We’ve already given Stanford’s Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative (EHLI) a word or two over their confused categories of “ableist language” and “racist language” but the horse we’re beating is not quite dead yet. It’s one thing to stigmatize normal phrases because their connotation or origin supposedly evoke offensive topics, as the Stanford harmful language list did with those two categories. It’s another thing to stigmatize normal phrases because their grammatical structure evokes insensitivity. But believe it or not, academia at the highest level has managed to do just that with the advent of “person-first language.” Grab onto the seat in front of you as we plummet to new depths of ridiculosity.

• “Convict” is politically incorrect. One ought to say “person who was incarcerated.”

• “Immigrant” is harmful language. One ought to say “person who has immigrated” or “non-citizen.”

• “Disabled person” is best left unsaid. One ought to say “person with a disability.”

• “Homeless person” is a no-no. One ought to say “person without housing.”

But why, you ask, are we no longer allowed to use these basic nouns and adjectives in their organic form? Stanford explains that person-first language “helps to not define people by just one of their characteristics.” Apparently, using the noun “convict” defines the convict according to his criminal record, while using the relative clause “person who was incarcerated” emphasizes that there is more to the convict than his criminal record—he is merely a person who has done jail time. Similarly for “immigrant,” etc. Get the picture? In case you didn’t, the EHLI even meticulously spells it out when it addresses “disabled person:” the phrase “implies that the disability defines a person, whereas ‘Person with a disability’ gives the ownership of the disability to the person.”

Sigh. As I said in my earlier analysis of ableist language, I hope you sense the confusion of an average English-speaker striving to justify the way language has worked for, well, forever. Let’s address this assumption that using nouns to refer to people is equivalent to defining them.

The way the world is structured, it is full of categories and subsets. The category of “father” refers to any male who has a child, and if I have a child, I now am a subset of the category “father.” The category of “manager” refers to anyone who supervises employees, so if I run the local grocery store, I am now a subset of the category “manager.” The category “comedian” refers to anyone who is repeatedly making people laugh, and if I am that kind of person, I now am a subset of the category “comedian.”

Now, there may be many other managers in the world besides me. So, if you were asked to pick me out of a crowd—and all you knew was that I was a manager—you wouldn’t be able to single me out without more information. “Manager” is not a definition of me, because there are many other managers besides me and a definition is neither too broad or too narrow for what it’s defining. Furthermore, “manager” isn’t even a defining characteristic of me; I could easily change my occupation status and remain the same kind of person I was before. Rather, when you say that I am a manager, you are saying that I am a particular member of the larger category of “those who supervise employees.”

This is true for many more such words. Saying that someone is an “immigrant” is not “defining” them by their immigration status; it’s just observing that such a person is a member of the larger category of “all people who have changed their country of residence.” Etc., etc. People can belong to zillions of categories without being defined by any of them!

There is no moral difficulty with using our current terms. But now let’s look at what Stanford’s list has revealed with all its politically-correct mumbo-jumbo: person-first language is just bad writing. If I am a firefighter, the “person-first” way to describe me would be as “a person who fights fires.” If I am a thief, my “person-first” designation would be “a person who steals things.” And beware if you are ever a person who patrons a bank, talking to the person who performs the teller’s duties, when a person who likes to steal comes in, demanding cash from all the people who have money. Yikes.

If this reminds you of your seventh-grade English class, it should. We were all coached to not use more words than we need to. Filling your prose with relative clauses—when simple nouns will do just fine—clogs up your writing. So, we all learned, refuse to continue to be the kind of person who does not allow himself to diminish the number of words that he types as he draws up a draft of the assignment that his teacher told him to come up with! In other words, just write concisely.

Let academia continue to obfuscate.

If anything G. K. Chesterton wrote is worth quoting once, it’s worth quoting twice. In our recent discussion about the theological and political significance of words, I quoted Chesterton as saying thus:

“If you’re not going to argue about words, what are you going to argue about? Are you
going to convey your meaning to me by moving your ears? The Church and the heresies
always used to fight about words, because they are the only thing worth fighting about.”

And as we’ve seen in the world of academia, the Left has recognized that words are the battleground of the mind and advanced into the fray with weapons swinging. Journalism is not far behind.

