{"id":17483,"date":"2019-08-07T02:08:41","date_gmt":"2019-08-07T02:08:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=17483"},"modified":"2019-08-08T08:30:40","modified_gmt":"2019-08-08T08:30:40","slug":"the-warspeak-permeating-everyday-language-puts-us-all-in-the-trenches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/the-warspeak-permeating-everyday-language-puts-us-all-in-the-trenches\/","title":{"rendered":"The ‘warspeak’ permeating everyday language puts us all in the trenches"},"content":{"rendered":"

Robert Myers<\/a>, Alfred University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

In a manifesto posted online<\/a> shortly before he went on to massacre 22 people at an El Paso Walmart, Patrick Crusius cited the \u201cinvasion\u201d of Texas by Hispanics. In doing so, he echoed President Trump\u2019s rhetoric of an illegal immigrant \u201cinvasion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Think about what this word choice communicates: It signals an enemy that must be beaten back, repelled and vanquished.<\/p>\n

Yet this sort of language \u2013 what I call \u201cwarspeak\u201d \u2013 has relentlessly crept into most aspects of American life and public discourse.<\/p>\n

After the Columbine shooting, I started writing<\/a> about how \u201cgunspeak<\/a>\u201d \u2013 the way everyday turns of phrase, from \u201cbite the bullet\u201d and \u201csweating bullets,\u201d to \u201ctrigger warnings\u201d and \u201cpulling the trigger\u201d \u2013 reflected a society obsessed with guns.<\/p>\n

But warspeak\u2019s tentacles extend much further. Words and phrases derived from war imagery<\/a> crop up in advertisements, headlines and sports coverage. They\u2019ve inspired an entire lexicon deployed on social media and in politics.<\/p>\n

The intent might be as benign as the creative use of language. But I wonder if it communicates larger truths about American violence and polarization.<\/p>\n

The political battlefield<\/h2>\n

For decades, America has been fighting metaphorical wars \u2013 wars on heart disease, drugs, smoking, cancer, poverty, advertising and illiteracy.<\/p>\n

Then there are the culture wars, which have intensified recently to include wars on Christmas<\/a>, abortion<\/a>, bathrooms<\/a>, cops<\/a> and women<\/a>. These are different: They involve people on two sides of a polarizing issue.<\/p>\n

War targets an enemy \u2013 someone or something to be defeated, using whatever means necessary. It\u2019s one thing when you\u2019re at war with a disease. It\u2019s quite another when you\u2019re at war with a group of people on the other side of a political issue.<\/p>\n

The political arena seems to have become especially fertile ground for warspeak.<\/p>\n

Otherwise boring legislative machinations have been energized with the drama of a life or death struggle. The Republican-controlled Senate uses a \u201cnuclear option<\/a>\u201d to confirm judges by a simple majority of 51 votes rather than the older standard of 60 votes. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell\u2019s ability to speed along the appointment of conservative judges constitutes the latest volley in a \u201cjudicial arms race<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elections deploy the language of military campaigns. Republican donors and lawmakers warned Trump of a potential bloodbath<\/a> before the 2018 midterm elections. Meanwhile, Democrats running for president strategize in their campaign \u201cwar rooms<\/a>\u201d for ways to build up \u201cwar chests\u201d that will leave them with enough funds to compete in the \u201cbattleground states.\u201d<\/p>\n

The political media reinforces it all. In its coverage of the July primary debates, The New York Times wrote that the moderates were \u201cthrowing firebombs<\/a>\u201d at the progressives. Cory Booker, the \u201chappy warrior<\/a>,\u201d sparred with former Vice President Joe Biden who \u201ctook incoming fire<\/a>\u201d all night, but \u201cshot back\u201d and survived, even as moderator Don Lemon \u201cthrew a generational warfare bomb<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Our semantic arsenals<\/h2>\n

Then there are the less obvious ways warspeak has become part of everyday speech.<\/p>\n

Baseball players mash bombs while basketball players drain three-point bombs. Social media is replete with photobombs<\/a> and tweet bombs<\/a>, and there are so many bombshells on cable news<\/a>, it\u2019s a miracle your TV hasn\u2019t exploded.<\/p>\n

Everything has been \u201cweaponized.\u201d According to Google\u2019s Ngram Viewer, the use of the word in print has increased by more than a factor of 10 between 1980 and 2008.<\/p>\n