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The Language Deficiencies of Jargon and Buzz Words

Language can be an art form. It is the tool, the medium with which writers and orators work to define the human experience. With the best of writing and, in fact, in the best or oratory and even casual conversation we use language to drill down on those experiences, to define a more precise description of our senses and emotions. It is also the brick and mortar of societies and civilizations.

Language enables us to make distinctions in what we mean. Through language we explore nuances and distinguish the severity of lack of it between one sensation or emotion and another. We organize our thoughts through language and can convey those thoughts and assign shadings of value to what is relatively the same experience. Language gives us the psychic leverage to not only interpret experiences, emotions, and idea with greater precision, it creates the means for the access to an even broader understanding of the human condition.

So, after centuries of honing and refining language, what do we do? We dumb it down. We take these complex experiences, ideas, and events of the human condition that have been passed on for generations and assign easy phrases and cheap jargon to cover the spectrum. We communicate in broad strokes and then fail to understand why there is so little understanding. Even our deeper emotions are communicated in sound bites and bytes and bits of phrases and jargon we employ for the general sensory experience.

And then we wonder why we screw up in romance, go to war, and can’t get across the complexity of social and political solutions. In fact, we encourage generality. We pretend to be distinctive, and issue buzz words like we are all unique in our own special way, we are like snow flakes, truly one of a kind. Yet we bow down to the altar of category and conformity. It seems that any message or idea that requires actual thought is scorned upon. We would rather have it short and sweet, even if in the end we find it confusing and unusable in our efforts to determine fact from fiction, to discern what someone is really trying to get at.

We encourage dumbing down in everything from our news programs to our entertainment. Love stories are over simplified with easy buzz words of engagement, loss, alienation, and then re-engagement. If only the world went like that. We watch our supposed movie heroes stumbling awkwardly like pre-adolescents when confronting the opposite sex. We find regal and entertainment that boys from the comedic boy groups don’t have the linguistic wherewithal to even ask girls out, yet along find ways to charm them into bed. In a world of free sex and mutual sexual aggression on both sides of the gender aisle, the viewing and reading audience is supposed to find it a major victory when our young heroes actually do it.

Forget about the nuances of relationships, the involvement and complexities of actually living together, of getting to know one another and absorbing the related personality and psychological changes our mates realize over time and experience. It would take far too many words to explain the vagaries of romance, as it does the vagaries of violence and the socio-political process, so we boil them down to simplistic jargon.

So in communication, when we try to communicate, even about our deepest emotions, we resort to buzz words and phrases. We stammer and stumble, as it is awkward enough trying to explain ourselves, and more so because we try to do it in general and often impenetrable terms. And when we try to explain concepts or issue forth on social, political and economic issues, we fear belaboring points and instead resort to sound bytes. Sound bytes that are encouraged by the media.

Sound bytes that are also encouraged by our friends and associates. Everyone is overworked and the input from so many information sources has created an overload. We can no longer focus and have witnessed a serious diminishing of attention spans. We are easily distracted, and while time management skills are not always the best, we simply don’t have the time for deeper explanations. We want it short, and we want it to the point. Simple phrases for complex issues. Who cares if we can’t understand?

Now there is a change and a need for change in communication forms. Some years back people did have time, and they would belabor points, deliver laborious and useless preambles, before getting to the point. We would sit and sigh, biting our tongues while they rambled on in tangential and desultory forms hoping there is a point to what they are saying. Many people still resort to this as their principal measure of communications. We roll our eyes as they try to decided what year the year took place–was it ’81 or ’83?– was it Sam or Steve? And all this discourse is replete with ridiculous biographies and personal tidbits about people you know nothing a bout and don’t care to.
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But then on the other hand, when information is relevant and may strike a point where nuance is significant in distinguishing the elements of one idea or emotion from the next, or at least explore them on deeper levels, we find the person we are addressing issues for the summary “got it.” They are telling us they full understand what they are saying. They knew where we are going, so no need to continue the conversation.

