Redefining Words
To advance their cause or push their ideas, people use commonly understood words, but mean something different. Because they intend to deceive. And it’s been effective.
Words, and the gift of language, are powerful.
Words have meaning. They are the basis of how we communicate with each other. We learn and understand the definition of words from the time we’re young.
We count on words to mean the same thing to us as they do to others. This ensures we understand what someone else is saying, and they understand what we’re saying.
If you use words that mean something different than what you’re trying to communicate, you’ll confuse the one hearing them. Or worse, you’ll deceive them.
This has become all too common in our conversations today. To advance their cause or push their ideas, people use commonly understood words, but mean something different. Because they intend to deceive.
And it’s been effective. The subtle “war on words” is how so many destructive ideas, so many former taboos, have been gradually accepted by our culture.
Most of us want to be seen as tolerant, for example. But tolerance means to have “sympathy or indulgence for beliefs or practices differing from or conflicting with one’s own” (Webster’s). In order to be tolerant, you must first disagree, but even so, have indulgence or sympathy. If you already agree, you have no need for tolerance.
Yet in our culture, when someone says you need to be tolerant, they most often mean that you must agree with and affirm something they say or do. And if you don’t, you are intolerant (or worse).
Other examples could include words like love or justice. Intentionally or not, people can use these words to justify something that is most definitely neither.
The result of the redefinition of words is confusion in our discussions, as one party thinks they are talking about one idea, while the other party intends to push another.
Ultimately, those with ill intent can bring about societal acceptance of things never imagined even a few short years ago.
Christians and other well-meaning people can likewise be made to accept ideas and public policies that run counter to their convictions, because they have been deceived.
Don’t be deceived
Words matter. Words have power. And redefining them to fit one’s own purpose is destructive to civil society.
Next time you’re in conversation and someone uses a word that doesn’t feel like it fits, ask them to define it. “What do you mean when you say______?” You may be surprised to learn that you’ve been speaking different languages.