George Carlin - Euphemisms

What people said

gorwell · 2021-08 · Strong recommendation

Did anyone else notice this euphemism treadmill update? "for people experiencing homelessness" "the number of people experiencing homelessness" "of those experiencing homelessness" This softer language with more syllables is not for the benefit of the homeless, it's for everyone else so they don't feel as bad about it. Which makes it less likely anything will be done. George Carlin made this point brilliantly: [VIDEO]

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bullfightonmars · 2024-08 · Recommendation

George Carlin has a great bit on euphemism where he makes the case that euphemisms are used to soften the meaning of things that are painful to the point of being meaningless, e.g. shellshock -> ptsd [VIDEO] The author of this article pointed our some similar examples: welfare -> cash assistance -> TANF.

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ryandrake · 2022-05 · Recommendation

George Carlin had a great bit[1] about our continuous need to soften our language with euphemisms. That, combined with a kind of forced optimism: needing to hide all negativity inside robotic passive aggression, is what communication has become in a lot of corporations. I don't imagine anyone actually likes having to do it, but we all seem to adopt these speech patterns eventually. Every time your boss tells you, "Hey, can you tone it down next time? Fred told me he was very offended by your asking him to do his job!"-- you're being asked to participate in the game. 1: [VIDEO]

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