From time to time, you may notice people misusing words. I know I do - and this abuse of language is beginning to annoy me. I decided to write a compilation of commonly misused words, and have now begun my work.
I would now like to introduce my Alternative Dictionary with a quote or two from someone who has long been an inspiration to the semantically challenged. Over to you, Humpty:
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in a rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master – that's all."
Abuse: an alternative term for 'factual comment'. For example, when someone points out, calmly and reasonably, that a person has amended their website to remove incorrect assertions.
Censor: to criticise what someone has said or written. Usually used in this manner by professional journalists. Here, Catherine Bennett criticised the censure of Rod Liddle and seemed to confuse 'censure' with 'censor'. More recently we have had Odone on being "muzzled".
Defamation: unwelcome criticism. This interesting use of the word "defamation" will be familiar to bloggers and those who run webzines.
Plethora: usually meaning "excess" or "overabundance", plethora can also (when used by advocates of alternative medicine) mean quite the opposite - for example, the BCA's pathetically inadequate evidence for chiropractic.
Racism: conventional dictionaries may define racism as "prejudice or discrimination based upon race", but the alternative crowd know better. David Tredinnick, up against the Science Party in the 2010 General Election, complained that scientists who do not share the alternative view that CAM remedies work (e.g. Traditional Chinese Medicine, Homeopathy and Chiropractic) are racially prejudiced.
Science: normally used to refer to, for example, "the observation, identification, description, experimental investigation, and theoretical explanation of phenomena", science can also be described as a Western construct whose goal has been to exploit Asia and Africa.
Vitriol: when someone disagrees with me using science and my own words to do it, they are actually being vitriolic.
:-)
perhaps your next entry could be the word cause, traditionally used to mean The producer of an effect, result, or consequence, but often used to signify "something that came before an observable event, like MMR was the cause of my son's autism, or 'WiFi is the cause of my anxiety...
Evidence:
/??v?d?ns/, noun:
1. Facts or observations presented in support of an assertion.
2. (law) Anything admitted by a court to prove or disprove alleged matters of fact in a trial.
3. (woo) Anything believed to be true.
Fact:
/fækt/, noun:
1. Something actual as opposed to invented.
2. An objective consensus on a fundamental reality that has been agreed upon by a substantial number of people.
3. (woo): A conjecture or unsubstantiated claim, often made up on the spot.
What else did we miss?
History only repeats itself if one doesn't listen the first time.
Hah, see also here for a collection of woo language abuse:
http://rockstarramblings.blogspot.com/2006/05/doggerel-index-suggestions...
Evidence:
4.var. of anecdotes
close-minded: unconvinced by my anecdotes
Thanks all for the suggestions.
I've spotted another. Here, Secret Squirrel provides a new definition of trolling: "asking questions or presenting facts at odds with our world view".