The Associated Press Stylebook, a preeminent reference guide for English grammar and journalistic principles and style—used by both educators and journalists—has chosen some eyebrow-raising guidelines for how reporters ought to address the topic of abortion in their reports. These guidelines show us, on a much more subtle level, how fiddling with words is fiddling with minds. Let’s look at one specific example in detail: the difference between “unborn baby” and “fetus.” (While this article won’t be using direct quotes from the AP Stylebook, the full text of the abortion topical guide can be accessed here.)

When referring to a baby before he is born, reporters are warned that terms such as “fetus” or “unborn baby” have been politicized by both sides of the issue (pro-life advocates argue that “fetus” devalues a human life, and pro-abortion-access advocates argue that “unborn child” equates abortion with murder). Therefore, the AP counsels us, we are to write with appropriate clarity and sensitivity. But the AP then provides a little more detail about what “appropriate” means.

“Fetus” is preferred in many instances (especially in scientific and medical contexts) when we are discussing a baby after 10 weeks of the mother’s pregnancy. “Embryo” is the appropriate term for a baby up to 10 weeks of the mother’s pregnancy. So when are we allowed to use “unborn baby?” Ahh, that’s a term that we to be used when “fetus” would seem too clinical for the context. E.g., “Sarah loved her unborn fetus more than anyone else in the world” sounds quite weird. So while the AP doesn’t explicitly say so, the examples they provide us seem to indicate what they think is “appropriate:” use the more clinical terms “fetus” and “embryo” in most cases, except for when they sound too clinical for the context, such as a mother loving her unborn baby. Saying “fetus” in such contexts doesn’t evoke the proper emotional reaction.

Yet that’s the whole point! The reason pro-life advocates insist on using the term “murder of an unborn baby” is precisely because saying “demise of a fetus” sounds too clinical! It doesn’t evoke the proper emotional reaction. Think of the difference between saying “the underdeveloped hominoid life form was severed with a sharp dividing instrument” and saying “the little girl was beheaded with an axe.” The more clinical our language, the less we feel natural emotional responses, which is why the abortion industry insists on “terminating pregnancies” instead of “dismembering unborn babies.”

The AP is onto the right principle: we ought to use “unborn baby” when omitting to do so wouldn’t evoke the right emotional response. However, the AP isn’t applying this principle evenly—they recognize the beauty of maternal affection but not the horror of abortion. By writing a topical guide that suggests we use “embryo” and “fetus” as our default terms when writing about abortion, they are suggesting we “clinicalize” a topic that is anything but clinical.

The AP also presents a few other eyebrow-raising guidelines, such as:

• Use “anti-abortion” instead of “pro-life,”
• Use “abortion-rights” instead of “pro-choice,” and
• Use “anti-abortion counseling center” instead of “crisis pregnancy center.”

Yet again, we have stumbled onto the vocabular battlefield and found pairs of competing words fighting over the same subject. And yet again, the difference lies not in the subject we are referring to (we’re talking about the same clinics and procedures either way); the difference lies in the connotations we pin onto it. We might be tempted to give way and just use the politically correct vocabulary, consoling ourselves in our heart of hearts that “we’re referring to the same thing either way,” but we’re not using the same connotations either way. And thus, in the end, we really aren’t meaning the same thing either way.

“Happy holidays” technically refers to the same time of year as does “Merry Christmas”—but removes Christ from the picture. “Transgender” technically refers to the same condition as the phrase “someone who is confused about their sex”—but acquiesces to the lie that sex is mutable. And “termination of a fetus” technically refers to the same procedure as “murder of an unborn baby”—but implies nothing more than a clinical separation of cells, rather than the horrific death by dismemberment or poisoning it really is. Just like “happy holidays” allows us to talk about Christmas without mentioning Christ, this connotation swap allows us to talk about murder without mentioning its horror. It further cements the idea that abortion is benign, first into our vocabularies, and then into our minds. When a whole generation can grow up talking about Christmas without thinking about Christ, or talking about abortion without thinking about murder, the vocabular battle will finally have been won.

And that world will be a scary place.