But, in fact, the majority of the time they really don’t “got it.” They got part of it. The broad strokes. And the broad strokes will only give you so much understanding. When it comes to romantic relationships or going to war, innuendo and greater detail have special significance. If we are to promote understanding and not just add to the confusion, the drilling down into greater explanation can make all the difference between war and peace or love and abandonment. It can make the difference between the successful implementation of a program or action and its failure.

So for expedience we encourage the dumbing down and discussion in general terms. We have texting now, which further encourages generality. And so with countless sources for our information, feed lines for every subject, and all the modern technological delivery systems for that information, we are more confused about life and its experiences than maybe ever before. We talk to people in messages created by Madison Avenue, or Wall Street, on populist pundits, or cable news. Terms, jargon, buzz words to describe ridiculously complex situations and emotions.

Perhaps it is because all the technological advancements we are more exposed to the complexities of life and society, than ever in hisotry. Perhaps this very exposure, especially on a global level, is so overwhelming, we are compelled to simplify. In the face of our confusion we utilize jargon and buzz words as weapons to manage the world around us. We wish for the easy answers, and believe that like the kid who finds horse manure in his Christmas stocking, there is a pony down there somewhere.

There is no pony. Just horse manure. Unless we teach our children to realize the world in complex terms and attempt to define it accordingly, we will continue to degrade our society and civilization. This, of course, means education. Not the education where for the convenience of teaching 97 kids to a classroom where we resort to simplistic terms to chronicle the events and lessons of world history and all the cultural attributes within. No.

We need to teach them how to think on complex levels. We need to show them how to absorb this information overload from all the reference channels and create from it the cognitive process that can best serve their expansion in the 21st century and beyond. We need to teach them there isn’t just one way of approaching a subject, but there are many, and they all may have varying degrees of merit and credibility. Most will warrant consideration, and in the end, despite our best intentions to live simply defined and well managed lives, there often isn’t the correct and incorrect approach. There are only decisions to be made that are either prudent, effective or principled.

In other words, on communications levels, we have to attempt to keep them from making the same mistakes we are making. We have to teach them that convenience is not necessarily expedient and the simplistic approach to the complex elements of life won’t make you happier or more uncomfortable.

We have to teach them the love for language. And then, the few of use that still remember, have to show them how to use it.

Baseball’s October Classic Will Soon Need Snowshoes

Once upon a time in baseball, you had two leagues, eight teams, and 152 games in a season. You had the American League and the National League. Whichever team in each league came out on top was the League Champ, and then they played the other League Champ in the World Series. Simple.

More to the point, the October Classic or the Fall Classic, as the World Series is known, was over in early October. The leaves were just beginning to fall. There was a slight chill in the air, maybe, and the first nip of winter was for the most part just around the corner. Ball players played the game in shirt sleeves, or wore the long sleeves under their uniforms. Their baseball caps were the same ones worn through the season. Their fans, save for the rare occasions, watched the game in windbreakers and sweater. No big deal.

But now you have the same two leagues, but with three divisions within each league, wild card teams, extended playoffs and more extended playoffs, and on top of it all an extended, 162 game regular season. So now, by the time you are done with the season, the playoffs, and, finally, the World Series itself, the October Classic can stretch into early November. Factor in a couple of rain outs, and Santa Claus may come watch the game.

Now, mind you, I love baseball. I love the playoffs. I understand that the leagues extended regular season to pay for the hefty player’s salaries. With so many teams, and in so many cities, the extended season for the most part is not surprising. With so much competition, the playoffs are surely exciting for any sports fan. If your favorite team is in the playoffs, then the excitement is that much greater.

But…it just looks so odd to see baseball players sealed up in hefty thermals. They wear hood like balaclava things on their head that make them appear like they are off on a Delta Force mission and not preparing to take the baseball field. Their baseball hats have ear flaps.

The fans are wearing parkas, thermals, and gloves. They wear rain gear, for winter rain, and snow gear. They look like they are going to a football game and not baseball. Everyone, players and fans, are blowing on their hands, drinking warm liquids and hoping more freezing rain doesn’t drop from the skies and douse their few remaining dry spots.

