The ability to use language is one of the most powerful advantages that humans have over other living things. Language lets us communicate information and ideas to each other. We use it to preserve and transmit useful knowledge over time, and across generations. It allows us to cooperate with each other in ways that other creatures cannot.

     Language is not just something we have invented. Noam Chomsky has demonstrated that the deep structure of language is hard wired into our brains. This is the result of an evolutionary process that gave a selective survival advantage to humans who were adept at learning language.

     We as a species have evolved to become language specialists.

     But, despite the considerable power and utility of language, it can also have the effect of obscuring reality. Sometimes this is the result of historical accident, and sometimes it is the result of the deliberate manipulation of language by people.

     I’m not talking about situations where people deliberately lie. Everybody lies at some time or another in their lives, some more than others. We are all aware of the risk of that type of manipulation.

     Instead, I am talking about the fact that the structure and vocabulary of a particular language can profoundly shape the way that the speakers of that language view the world. This can happen in a number of ways.

     For example, a language simply may not have any words for particular things or qualities or ideas. Speakers of such a language are much less likely to think about the existence of these unnamable things or qualities or ideas.

     Another example comes from languages that assign genders to nouns. It is not a distortion for “el toro” to be considered masculine, but when a language assigns genders to shoes and ships and sealing wax, it distorts the entire mindset of the speakers of that language. They react at some level as if these things actually had sexual characteristics.

     A subtler example arises when a language (or speaker) uses the same word to describe two different things. People tend to react as if the different things share similar qualities simply because the same word is used to describe them both.

     Some of the more enduring (but not endearing) examples of this latter type of distortion from the last fifty years is the use of the word “war” to describe different types of governmental campaigns.

     I know you may already thinking about George “I’m a war president” Bush, but he did not start this fad. LBJ started a “ war on poverty.” It was not a war but he used that phrase in an effort to muster public support, and to tell the public that the program was important to his administration.

     Of course, after that there was a “war on drugs.” Again, this terminology was chosen in order to muster public support and to send signals to the public about the importance of the program. The war terminology of the “war on drugs” was also used to justify the infringement of constitutional rights, although not nearly to the extent that this has been done more recently.

     Now we have the “war on terrorism.” George Bush has used the war metaphor to justify breathtaking power grabs both internally and internationally. After all, if it is a “war” then we must be willing to follow orders in order to win the war. The logic behind this is deeply flawed.

     While it has actually spawned a real war in Afghanistan and a real war in Iraq, for the most part the “war on terrorism” is not a real war. Real wars are efforts by governments to control geographical territory through the use of military force.

     The war on terrorism is an effort to wipe out certain political ideas, and the people who hold them. It is similar to ethnic cleansing, but it is really more like ideological cleansing.

     There is a Russian word for this type of thing, but I don’t think there is a name for it in English.

     The word is Pogrom. And it’s not a good thing.

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