< PREVIOUS ] [ 1989 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >
Until quite recently, the English language, especially
the Official dialect, tended to be rather Orwellian. In
1984, George Orwell envisioned a society with
mottoes like War is Peace,
and in essays like
Politics and the English Language,
he pointed out
that when officials use words like pacification,
what they really mean is making war on the
populace.
That might have been misleading to a few naive souls,
but it was convenient for the rest of us. You could always
assume that the objective truth was the precise opposite of
the official words. You knew a Freedom fighter
wasn't fighting for anybody's freedom, but only to install
a different dictator. A congressman's vote in the public
interest
was in fact a vote in reciprocation for PAC
funds when he was running for reelection, and for those
speech-making honorariums during the other two weeks of his
term.
User-friendly
meant that you never wanted to see
anything that was user-hostile,
not after you spent
six hours poring through a four-foot stack of
poorly-indexed manuals written in the arcane Asiatic pidgin
techno-English patois. A child-centered
program was
in fact oriented solely for the convenience of the
management and staff,
and some assembly required
meant no one with less than a master's degree in
mechanical engineering and a week to spare should open this
box.
But things are changing. Most socialist nations have a
People's Army,
which always acted against the
people. Now China's army has taken the people's side in
Beijing. The Soviet Union was fond of the word
democracy,
and they just held real elections in
Russia. In one workers' paradise,
Poland, workers
are actually getting a voice in the government. Reality
changes to match the high-sounding words.
This may be a healthy development, but suppose this contagion of truthfulness spreads. We might be reading stories like these:
· Denver Water Board officials announced
yesterday that metropolitan water consumption had dropped
substantially, in conformance with a board agreement signed
in 1979. When we say we're pledged to conservation, we
mean it,
a spokesman said, and when we sign an
agreement, we respect it.
· Every employee in the Taxpayer Assistance
Division of the Internal Revenue Service employees was
commended by President George Bush during a White House
ceremony Friday. They gave perfectly accurate advice to
every caller, no matter how complex the question,
the
President said. There was a time when a citizen might
get into trouble with his government by following the
advice his government gave him, but I am pleased to report
that those days are long past. It's another great step
toward a kinder, gentler nation.
The President went on to say that he would call for huge
cuts in military spending. Kind, gentle nations do not
stockpile bombs and missiles while citizens go hungry.
Besides that, we call it the Department of Defense, so
that's what it's for -- defense. No invasions from Canada
or Mexico appear imminent, so this is a good time to prune
that bloated budget to a sensible figure.
· Gov. Roy Romer has apologized for
misunderstandings about the term economic
development,
and pledged never to use it again.
Many people thought that
economic development
meant
more jobs at better wages, and so it was understandable
that they supported it. However, the truth was that in
Colorado, economic development
really meant tax subsidies
to inefficient industries who could afford good lobbyists,
along with rampant real-estate speculation that led to
bankruptcy and foreclosure when it didn't succeed, and even
worse results when it did -- pollution, congestion, general
degradation in our quality of life. I refuse to be party to
such deception.
Will truth ever catch on in the capitalist world, the way it is spreading in the communist bloc? At first, it was inconceivable. But in a time when the chairman of the Republican National Committee plays rhythm guitar with a blues band, anything seems possible.
< PREVIOUS ] [ 1989 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >