim, However, my concern here is about a particular damage that careless usage can do. We must try to use words that don’t reinforce any frustration we might feel.