The Patriot Post® · Are Conservatives Ruining Dems' Language?

Bemoaning the fact that conservatives actually take the meaning of words seriously, CNN recently published an article titled, “How conservatives use ‘verbal jiu-jitsu’ to turn liberals’ language against them.” Wow. That is an incredible case of projection.

Of course, CNN was not making the case that conservatives treat words as having actual meanings that can’t merely be changed on a whim. Words like “gender,” “sex,” “woman,” “mother,” “female,” “science,” “democracy,” “racism,” and “fascism” all once had universally agreed upon definitions.

Instead, the article laughably claims, “Republicans are masters of verbal jiu-jitsu,” a term CNN apparently believes it is free to redefine to support its argument. CNN defines the problem as “a form of linguistic combat in which the practitioner takes a political phrase or concept popularized by their opponent and gradually turns [it] into an unusable slur.”

However, according to most definitions that are more than 10 minutes old, the phrase verbal jiu-jitsu has a positive rather than a negative connotation. In essence, like the martial art, it is the skill of using appropriate language (not redefining terminology) to win over an opponent into a mutually satisfactory agreement. In other words, to use verbal communicative skills to enlighten and hopefully win over someone who initially disagrees.

Given that older and more accurate definition, yes, there are some Republicans who are masters at that practice. But unlike CNN’s misleading definition, the objective is not to deceive people but to enlighten them to the truth. “Taking the red pill” might be a more hip phrase — a nod to the scene in “The Matrix” where Neo takes the red pill instead of the blue one so as to remain in reality and not in a coma-induced dream world.

The charge of projection comes from the fact that CNN, like so many Leftmedia outlets, practices a form of disingenuous newspeak with the objective to deceive and manipulate people into embracing the Left’s preferred political narrative.

This initially subtle and now more blatant effort to redefine words as if they were wax noses meant to be freely manipulated into a more politically convenient shape is seen as perfectly fine, even advisable.

One of the greatest examples of this wax nosing at play is the newspeak of “preferred pronouns.” No longer are pronouns to be used in accord with the antiquated rules of the English language as mere generalized identifiers of sex/gender. Rather, now we’re told that pronouns are subject to the felt identity claims of a gender-confused individual.

CNN’s article continues its disingenuous charge by claiming that conservatives disarm “a liberal phrase by transforming its meaning.” The example then given is the term “social justice warrior,” which CNN defines as “someone fighting on behalf of the poor and exploited.” Conservatives turned it “into something else: a ‘whiny,’ self-righteous progressive who can’t take a joke.” That SJWs are whiny, self-righteous, and can’t take a joke is not what conservatives “turned them into.” It’s a rather accurate description of how they comport themselves in trying to further socialism.

Critical race theory is another term CNN bemoans as having been “redefined” by conservatives. Yet there again, conservatives didn’t redefine CRT. They merely exposed to the American public what it is — an agent to redefine the widely understood and well-defined term “racism.”

The article then whines about how terms such as “diversity” and “equity” have become “dirty words.” CNN quotes none other than one of the leading woke race hustlers, Robin DiAngelo, who trades in term-redefining for a living. Conservatives are seeking to “silence the conversation and to protect the status quo,” she insists. “It doesn’t have to make sense. It just has to work and get race off the table and prevent any challenges to the status quo.”

No, conservatives have not been the party of censorship. Rather, they have exposed and challenged the attempt to indoctrinate Americans into a Marxist worldview.

Freedom of thought demands principled and accurate definitions. Terms aren’t up for grabs for anyone with an agenda to redefine to suit their own predilections. This is why when Leftmedia outlets like CNN engage in the Orwellian practice of newspeak, more and more Americans simply refuse to take them seriously.