A wonderful high school teacher in Mobile, Alabama taught her students that our language “is our mother.” She meant it is the generative foundation of culture. She was right.
Words matter. Especially emotionally loaded words such as “racist.” That’s why it is so frustrating to see President Trump’s awful, inexcusable tweets telling Democratic congresswomen to “go back” to other countries mischaracterized as racist.
Race and nationality are not the same thing. Race and ethnicity are not even the same thing. Race and religion are far from synonymous.
Likewise, racism is not the same thing as xenophobia, or as nativism, or as bigotry. Racism is a form of bigotry, but not all bigotry is racism. All of those things are morally wrong. Badly wrong. To say that something isn’t racism is not to say it isn’t wrong or that it isn’t bigotry. It is merely to insist on the correct language.
Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan is a Muslim of Palestinian descent. Are Palestinian Muslims a race? No. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is of Puerto Rican descent. Puerto Ricans aren’t a race, and indeed aren’t even a nationality.
Reps. Tlaib and Ilhan Omar of Minnesota are Muslims of the variety who sound anti-Semitic and who seem friendly with the Muslim Brotherhood and their allies. To suggest that they leave the country is wrong, but it is based on their statements and beliefs, not on skin color and not on “race.”
When words are over-used or misused, they lose their power. That’s why we all learn the story of the boy who cried wolf. If “racism” is used to refer to everything that is seen as bad and as seen as having anything to do with “other-ness,” people start tuning it out. Because it is used to mean so many things, it begins to mean nothing. Its horribleness then becomes more difficult, not less, to recognize and counteract.
Trump’s tweets were wrong because they were nativist and arguably bigoted. To say that is to say enough.
On a much less emotionally fraught level, there are those of us who are repeatedly frustrated by, and repeatedly if somewhat fruitlessly argue against, the misuse of all sorts of words. We believe language matters. Our 1975 dictionaries (Webster’s New Collegiate, in my case) support us.
For example, “impact” is not a transitive verb. And it isn’t a synonym for “affect.” And there is no such word as “impactful” — or at least no such word until dictionaries began losing their standards.
Also, “concerning” is not a synonym for “distressing,” “disturbing,” or “worrisome.” It should not be used as an adjective. It is a preposition meaning “with regard to.” Or at least it was, until it suddenly began being bastardized about 15 years ago. To hear it misused now is extraordinarily grating on the ear of those who know better. It’s like the queen in Alice’s wonderland saying words mean whatever she wants them to at the moment she uses them. Or like liberals saying the Constitution’s meaning evolves. It’s just not right.
These examples aren’t unimportant. They are intended to ratchet down the emotion from the “racism” debate, so as to keep things strictly rational and make the broader point. Set aside, for just a moment, any debate about whether Trump’s awful tweets were racist. The point is that using words correctly is important for clarity, and for common understanding of whatever is being discussed.
Specificity is important. Words matter. The language is our mother. Don’t abuse her.