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But this is baseball. It isn’t football, and it isn’t a trip to Grandma’s house for Thanksgiving Day, or Christmas Shopping. It only looks that way.

The added cold has to have its impact on the game. Balls don’t travel quite as far in cold air. Sliding hurts, collisions hurt more. Just the impact of the ball, whether it’s in your glove or bouncing off your shins, has to start hurting after awhile. The ball has to bounce differently on the harder infield group. Throwing has to be tougher. In all, what may have been the strong points for a team all season may be altered by the World Series. I am not saying this as a fact, but you would think it the case.

Anyway, I write this as I watch the Philadelphia Phillies beat on the Los Angeles Dodgers. I was born in Philly and grew up in L.A., so there is a definitely mix of emotions working for me. But then, when it comes to watching sheer precision, the most consistent team in executing fundamental baseball, there is nothing like the Yankees. Make a mistake with the Yankees, and you will pay a heavy price. But I digress here.

So if the season gets any longer, baseball’s concession stands will be selling hot toddies and soup. You will soon see the concession stands selling acrylic mufflers and ear muffs with the team logo boldly emblazoned. And the people will come in hefty four wheelers, wearing snow boots. Between baseball and football, out in the post-season parking lot, you will hardly tell the difference.

When You Wear Pants In Sudan

I have also quoted Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Ali for the less informed Ali grew up in the draconian circumstances of her native Somalia where she was forced to endure genital mutilation and the ignominies of an arranged marriage. She managed to flee to the Netherlands where she became a political activist and criticized Islam. Among other things, books, papers, etc., she wrote the screenplay and appeared in the controversial film, by Dutch director, Theo Van Gogh. Van Gogh faced harsh criticism for his film and was ultimately assassinated by a religious zealot. Subsequently, Ali received numerous death threats. She lives in seclusion under the protection of the Dutch government.

Anyway, among her writings, the quote I so remember is that “The West refuses to recognize the obvious.” This statement in stark in its simplicity and so very true. It brings to bear Western History in the 20th Century where strategies of appeasement and distraction threatened the collapse of civilization as we know it. And once again, we are confronted by similar challenges.

I am reminded of all this because of the recent instance where a a Sudanese court fined a Sudanese woman $200.00 for wearing pants in public. A woman wearing pants in the 21st Century? Who could imagine such a thing? Surely the woman, Lubna Hussein, a notable journalist, is no shrinking violet. She is an educated woman who tested the law and understood the ramifications of her act. The penalty could have included jail time and the traditional forty lashes. Some places just love their traditions. I guess it is one thing to sing Happy Birthday, and quite another to deliver forty lashes for wearing pants. But in this case with the world watching, the judge expressed his leniency by merely handing down a fine.

Islamic law calls for women to dress modestly. In countries where Islamic law is in fact the law, the laws should be obeyed. We would expect the same here. Or do we? But in Islamic countries, traditions and laws are such that any real interference other than lip service results in invasions and nation building, and we have seen throughout history where that gets us.

I really find it hard to take issue that these laws are preserved with only a smattering amount of protest that is often mitigating by social pressure and outright fear for one’s well being. Nevertheless, it is their country and their laws, and it is up to their people to compel changes, if they so see fit. There are, after all, issues of sovereignty.

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We fake it. We pay lip service to ideas that we really can’t stand. We pretend that draconian issues require our understanding and we try to engage those who willfully and wantonly reinforce this culture. Simply put, we have given these practices enough credibility that cultures who practice the subjugation of women can somehow behave that way within Western borders.

We read periodically about men living here who kill and beat their wives because of the perceived shame they bring the family. We read about the guy who destroyed his TV because it was showing a woman’s bare legs. We pretend this is understandable and that those whom emigrate to the West and fail to adopt to Western culture are somehow practicing their ethnicity. Yeah, if it means following certain dietary customs. But it is not okay when men, especially men, can’t get used to the idea that their women have a greater freedom of movement in the West. That we can in fact criticize damn near anything with relative impunity, based on our constitutional rights.

