A question about our choice of words and why we choose them...?

Question

Anyone remember the George Carlin bit about shell shock vs post tramatic stress syndrome? Well I was thinking about it and other various word evolutions(I said the "E" word so it fits R&S) Do you think that we keep changing the words we have for meanings that never change in an effort to make OURSELVES feel better? Ya know, as opposed to "Not hurting anyones feeling" ?
Like Shell Shock, then Battle Fatigue, then Post Tramatic Stress Sydrome... the guy is still all f****** up and in distress no matter what we call it... do our PC words merely seek to gloss over the unpleasentness WE have thinking of it? Cause I am sure he doesnt care... Of course there are many terms we do this with... this was a single example... now I am rambling... or am I "Speaking on beyond the needed point?"

Answer 1

Jack is not conceited, Jack has "self-evident validation actuation perception". ;)

Answer 2

There are a lot of reasons that our choice of words, or the meaning of certain words, changes. Shell shock (to use your example) was the term used after World War II (not sure if it was used after WWI) to refer to a certain type of disorder that was seen among veterans. Since this disorder was not widely recognized in the medical field, shell shock was the accepted term. Only later did the medical field determine that there was a real disorder caused by exposure to extreme situations like battle, and it was dubbed "post traumatic stress disorder". Now you rarely hear of "shell shock", but you hear a lot about "post traumatic stress".

In some cases the words change because we learn more about the concept behind the word(s), such as the case above. In other cases, changes are made for political correctness, or because the meaning of the word originally used no longer applies.

Answer 3

PC makes idiots out of everyone involved. PC gives credit where no credit is due. The victims are criminals and the criminals are the victims. PC is just political nonsense. When you hear a politician speak, you really don't take him seriously because he is politicking. We recognize the politician speaking lies, yet we fail to see it in ourselves and each other. Time to clean up our language and make it real again.