Our Language Used Against Us

What if everything we’ve ever heard was a lie? What if it was close to the truth? Would it be okay? The answer to these questions, and any question that deals with the manipulation of our knowledge and opinions as significant citizens needs to be, bluntly put, a resounding no. Instead, we, the public, want to hear the facts about the everyday events that we ultimately have power over (we are in a democracy) because if our decisions are uninformed or, moreover, not presented to us, then we will be led blindly into a future we have no control over.

This scary point illustrates the fluidity or shakiness of language—that what we may hear has a certain meaning on the surface, but underneath it takes on a completely different, more concealed, definition. To understand this idea of language as oral exploitation, we will define it as doublespeak. George Orwell, who sought to uncover these secret “linguistic” tactics used by the government and military to sway public views and opinions, coined the term doublespeak in the earlier part of the 20th century. The way doublespeak “softens” language bears significance because we inevitably make decisions based on these expressions and, from a political standpoint, we are given the opportunity to choose wisely.

Let’s look at some examples in the past when doublespeak was used, and what consequences it had on us as a people.

Every year since 1974 the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) awards somebody in the political sphere a doublespeak award. Past winners include the Bush Administration, Newt Gingrich, and NASA. All of these people, or organizations, somehow distorted facts by softening the way they presented them. For example, NASA called the space shuttle challenger explosion “an anomaly” and said that the dead bodies of the astronauts on board were simply “recovered components” (NCTE). As public listeners we would have no idea of what this means, and in situations where our opinions as decision makers are threatened by doublespeak, it becomes even more dangerous. Recently the Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, discussed the torture acts that happened at Abu Ghraib prison by calling them “the excesses of human nature that humanity suffers” (NCTE). Here, Rumsfeld neglects to accept responsibility for the crimes that happened at Abu Ghraib and as the public we are not given some important information.

Perhaps a new question is raised after hearing this distorted language and it is one that Robin Lakoff answers in her book The Language War. The question, simply stated, is why do we hear so many insincere or, as Lakoff says, infelicitous apologies (or doublespeak) emerging from the political realm? The answer or reason that formal apologies are so rare is that the political world is so afraid to relinquish power—which sometimes happens when you admit a mistake. To answer the question of this muddied language Lakoff says, “I suspect it’s because the more perceptive recognize that these apologies, for all their literal meaninglessness, have serious consequences, reallocating as they do the right to determine what events mean, and how they shall be spoken of and who shall speak of them in public” (Lakoff 31).

There are several dangers that the public, then, receive from these apologies, expressions, and linguistic cover up. There is no doubt that doublespeak can move public opinion, for it creates ignorance in the public and, of course, our decisions are uninformed. The public sphere becomes a public satire; it is no longer well informed or aware of this deception. Walter Lippman, a famous political writer, discusses this point more deeply, saying that public apathy is an offshoot of this political trickery. The public is not given a fair chance at forming opinions, and therefore should not be held responsible for mistakes that happen. Nevertheless, we have learned that doublespeak assaults the idea of a true democracy, one that is built on trust and public communication. Doublespeak is unsafe to the people who use it, to the people it targets, and to the public, who hears and reacts to it.