We are the product of the Age of Reason. It is often forgotten here. We cling to our own arcane traditions, or what we believe are traditions, ignoring the thoughts and practices of our founding fathers. We praise them, vaunt them, but we really don’t have a clue or sense of the age they came from. But nevertheless, it was The Age of Reason. The Age when people quested after science, a logic.

So while we are unified as human being in one world, we are not unified by a single set of beliefs. And while we can tolerate the beliefs found in other nations, we don’t have to accept them as our own, make excuses for our own way of thinking, or pretend we are more equanimous than we actually are. We aren’t. We prefer what we have to what others have. We want to practice as we see fit and wear our pants around our heads if we so choose it. We don’t care for restrictions about religion. Hell, we don’t have much tolerance for dress codes. We like our women in blue jeans.

Hey, it’s obvious.

Obesity and Healthcare Reform

While everyone rants and raves on one side or the other about healthcare reform, little is said about one major contributing factor to the outrageous cost of healthcare. Fat people. I know it is a term that makes everyone flinch as it is no longer politically correct. There are other terms to use instead, full figure being one of my favorites, but at the end of the day there are only two real terms that apply. The first is obesity. The second is fat.

That’s right–fat. We are a fat country. We are a nation that eats like pigs. We have more all you can eat buffets in this country than anywhere else in the world. Maybe we have more all you can eat buffets than there are in the rest of the entire world combined. We stuff food into ourselves as if we were loading up to hibernate in the winter. We got to the big buffets and just pile food on top of food until our oversized plate looks absolutely grotesque with its oddball combination of food, laid out this way and that. We put the smoked salmon with the pork chops, the pizza with the chocolate souffle. We would put our ice cream on our T-Bone steak if most buffets didn’t extend the hospitality of a dessert plate. We eat cabbage and crustaceans with equal glee. We don’t care. As long as it is food. Dump it on and stuff it down.

And while food is relatively cheap in this country our binge overeating formula and guide to what we call happiness does not come without a price tag. In fact, our eating habits are quite expensive. Two thirds of our country is overweight and 25 to 30% are seriously obese. Fat. A walking health danger.

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Additionally, it has been reported on WEBMD.Com that obesity can lead to brain loss. The brain may actually atrophy because someone is too damn fat. And then there is, for the bonus plan, an increased risk of dementia.

It would seem that this damning evidence combating obesity should not merely be a suggestion. Obese people should be penalized and forced to pay more for their indulgence. Better, still, if they lost weight, but that would mean self-denial and increased discipline, and we are hardly a nation for that, anymore.

So before we start worrying about pulling the plug on grandma and some other arcane, if not insane ideas, that have popped their little pus heads on the public scene during the past couple of months, maybe we should concern ourselves with the reality of our own condition and get to work on that. Eat better. Eat less. And move around some. Who knows, you may even get to like it.

Will Democrats Screw Up Healthcare Reform?

There is a darkly humorous scene in the film, The History of Violence, where the main gangster, played by William Hurt, arranges for the murder of his brother, played by Viggo Mortensen. One of Hurt’s henchman is to sneak up behind Mortensen, wind the garrote around his neck and strangle him. But the tables are turned, and Mortensen escapes.

“How can you f**k that up?” exclaims and exasperated William Hurt. He then shoots the henchman to punctuate his case.

This is how I feel about the Democratic Party and its attempt to reform healthcare. I am aware you can argue intelligently for healthcare reform and variations on that healthcare reform, or you could against it. There are credible opinions, for sure. There are options that may be worth considering. But that is not what I am talking about here. That on one hand is too simple and argument and too mired in knee jerk doctrine to warrant my adding my two cents on the matter.

First off, healthcare is not what I consider a philosophical issue. Abortion. Same sex marriage. These can be philosophical issues. Not healthcare. People get sick. People need healthcare. Many people don’t have healthcare. Even more can barely afford the healthcare they have. I pay a fortune every year in healthcare. I pay more for healthcare than a fair amount of people make as take home pay, annually. And every January my premiums go up. Last January it went up 40-something percent. That’s a big increase. I have no idea what will be extorted from me this January. And I am lucky. Why? Because I am in a group, so I am not confronted with the big, bad bugaboo, preexisting conditions.

