NATIONAL BESTS '"An irrefutable indictment of those who subvert language ti distort the truth. ... It should be read by all who care to know when, how, why and by whom they ore being bamboozled ." - New York Times Book Review F ROM "REVENUE ENHANCEMENT TO "TERMINAL LIVING" HOW GOVERNMENT, BUSINESS, ADVERTISERS, AND OTHERS USE LANGUAGE TO DECEIVE YOU WUHAN lUTZ PRESENTER OF THE DOUBLESPEAK AWARD DOUBLESPEAK Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2011 http://www.archive.org/details/doublespeakfromrOOwill DOUBLESPEAK From "Revenue Enhancement" to "Terminal Living" How Government, Business, Advertisers, and Others Use Language to Deceive You WILLIAM LDTZ HarperPerennial A Division ofHzrperCoW'insPublishers Figure 1 on page 47 copyright © 1981 by The New York Times Company. Reprinted by permission. Figures 2, 3, and 4 on pages 49, 50, and 51, respectively, reprinted with permission from the July 1988 issue of ETS Policy Notes, published by the ETS Policy Information Center, Educational Testing Service. The Adman's 23rd on page 103 copyright © 1983 by D.G. Kehl. A hardcover edition of this book was published in 1989 by Harper & Row, Publishers. DOUBLESPEAK. Copyright © 1989 by Blonde Bear, Inc. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information address HarperCollins Publishers, 10 East 53rd Street, New York. NY 10022. First HarperPerennial edition published 1990. The Library of Congress has catalogued the hardcover edition as follows: Lutz, William. Doublespeak /William Lutz. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN 0-06-016134-5 1. Jargon (Terminology) 2. English language — Jargon. I. Title. P409.L88 1989 427'.973— dc20 89-45051 ISBN 0-06-091993-0 (pbk.) 90 91 92 93 94 FG 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 For my wife, Denise CONTENTS Acknowledgments ix Preface xi I. Involuntary Conversions, Preemptive Counterattacks, and Incomplete Successes: The World of Doublespeak 1 II. Therapeutic Misadventures, the Economically Nonaffluent, and Deep-Chilled Chickens: The Doublespeak of Everyday Living 22 III. Virgin Vinyl, Real Counterfeit Diamonds, and Genuine Imitation Leather: With These Words I Can Sell You Anything 68 IV. Negative Deficits and the Elimination of Redundancies in the Human Resources Area: Business Communication, Sort Of 104 V. Protein Spills, Vehicle Appearance Specialists, and Earth Engaging Equipment: Doublespeak Around the World 138 VI. Predawn Vertical Insertions and Hexiform Rotatable Surface Compression Units: The Pentagon Word Machine Grinds On 162 Vll viii CONTENTS VII. Nothing in Life Is Certain Except Negative Patient Care Outcome and Revenue Enhancement: Your Government at Work 192 VIII. Winnable Nuclear Wars and Energetic Disassemblies: Nuclear Doublespeak 252 Appendixes Quarterly Review of Doublespeak 271 Recipients of the Doublespeak Award 272 Recipients of the George Orwell Award for Distinguished Contribution to Honesty and Clarity in Public Language 276 Index of Doublespeak 279 General Index 283 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I gratefully acknowledge the support of the Rutgers University Research Council for grants that assisted in constructing a data base of examples of doublespeak, thus making the writ- ing of this book a manageable task. I also gratefully acknowl- edge the National Council of Teachers of English for allowing me to use material from the Quarterly Review of Doublespeak, I would like to thank the gracious women of the Four Arts Club of Elkhart, Indiana, who listened to an early version of Chapter II and laughed at all the right places. My thanks, too, to Harry Brent and Murl Barker, colleagues and good friends, who read earlier versions of parts of this book and were generous with their helpful comments. My thanks also to Jean Nagger and Hugh Van Dusen for their faith in this project and their support. And special thanks to all the readers of the Quarterly Review of Doublespeak who sent me examples of doublespeak, many of which I have used in the Review and in this book. But, most of all, I want to give very special thanks to my wife, Denise, who, in addition to providing me with the perfect writing environ- ment, convinced me that I could write this book and then served as my best, most helpful critic and reader, even while writing her second novel. I owe her more than I can say, or ever repay. IX PREFACE Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad way. — GEORGE ORWELL "Politics and the English Language," 1946 There are many people who agree with Orwell. Indeed, there are quite a few who believe that the situation has deteri- orated to the point where there is little hope left for the English language. I am not among either of these groups. The English language is doing quite well, thank you; it is we who use the English language who are not doing well, not doing well at all. Nor will America be the death of English. For all the supposed misfortunes the English language has suffered in recent years, it gives every sign of continuing as a living, prosperous, effective language for quite a while. If anything, English is growing. Each year more and more people learn and use the language as an integral part of their lives. Some estimates place the number of people who use English