Category: Language Matters

Word of the Day: Perseveration

Leftists want to limit your vocabulary so as to limit your thought and make you easier to control.  They want total control. David Horowitz says it well on his masthead, "Inside every progressive is a totalitarian screaming to get out."  (When a transgressive calls herself 'progressive,' you know there's a cesspool of mendacity up ahead.)

perseveration /pər-sĕv″ə-rā′shən/
 
noun
  1. Uncontrollable repetition of a particular response, such as a word, phrase, or gesture, despite the absence or cessation of a stimulus, usually caused by brain injury or other organic disorder.
  2. The tendency to continue or repeat an act or activity after the cessation of the original stimulus.
  3. The act or an instance of persevering; perseverance.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition • More at Wordnik

 

On the Gender-Neutral Use of ‘Man’

Top o' the Stack.

Roger Donway writes,

As I understand it, there are no "gender-neutral" nouns or pronouns in English. There is the masculine gender, the feminine gender, the neuter gender, and the common gender. The last applies to entities which have sex, but in contexts where both sexes are included or the sex is undetermined. "Someone has forgotten his umbrella." "Someone" and "his" are in the common gender. So, they do possess grammatical gender. They are not "gender neutral." Not positive about this, however.

Excellent comment, Mr. Donway. You're right. Strictly speaking, gender is a grammatical category with the four subcategories you mention. I was being sloppy in violation of my own principles.  Properly expressed, my point was that 'man' has a legitimate sex-neutral use in standard English. When used to refer to both males and females, it is sex-neutral but not gender-neutral for precisely the reason you supplied: so used, the term's gender is common. 

The sex of an animal is biologically based and therefore not a linguistic construct. This fact notwithstanding, it strikes me as legitimate to extend the sense of 'gender' so as to cover social roles. For example, traditionally women as a group have instantiated the nurse role and not the doctor role. No surprise: women can give birth, which biological fact makes women as a group more nurturing than men as a group and suits them for the nurse role. I have no objection to referring to the nurse role, a social role, as a gender role, midway as it is between the biotic/biological and the grammatical. 

But this is an extended use of 'gender.' Strictly speaking, gender is a grammatical category!

Gun Semantics

Under 14 minutes, by Massad Ayoob, one of the best. Words mean things, especially in a court of law. Precise, penetrating, and practical. As civil society collapses around us, and more and more of us must look to our own physical defense, you must also know how to avoid verbal entrapment by the prosecutorial shysters of the Left. 'Shyster,' as you know, is from the German sheissen, to shit. (I shit kid you not.)

Word of the Day: ‘Phatic’

phatic /făt′ĭk/
 
adjective
  1. Of or relating to communication used to perform a social function rather than to convey information or ideas.
  2. Pertaining to words used to convey any kind of social relationship e.g polite mood, rather than meaning; for example, "How are you?" is often not a literal question but is said only as a greeting. (Similarly, a response such as "Fine" is often not an accurate answer, but merely an acknowledgement of the greeting.).
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition • More at Wordnik
 
Don't confuse 'phatic' with 'vatic.' 
 
vatic /văt′ĭk/
 
adjective
  1. Of or characteristic of a prophet; oracular.
  2. Pertaining to a prophet; prophetic, oracular.
  3. Resembling or characteristic of a prophet or prophecy.
    "a kind of sibylline book with ready and infallible answers to questions"
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition • More at Wordnik

Wolff on Israel

Robert Paul Wolff, 30 October 2023:

I have found the series of comments on the Israeli situation interesting and helpful. I have not responded to them because I am so upset by what is happening that I can barely watch the news reports of it anymore. Let me make one small observation. There has been talk by Israeli officials and others about how this is an existential threat to the state of Israel. Let us just keep in mind that Israel is the only nation in the region with nuclear weapons and more generally is far and away the most powerful militarily. The attack on October 7, horrific and ugly and sadistic as it was, was no more a threat to Israel's existence then [than] was the attack on the twin towers on September 11 a threat to the existence of the United States.

Two points by way of rebuttal.

First, while it is true that Israel is the only nation in the region with nuclear weapons at the moment, that is very likely soon to change thanks to the concessions and fecklessness of the Obama-era appeasement policies vis-à-vis Iran promoted by puppet Biden and his (mal)administration. 

Second, the October 7th massacre was not an isolated event, but part of the larger project of clearing the space "from the river to the sea" of Jews and their state once and for all. This larger project is part of a still larger one that without exaggeration can be  called genocidal: to exterminate the Jewish people.*  And beyond this there is the anti-civilizational project of destroying our superior Western culture, one pillar of which is Judeo-Christian, and whose last bastion, bloodied, decadent, and tottering though she be, is the Great Satan, the USA.

I will leave it to others to comment on the psychology of Jews like Wolff who embrace leftism.  Some will say that he is a self-hating Jew who has internalized Jew hatred and turned it upon himself. I take no position on that speculation, but I do think a distinction is called for, namely, the distinction between a self-hating Jew and a Jew-hating Jew.  Obviously, a Jew could hate himself  for reasons other than his being Jewish. But every Jew who hates himself because of his Jewishness is a self-hating Jew.

__________

*To characterize the October 7th attack as "genocidal," as I heard one commentator do this morning, is a semantic stretch of the sort that is frowned upon here. Precision in the use of language is essential to intellectual hygiene.

Allyship?

Explained here. Is this a parody?

Word found here:

“I started to see these intelligent, educated people, whose mission is to make our system better for people of color, suddenly posting all this anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian stuff,” Rose said. “I’m not changing my values, but screw the allyship. I will not stop fighting, because I believe in the causes themselves. But as for going out of my way to support, to post, to give money? I’m done.”

Mike Pence ‘Suspends’ his Campaign

Here: 

"I came here to say it’s become clear to me this is not my time. So after much deliberation I have decided to suspend my campaign for president effective today," he said onstage. "

It'll never be your time, pal. You're a superannuated relic of a time long gone. Good riddance. Your use of the weasel word 'suspend'  fits well with the slipperiness of the professional pol. It beggars understanding that anyone would fund your campaign.

Pence called for federal abortion legislation to establish a 15-week minimum national standard . . . . 

The fool seems unaware that the abortion question was returned to the states by the overturning of Roe v. Wade. To call for federal abortion legislation after the 2022 Dobbs decision makes no sense at all.  Or am I missing something? It is hard to believe that a seasoned and well-connected politician such as Pence could be either that stupid or that ignorant.

Is it not more likely that I am missing some nuance of the law?

‘Islamophobia’ and ‘Hoplophobia’

A very polite Substack chiding of the stupid and often vicious use of these terms. My entry shows how to make a point rationally and stylishly without any use of invective and only the slightest trace of sarcasm. You have to cultivate the ability to write in a civil and respectful way. But you must also know how to pummel and deride scum like the present POTUS and his sorry entourage who, in their willful self-enstupidation, mindlessly repeat phrases they have heard with nary a concern for what they mean or ought to mean.

Different strokes for different folks. Sweet reason for some; the hard fist of unreason for others. The 'hard fist' comes in two flavors, one verbal, the other meta-verbal.