Re: [RC] Gripes about words

[David R. Block]

Title: “A society that does not recognize that each individual has values of his own which he is entitled to follow can have no respe

You can go back to TR. It's just that the first thing that pops into the head of someone when they hear "progressive" isn't Teddy Roosevelt, it's Nancy Pelosi, or some such. Don't think that's what you have in mind... ;-) You have to change the frame of reference from current usage and the intended audience has to know that you are doing it. Lest you be grossly misunderstood as endorsing Nancy "Stretch" Pelosi.  David “A society that does not recognize that each individual has values of his own which he is entitled to follow can have no respect for the dignity of the individual and cannot really know freedom.”—Fredrich August von Hayek   On 1/10/2012 9:58 PM, bil...@aol.com wrote: My question simply is : Where does it all  stop ? I have no idea of the exact count  of words that have been hopelessly corrupted from their origins or common use sometimes for centuries, but it surely is a large number.   We should cave-in to homosexuals and conceded the word "gay" ? I sure in heck will do no such thing. I am sick and tired of worrying about the words of approximately 20 Christmas carols, and also sickened when reading historical texts and there's the word "gay" and the next time I may need to discuss a book written in 1911 or a magazine article published in 1952, and must explain things to people who are clueless about how words change meanings over time  --needlessly.   The only published things that count are published in 2011 or 2012 and nothing else matters ?   But this isn't just the Left, it is popular culture,  aided and abetted by the media, especially entertainment.   Why, exactly should I read today's Leftist meanings of "progressive" back into things I research about TR ?  I can't discuss TR at all because he ran as a Progressive in 1912 ? Huh ?   This, for me, is a professional matter, as a professional  historian. Which is to say that in many ways the past is alive and doesn't die, its always there, always part of culture, and education, and it matters. My universe is ca 3000 BC to the present, and is far from being only the present.   So I prefer to fight the current warped-Left and deny them, as much as possible, their use of heritage words. Way I look at it, they don't deserve even one word they have co-opted from the past. Nor do homosexuals ands feminists etc. I refuse to concede even a single word to them. This sometimes applies to the Right, too, needless to say.   If I need to talk to such idiots, they are ( so to speak ) in my class and they receive a flunking grade for misuse of language, among other things. When I want to,   I can be as arrogant as any sonovabitch teacher you can imagine.   They don't teach you this in teacher school, but you learn it soon enough when you have your own classes to instruct. Try it sometime, then you will understand.   Billy -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <RadicalCentrism@googlegroups.com> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <RadicalCentrism@googlegroups.com> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org