Against “We,” “Us,” and “Our” in Policy Discourse
9th May 2016
Robert Higgs writes up something that has irritated me for years.
Rhetoric is often insidious, especially in political and policy-related discourse. The words a writer or speaker uses to express his ideas may easily tilt the reader or listener’s evaluation toward unwarranted acceptance or rejection. Politicians and others who make public pronouncements understand this effect, and they choose their words with an eye toward using the terms that make their arguments and proposals most persuasive.
Think ‘capitalism’, ‘price gouging’, ‘black market’, ‘frankenfood’, ‘Islamophobia’, etc.
Perhaps the most dangerous examples pertain to the ordinary, oft-used words “we,” “us,” and “our.” The danger arises because these words relate to groups of people, perhaps to groups as small as those with only two individuals, but often to groups comprising hundreds of millions of persons. Speaking in terms of collectives predisposes everyone who reads or hears the words toward the assumption that a collective is the appropriate concept for the consideration of what is right or wrong, desirable or undesirable for the government to do.
Whenever a Leftist wants to rope you into whatever Narrative item he (or she) is pushing, he (or she) always uses ‘we’, as if he (or she) and you were part of some group to which certain things ought to apply.