Gaslighting, Gerrymandering, and Sanewashing

Key points

Political slogans and newly coined words can be funny and trenchant.

Sanewashing masks incoherent speech by simplifying it, misleading audiences.

The English lexicon encourages both precision and evasion.

Empty or inflammatory speech challenges us to speak up.

The English language is extraordinarily adaptable and our tongue friendly and receptive to innovation and creativity. Speakers of American English have welcomed words and coined new ones for accuracy and for fun.

Colonialism played its role in this capacity, of course. For instance, 700 years of colonial rule in Ireland gave Americans bog, whiskey, hooligan, shenanigans, and smithereens. If you say heaps of in place of a lot, you got it from droll Australians.

And where would we be without recourse to the