As for our “choice.” That’s almost funny. Our choice is to face rejection for different procedures or fight like hell for months on end with the health insurance people. Luckily, we have good doctors with whom we have established long term relationships. I can only imagine how it would go down if our doctors just got here last Wednesday and had no personal investment in our general well being. And that is what most people are facing.

So we need healthcare. And we need healthcare reform. What gets me is the Democrats and the remarkable way, to paraphrase William Hurt, they managed to f**k this up. How when you have any number of options to clarify your healthcare initiative do you choose to lead with your chin? In fact this desultory attempt at convincing America that healthcare reform is necessary and is being implemented with the best intentions is so lame, so lacking in clear information, that the Democrats risk having any meaningful healthcare reform being kicked down their throat. They could lose their advantage in both houses of Congress in the forthcoming elections. They could face disaster and render what should have been a shoo-in eight year Presidential term into a four-year Jimmy Carter extravaganza.

Amazing. It is so amazing that one friend of mine believes the inept way the Democrats, in general, and the White House, specifically handled this healthcare initiative, they must have a secret plan. They must be sandbagging the opposition. They must know something that we don’t, but like any secret weapon they are only waiting for the right moment to unleash it on their opponents. I can understand why he would think that way. Hoping against hope that they are not that incompetent. Unh uh. Not happening.

We have done nothing during the past couple of decades or so if not turn every smart strategic act, politically, socially, and otherwise into some slick term that is used to identify its application. We are homogenized that way, very precise with all of our modeling, studies, surveys, statistics, pigeonholing. There is little allowance for random and unpredictable action. There is little allowance for gullibility that can border on insanity. But things do fall randomly, and even the most cogent proposition can lead to chaos. And, indeed, the road to hell has often been paved by good intentions.

Among the first things you learn in media management is to conceive of your message. Keep it concise, make it clear, and be damn sure the language is such that the average Joe Public out there can grasp what you are getting at. Introduce your message way ahead of time. Test market that message. Take it for a spin. Kick the tires, looking under the hood. If it’s a clunker, modify it in a hurry.

Repeat the message as if it was a Sunday prayer. Make sure all your primaries, secondaries, and surrogates understand that message. Make sure they can translate it, repeat it to large crowds and as a talking head on news shows. Like any good sales pitch, preach all the good stuff in easy language. Don’t allow for confusion. If you have too many facts, realize you are not in a fact finding nation. Reduce those facts to the three or four things that will resonate with the crowds. And if all that fails, hire a brilliant guy like Frank Luntz to make sure you can stay on point and deliver your message.

In the case of the Democrats, they believed people were hurting in a bad economy and would be open to change in their healthcare system. They probably would. The Democrats believe that there is a matter of moral consciousness, that there are far too many people without healthcare. Very true. The Democrats believe that economically speaking we are in big trouble with our present healthcare system, and in the very near future with costs soaring more and more people will not have a viable healthcare plan. No argument there.

But so much for beliefs when they translate to message that is supposed to lead to action. Democrats have approached this vital initiative, believing because it may be so you won’t have your ass handed to you by the financial interests concerned with preserving the private healthcare system just the way it is? We’re talking big bucks adversaries who have no interest in reform, really, not when they are raking in the money. And some of that profit goes to a fair share of legislators, local, national and statewide, in the lovely guise of campaign contributions. Maybe so. But certainly these campaign contributions, which total in the tens and maybe hundreds of millions, are not crossing palms to encourage reform that would detract from the bottom line. These campaign contributions, all right, you can call them bribes, are being paid out to keep things just the way they are, or close enough.

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So now President Obama is the one delivering the healthcare message. Sort of. Finally. This tactical decision only comes after the Republican leadership and the private healthcare industry takes the Democrat’s discombobulated message and turns it on its fanny. But the damage has been done. People love to buy into groundless information, it would seem. Thanks to the Democratic stumble step, a fair percentage of this country believes the Democrats are planning to kill grandma and the government is climbing into your underwear.

