Truth Month - July 2024
Day 5 - Redefining words does not change reality. Ignoring reality has consequences.
There is a current trend to constantly redefine words, which started with mid 20th century postmodern thought. George Orwell noted this trend back in his visionary book, 1984. In this book, he envisioned a dystopian future where the government-run Ministry of Truth was in charge of controlling the thoughts of the masses. To do this, they created a whole new language, "Newspeak", with their stated goal,
"Don't you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it."
The modern progressive liberals have fully embraced this concept to foster societal change in the name of justice, diversity, and equity. Many words now have been redefined to mean the opposite of what they used to mean. For instance,
Sexual orientation and gender are now preferences and/or feelings rather than biological realities
Tolerance now means you must agree with me or you are hateful, instead of allowing others to openly challenge, disagree, and debate
Equity in outcomes has replaced equal opportunity
Women's healthcare is now primarily about the "right" to kill unwanted, unborn children
Racism is wrong when practiced by the oppressive, dominant white culture, but cannot ever be practiced by the oppressed – by definition
Criminals are the victims of an unjust system and thus should not be punished. Political opponents of Big Brother's rule excepted
The designation of man/woman has been replaced by the subjective self-determination of the individual, instead of objective criteria like biology and physical science
"Mother" has been replaced by more inclusive terms like "birthing people", since now men are defined such that they can have wombs too
Fairness in competition now means opportunity to take part in sports, locker rooms, and Greek housing based solely on mutable stated preferences and/or claims
And the list goes on, and on, and on. We have compiled many of their contemporary twisted meanings here Ministry of Truth.
If there weren't consequences to this, we could just laugh them off as out of touch kooks, but unfortunately there are real world impacts. You can truly believe that you can fly, but if you step off a 10th story balcony, gravity will have an impact on your beliefs. You can tell yourself and others that it was not a human baby that was once growing in your womb, but is now dead by the hand of a doctor or reproductive health medicine. You can try to live a life filled with morality, meaning, order, and beauty, while denying that ultimately there is no hope for a future past death for yourself, your loved ones, humanity, and even the earth (w/o God).
So carpe diem. Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow you may die. Or just maybe… stop twisting words and embrace the source of Truth and choose to live.
