Political euphemisms

[Phillip Hone]

What are your favorite political euphemisms? My top 3 :

"ethnocentrism" (racism). Used by a fear mongering "brown people are destroying Europe" European person on a message board I post at. He fervently denies the accusations of racism which are leveled against him, despite the fact that he has repeatedly stated that only ethnically European people should be allowed to live in Europe.

"harsh interrogation methods" (torture). Generally used by douche/windbag conservative talk radio hosts, such as Steve Malsburg and Mark Levine.

"protecting marriage" (keeping those damn gays out of our sacred institution). Used by many, many "conservatives" (bigots).

[CmdrWilkens]

I think everyone who watches politics in the US has their favorite euphemism in "Fair and Balanced"

[Kronos]

"Liberate" When it comes to America, Or really any use of the word other than in hostage situations, we all know what it means

[irishmick79]

For some reason, "Low-Intensity Conflict" always bothered me, even though it does describe small scale warfare pretty well. It's not really a 'conflict' or 'low-intensity' if you're fucking getting shot at.

[Coyote]

Other countries have "spies". Your own country just has "intelligence agents".

[Uraniun235]

"harsh interrogation methods" (torture). Generally used by douche/windbag conservative talk radio hosts, such as Steve Malsburg and Mark Levine.

There's a more insidious one: "enhanced interrogation techniques". See, "harsh" actually implies that it's more severe, whereas "enhanced" has the connotation that it's better.

[The Yosemite Bear]

"save" as in "Save the village", or "save social security"

[Knife]

Racism. To that extent; conservative or liberal. All the normal labels in US politics are pretty much euphemisms anymore.

[D.Turtle]

Collateral Damage - and other ways to make war seem more clinically clean.

[Guardsman Bass]

"Drawing contrasts"

You've probably heard every one of the US Presidential candidates say it if you've heard or read anything that they've said. If Hillary Clinton was going to pass along a story about how Obama is secretly a Big O giant robot shrunk to human scale that converted to Islam 400 years ago and parades around in blackface trying to convince people that he's right for opposing the Iraq War from the start, she or one of her advisors would probably say, "We're going to start drawing contrasts."

"Private Contractors"

You know, as opposed to "highly trained mercenaries."

[hongi]

"Misleading". Sometimes, misleading statements are just outright fucking lies.

[Guardsman Bass]

To Add-

This may be more of a political expression rather than a euphemism, but is anyone else sick of how in American politics, whenever a scandal emerges, some combination of jerkoffs in the press always feels the need to add "-gate" to it, like "Nafta-gate"? Why can't scandals stand on their own merit?

[Phillip Hone]

"Freedom fighter" (terrorist). Generally applied to thugs who murder innocent people, but since they do it in a way that advances U.S. interests, they aren't given a bad label.

[Gil Hamilton]

Ah political euphemisms. Coyote's reminds me of the classic one, where you were a "pirate" or a "privateer" entirely based upon whether a government was paying for the activity.

[Drooling Iguana]

You know, as opposed to "highly trained mercenaries."

From what I've seen, they're not highly trained.

[Phillip Hone]

"family friendly laws" (censorship of things that bother Christians). We have to maintain the purity of the youth against impure heathen thoughts.

[Phantasee]

"Freedom fighter" (terrorist). Generally applied to thugs who murder innocent people, but since they do it in a way that advances U.S. interests, they aren't given a bad label.

I'd say it's more often applied to people fighting a war of independence, so it could equally apply to US troops during the American War of Independence, or some random dude in Palestine or something (I can't think of another, better example right now). Terrorists are usually people going to fuck shit up somewhere else, and nowadays aren't really fighting for a state, more often an organization like Al Qaeda or Hezbollah (which is technically not fighting for independence, just for control of Lebanon, and is also supported by Iran, so it's like a foreign country stirring shit up elsewhere).

[Darth Wong]

I think everyone who watches politics in the US has their favorite euphemism in "Fair and Balanced"

I think that's more of a lie than a euphemism.

Racism. To that extent; conservative or liberal. All the normal labels in US politics are pretty much euphemisms anymore.

And that strikes me as more of a misnomer than a euphemism.

Remember, folks: a euphemism is a term for a very bad thing which is designed to make it seem as if it is not so bad. Or, as Merriam-Webster puts it: "the substitution of an agreeable or inoffensive expression for one that may offend or suggest something unpleasant".

"family friendly laws" (censorship of things that bother Christians). We have to maintain the purity of the youth against impure heathen thoughts.

Technically, "family friendly laws" is a euphemism for censorship of things that Christians don't want their children to see, not necessarily things that bother the Christians themselves. Remember: the goal of "family friendly" government is to take the place of responsible parenting, by censoring the entire society so that Mr. and Mrs. Negligent Moron can leave their child totally unattended in front of the TV or the computer all day and not worry.

[K. A. Pital]

I like the "soldiers died in operation so and so" or "opeation so and so" instead of plain WAR. Our country seems to be more straightforward, I mean when it comes to war, usually they say the word "war" openly (and write on memorial stones) "to the soldiers who died in the Afghan/Great Patriotic/Chechen War" and so on. Somehow they don't shy using it.

In the US, they choose "Operation Iraqi Freedom" instead and that colossal bullshit phrase is used by every media outlet out there and officials spout it out. What a fucking joke. They can't say "In the honor of soldiers who died in the Iraq War"? Does't sound too good I guess; implies you started a war, not some cuddly-feel "operation".

[Darth Wong]

The best military euphemism ever was a US Army original: "pre-emptive defense". Because the good ol' USA never attacks anyone! Oh no, they just "pre-emptively defend" themselves.

[The Yosemite Bear]

I do believe that the roman empire practiced a whole lot of "Pre-emptive" defense acts.....

just ask the gauls, carthenagens, celts, parthians, jews, etc...

[Adrian Laguna]

In the US, they choose "Operation Iraqi Freedom" instead and that colossal bullshit phrase is used by every media outlet out there and officials spout it out. What a fucking joke. They can't say "In the honor of soldiers who died in the Iraq War"? Does't sound too good I guess; implies you started a war, not some cuddly-feel "operation".

That's a completely new thing, I'm not entirely sure why but it probably has to do with the Republican administration's overblown sense of self-righteousness. Everything prior to that, whether it was a justified war or glorified ethnic cleansing, has been simply called "the (whatever) War".

[MKSheppard]

That's a completely new thing, I'm not entirely sure why but it probably has to do with the Republican administration's overblown sense of self-righteousness. Everything prior to that, whether it was a justified war or glorified ethnic cleansing, has been simply called "the (whatever) War".

Actually, it started with Reagan and so in the 1980s:

Operation Just Cause, the 1989 US invasion of Panama
Operation Urgent Fury: the 1983 US invasion of Panama
Operation Desert Shield: 1990 Defensive buildup in Gulf
Operation Desert Storm: 1991 Asskicking of Saddam
Operation Desert Fox: 1998 bombing of Iraq
Operation Allied Force: 1999 Yugoslavia Bombing

A lot of popular references at the time referred to the Gulf War of 1990 as "Desert Storm" and even the US Army has gotten into the act, with the majority of their bradleys modified to M2A2 ODS (Operation Desert Storm) Standard.

[Adrian Laguna]

The '92 LA riots killed more Americans than everything on that list save Desert Storm. I'm having trouble calling something a "war" when the Army could lose more people if one of its troop transport planes has a bad accident.

[Darth Wong]

They don't call them "Wars" because the US Congress never bothers declaring war before any of these "operations". Pretty ironic for a country whose sense of outrage about Pearl Harbour was based upon Japan's failure to declare war first, but there you go.