We all know what the mob boss means. We must stop pretending like the words themselves are the problem here.
When we watch a mob boss order a hit in a movie, no one expects him to say it in those words. The kill order doesn’t have to be “kill him.”
They use other words to say it. Like “put him on ice.”
The euphemism is supposed to act like a prophylactic—a barrier that somehow protects the boss from culpability. But it doesn’t actually work. Everyone knows that putting someone on ice is a kill order. Every last one of us. Without question.
The words don’t obscure the truth from anyone. We all get it.
So why do so many in the real world pretend that the words themselves are the part that matters? We understand loud and clear.
Pretending the euphemism isn’t another way of saying the same thing is a willful refusal of dealing with truth.
So why do people insist on focusing only on the words?
Because we are afraid to focus on how responsibility actually works.
A Fake Paradox
Focusing on the words feels like we are making a subjective reality objective. Like that is the only way to deal with it.
We’re also cynical enough to reject this approach. We worry about the slippery slope of sanctioning the euphemistic words like ice and hit. Like these will be used like a dumb algorithm that condemns any talk of freezers and mixed drinks. We don’t want innocent bartenders caught up in this. Like we couldn’t possibly recognize when the euphemism isn’t a euphemism.
This is a low view of language. And of the truth.
We encourage a dishonest debate that masquerades as a paradox. A problem that is, therefore, unsolvable. But we really can’t live with leaving it there. It isn’t real or true.
If there were any daylight at all between the euphemism and its meaning, we would have a more honest debate. And in many places in our world, we have a healthy debate about it.
But often there isn’t. We all know how the mob boss puts out the hit. Just like the candidate who promised to pay the legal bills for any person who attacks his opponents’ supporters. The communicated meaning is obvious. And we can’t pretend that certain words become a legal incantation.
A Bigger Problem
This is also why so many object to the disparities in the criminal punishment system. It is easy to put one person away on flimsy evidence and another can take advantage of this euphemistic “protection” (often saying “it was only a joke.”). The use of this certainty about language is unjustly applied.
The protection of obscured speech and motivation seems to evaporate depending on wealth, race, gender, and crime.
There is little question of whether the president incited the violence of January 6th. Like a mob boss, we all know what he was saying. Because there was no daylight between what he said, what he wanted, and the actions intended to give him what he wanted.
If the law can’t protect us from something we all know is happening, then perhaps we have misunderstood the meaning and purpose of our law.