Even on their own terms, the civility police had missed the point. At that point, when the evidence was clear that this bill would hurt people (and was overwhelmingly rejected by public consensus) and the Senate Republicans were looking to pass it anyway (whether to achieve tax cuts, deliver a political promise to the hard right, or placate Donald Trump) there was no space for civil debate. People in power were simply trying to do an indefensible thing. Elizabeth Warren was using the language that people use to describe indefensible actions, and she was using it clearly and accurately. But certain types of political minds were more offended by her description of these actions than by the actions themselves. In “Politics and the English Language,” George Orwell wrote that “political speech and writing are largely the defence of the indefensible.” Politicians mask descriptions of their atrocities in vague or meaningless language to obscure them. In civility-policed discourse, something similar is at play. The language that can plainly describe terrible things is declared out of bounds, so, in response to an atrocity, you’re faced with either normalizing it or stepping out of line to name it.
—David Iscoe, in “Political science”
Published to write.house by Bix Frankonis. Comments and replies by email are welcome.