A Language Confounded

Bless her heart, my departed mother would be appalled by such stupidity. In her time, America was, as noted in Genesis, “of one language.”

---

As a child, she spoke only Italian. When she tried to enter elementary school, the principal told her to go home, learn English, and enroll the next year. And, that is what she had to do. As damaging as translating everything for everybody is, it’s the doublespeak of political correctness that does the most to deconstruct America’s modern-day Tower of Babel. Even though freedom of speech is touted as an American birthright, it has come to mean, “Free — as long as it does not offend.” Ironically, the offending part seems to apply only to minorities; those not considered members of a minority could be torn to shreds verbally, as was the case with former President George W. Bush. Destructive criticism offends, and quite often so does constructive criticism. Therefore, if something accurate and useful cannot be said because it offends, it will never benefit the “offendees” — or society as a whole. So, Americans have learned to beat around the bush, babbling in contorted circumlocution, and, in effect, communicate about as poorly as Grogg’s grunts. Such foolishness might be explained better in a hypothetical situation involving the imaginary country of Slobbovia. Two races of people populate this country — the Magentas and the Malachites. The Magentas comprise 75 percent of the population; the Malachites, 25 percent. One day, the races began arguing among themselves over two cultural issues about which there was vast disagreement: abortion and illegitimate births. The majority Magentas were responsible for 80 percent of the abortions, and the Malachites attacked them relentlessly via the media because they felt that, since young women had no fear of becoming pregnant, they, along with their willing sexual partners, led promiscuous, libertine lifestyles, which brought about a rapid rise in sexually transmitted diseases. The afflicted were unable to work, and taxes to support them created an increased burden for productive taxpayers. On the other hand, the minority Malachites were responsible for 80 percent of illegitimate births, which created financial hardships for doctors, hospitals and the government, as the survival and well being of the un-pedigreed offspring often depended on government largesse. The Magentas, disturbed by the escalating taxes required to fund this largesse, began to exhort the media to publish articles critical of the Malachites’ tendency to procreate out of wedlock. But no! Because of firmly entrenched, politically correct precedents, any criticism of the minority Malachites, whether it might lead to solving problems or not, was automatically considered offensive. The vehement howls and hysteria of radical Malachites were too intimidating for the press, and the articles were never published. What was the end result? Because communication between the segments of Slobbovian society became nothing more than babble due to the “offending factor,” the people fell further apart instead of coming together: They polarized … which is what evolves when constructive communication is replaced with non-offending nonsense: a language confounded.