as their first or second language as high as one billion. Rather than causing the death of English, America has been one of its greatest supporters, spreading the language throughout the world. The issue is not what we are doing to the language, but what we are doing with the language. The issue is not just whether XI xii PREFACE subjects and verbs agree, but whether statements and facts agree. As Orwell also observed in his 1946 essay, the "defense of the English language has nothing to do with correct grammar and syntax, which are of no importance so long as one makes one's meaning clear ... or with having what is called a 'good prose style.' What is above all needed is to let the meaning choose the word, and not the other way about." Language is a tool, just like any of the tools human beings have invented. Like any tool — a knife, a screwdriver, a computer, a space satellite — language is used to do something, to achieve a goal. A knife can be used to carve a roast or carve a relative; a computer can be used to keep lists of people who donate money to charity or to keep lists of people marked for summary execu- tion by the government; a satellite can provide information on the weather or navigational directions for nuclear missiles to hit their targets. Language can be used to write the Constitution of the United States or to write the laws of apartheid; to write King Lear or pornography; to write the lyrics of John Keats or plans for a winnable nuclear war. The fault lies not in the language but in us, the creators and users of language. I have in this book brought together some of the examples of doublespeak that I have collected since I became a member of the Committee on Public Doublespeak of the National Council of Teachers of English, and since I became editor of the Quar- terly Review of Doublespeak, In an attempt to make the text as readable as possible, I have not used footnotes to document my source for each example of doublespeak I have cited. However, I can document every example of doublespeak I have used, as I do in every issue of the Review. My goal has been to make this book more than a simple collec- tion of the most egregious examples of doublespeak. I have tried to show that doublespeak is not a slip of the tongue, or language used out of ignorance, but is instead a very conscious use of language as a weapon or tool by those in power to achieve their ends at our expense. While some doublespeak is funny, much of it is frightening. We laugh and dismiss doublespeak as empty or meaningless words at our own peril, for, as George Orwell saw Preface xiii so clearly, the great weapon of power, exploitation, manipula- tion, and oppression is language. It is only by being aware of the pervasiveness of doublespeak and its function as a tool of social, economic, and political control that we can begin to fight those who would use language against us. CHAPTER I Involuntary Conversions, Preemptive Counterattacks, and Incomplete Successes: The World of Doublespeak There are no potholes in the streets of Tucson, Arizona, just "pavement deficiencies." The Reagan Administration didn't propose any new taxes, just "revenue enhancement" through new "user's fees." Those aren't bums on the street, just "non- goal oriented members of society." There are no more poor peo- ple, just "fiscal underachievers." There was no robbery of an automatic teller machine, just an "unauthorized withdrawal." The patient didn't die because of medical malpractice, it was just a "diagnostic misadventure of a high magnitude." The U.S. Army doesn't kill the enemy anymore, it just "services the target." And the doublespeak goes on. Doublespeak is language that pretends to communicate but really doesn't. It is language that makes the bad seem good, the negative appear positive, the unpleasant appear attractive or at least tolerable. Doublespeak is language that avoids or shifts responsibility, language that is at variance with its real or pur- ported meaning. It is language that conceals or prevents thought; rather than extending thought, doublespeak limits it. Doublespeak is not a matter of subjects and verbs agreeing; it is a matter of words and facts agreeing. Basic to doublespeak is incongruity, the incongruity between what is said or left unsaid, 1 2 DOUBLESPEAK and what really is. It is the incongruity between the word and the referent, between seem and be, between the essential function of language — communication^ — and what doublespeak does — mis- lead, distort, deceive, inflate, circumvent, obfuscate. How to Spot Doublespeak How can you spot doublespeak? Most of the time you will recog- nize doublespeak when you see or hear it. But, if you have any doubts, you can identify doublespeak just by answering these questions: Who is saying what to whom, under what conditions and circumstances, with what intent, and with what results? Answering these questions will usually help you identify as dou- blespeak language that appears to be legitimate or that at first glance doesn't even appear to be doublespeak. First Kind of Doublespeak There are at least four kinds of doublespeak. The first is the euphemism, an inoffensive or positive word or phrase used to avoid a harsh, unpleasant, or distasteful reality. But a euphe- mism