No matter that in the Bush administration, civil rights were abrogated, voluntarily surrendered, and intruded upon without so much as a peep from this crowd. No matter that we are still taking off our shoes in the airport and being forced to carry a gnat’s worth of shampoo on a seven day business trip. Forget you have nineteen different agencies listening on your phone, monitoring the books you read and checking out your toilet paper for secret code. It’s the healthcare reform that will ruin our country. In fact, in some circles the message has been so distorted that some ardently believe it is a copy of Nazi policy.

Amazing. Again, let me repeat. There are intelligent ways to debate healthcare reform. There are civil and cogent perspectives that should be heard. There are people out there, on both sides, who are actually trying to be heard. But they cannot be heard above this ridiculous din of lunacy and ragged incompetency that has predicated this mess.

I watch not with shock, but a whole lot of dismay as the princes and peasants with pens and pitchforks descend on these alleged town hall meetings, to rant and rave, show their guns, and try to shout down what are far too many excuses for legislators who are tongue tied and brain twisted by the level of adversity and near-violence. With the notable exception of Barney Frank who offered the appropriate response to one programmed lunatic who termed the healthcare plan a play taken out of Hitler’s National Socialists, most other Senators and Congress Persons seem grossly incapable of dealing with adversity.

Yes, adversity. It does still happen in a world where we believe everyone should be safe. In a world where our more naive believe American citizens will not be subjected to any abuse, in spite of the more obvious atrocities in the world around them. These are the people who believe reason prevails. Well, like anything else, miracles included, sometimes it happens that way, and most often it doesn’t. Sometimes, if you want to reason with someone, you have to hit them with a two by four in order to get them to listen.

I am not suggesting actual violence. I can see already what would come of it, what with the nut jobs out there who are carrying their guns to Presidential rallies. I believe in gun ownership. Really. But I also believe that anyone carrying a gun within the proximity of a president or elected official is not confronting a rights issue. That person is confronting a security issue. It is dangerous in theory and even more dangerous in practices. It is incredible to me that this should be allowed to occur. It is amazing that any doofus carrying a gun to a political rally isn’t hauled off to the rubber room for a quick stay with the shrink of his choice. C ‘mon, people, haven’t we all seen “Taxi Driver?”

But I digress. The fact remains that the Democrats have muffed the healthcare initiative. They have screwed up. Now they are playing defense. A smart defense is a good offense. A good offense is one that works. If you want to get it passed perhaps it is best to forget bipartisan efforts, group hugs, and marshmallow roasts. Tear a page from the old Democratic Playbook when such pols as Lyndon Johnson and Sam Rayburn were not afraid to twist arms in their own party. Even Bill Clinton did that.

Tell your supposed Blue Dog Democrats, cute name, that if they don’t climb on the train here, they can forget about any National Party support in 2010. Tell him there were be no funding, no marquee value personalities showing up in support. There will be no support of any kind. Nothing. Hell, if this healthcare initiative fails, as the Democrats must realize, and the Republicans certainly do, they will be losing congressional seats anyway. They might as well lose the seats that didn’t do them any real good.

In other words, cowboy up and show some boldness. Do like the Republicans do. When they get in power, they have an agenda, and they follow it in lock step to see that agenda is realized. They don’t mess around, getting caught up in the facts or apple bobbing in their own confusion. The Republicans don’t apologize. They don’t hem and haw. They have a message, and they stick to it. They don’t want to hug. Whether their policies are right or wrong, they are there to do their job, and that is exactly what they do. Give them credit where it is due.

But not the Democrats. They mistake confusion and mixed messages as freedom of choice and personal expression. They believe like every obnoxious television series that everything will right itself in the end. It doesn’t. It often gets worse.

So, Democrats, if you are really concerned with healthcare reform, then act the part. Get tough. Be direct. Get your message straight. Get rid of a thousand page document. Tell the public the public option is Medicare, but only if you are younger than 65, then you have to pay for it. That’s it. If you like Medicare, then this is your chance to buy it. Simple. To the point. No confusion.

Am I making myself clear?