can also be a tactful word or phrase which avoids directly mentioning a painful reality, or it can be an expression used out of concern for the feelings of someone else, or to avoid directly discussing a topic subject to a social or cultural taboo. When you use a euphemism because of your sensitivity for someone's feelings or out of concern for a recognized social or cultural taboo, it is not doublespeak. For example, you express your condolences that someone has "passed away" because you do not want to say to a grieving person, "I'm sorry your father is dead." When you use the euphemism "passed away," no one is misled. Moreover, the euphemism functions here not just to protect the feelings of another person, but to communicate also your concern for that person's feelings during a period of mourning. When you excuse yourself to go to the "rest room," or you mention that someone is "sleeping with" or "involved with" someone else, you do not mislead anyone about your meaning. The World of Doublespeak 3 but you do respect the social taboos about discussing bodily functions and sex in direct terms. You also indicate your sensi- tivity to the feelings of your audience, which is usually consid- ered a mark of courtesy and good manners. However, when a euphemism is used to mislead or deceive, it becomes doublespeak. For example, in 1984 the U.S. State De- partment announced that it would no longer use the word "kill- ing" in its annual report on the status of human rights in coun- tries around the world. Instead, it would use the phrase "unlawful or arbitrary deprivation of life," which the depart- ment claimed was more accurate. Its real purpose for using this phrase was simply to avoid discussing the embarrassing situa- tion of government-sanctioned killings in countries that are sup- ported by the United States and have been certified by the United States as respecting the human rights of their citizens. This use of a euphemism constitutes doublespeak, since it is designed to mislead, to cover up the unpleasant. Its real intent is at variance with its apparent intent. It is language designed to alter our perception of reality. The Pentagon, too, avoids discussing unpleasant realities when it refers to bombs and artillery shells that fall on civilian targets as "incontinent ordnance." And in 1977 the Pentagon tried to slip funding for the neutron bomb unnoticed into an appropriations bill by calling it a "radiation enhancement de- vice." Second Kind of Doublespeak A second kind of doublespeak is jargon, the specialized language of a trade, profession, or similar group, such as that used by doctors, lawyers, engineers, educators, or car mechanics. Jargon can serve an important and useful function. Within a group, jargon functions as a kind of verbal shorthand that allows mem- bers of the group to communicate with each other clearly, effi- ciently, and quickly. Indeed, it is a mark of membership in the group to be able to use and understand the group's jargon. But jargon, like the euphemism, can also be doublespeak. It 4 DOUBLESPEAK can be — and often is — pretentious, obscure, and esoteric termi- nology used to give an air of profundity, authority, and prestige to speakers and their subject matter. Jargon as doublespeak often makes the simple appear complex, the ordinary profound, the obvious insightful. In this sense it is used not to express but impress. With such doublespeak, the act of smelling something becomes "organoleptic analysis," glass becomes "fused silicate," a crack in a metal support beam becomes a "discontinuity," conservative economic policies become "distributionally con- servative notions." Lawyers, for example, speak of an "involuntary conversion" of property when discussing the loss or destruction of property through theft, accident, or condemnation. If your house burns down or if your car is stolen, you have suffered an involuntary conversion of your property. When used by lawyers in a legal situation, such jargon is a legitimate use of language, since law- yers can be expected to understand the term. However, when a member of a specialized group uses its jar-, gon to communicate with a person outside the group, and uses it knowing that the nonmember does not understand such lan- guage, then there is doublespeak. For example, on May 9, 1978, a National Airlines 727 airplane crashed while attempting to land at the Pensacola, Florida airport. Three of the fifty-two passengers aboard the airplane were killed. As a result of the crash, National made an after-tax insurance benefit of $1.7 mil- lion, or an extra 18^^ a share dividend for its stockholders. Now National Airlines had two problems: It did not want to talk about one of its airplanes crashing, and it had to account for the $1.7 million when it issued its annual report to its stockholders. Na- tional solved the problem by inserting a footnote in its annual report which explained that the $1.7 million income was due to "the involuntary conversion of a 727." National thus acknowl- edged the crash of its airplane and the subsequent profit it made from the crash, without once mentioning the accident or the deaths. However, because airline officials knew that most stock- holders in the company, and indeed most of the general public.