Words Hurt

Everybody remembers the childhood chant:  “Stick and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.”  The idiom implies that since words cannot cause us any physical pain or damage, they can be ignored or disregarded.  But it just isn’t so.  Words hurt!  Words may not break our bones, but they can do a lot of emotional and psychological damage.  That is why bullies use “names” to beat up on another person.

Apparently, I’ve been blind to the partisan name-calling that occurs on social media, or perhaps I’ve just simply ignored it, trying to remind myself of that old childhood chant.   In my vocabulary, a liberal is “adult, benevolent, broad-minded, friendly, generous, kindly, lenient, sympathetic, tolerant, latitudinarian, well-informed.”  Other synonyms for liberal are: flexible, humanistic, reformist, rational, indulgent, reasonable, receptive, unbiased, unbigoted, and unorthodox.”   Likewise, in my vocabulary, a conservative is “middle-of-the-road, traditional, constant, fearful, conventional, old line, and right-wing.” Other synonyms for conservative are:  steady, controlled, guarded, orthodox, firm, and bourgeois.  None of these synonyms are vulgar, insulting, or denigrating of a liberal or a conservative person.  Synonyms are words that “mean exactly or nearly the same as another word,” as the word “shut” is a synonym of the word “close.”

Reading “comments” on Facebook and various other social media outpourings, I have gained many new so-called synonyms for “liberal, Democrat, and left-wing” and “conservative, Republican, and right-wing.”  The difference between these new synonyms and the old (traditional synonyms above) is that they show that derogation (“the perception or treatment of someone or something as being of little worth”) has become part of our division as Americans.

New words for “liberal, Democrat, and left-wing” include:  “hippie, commie, elitist, fanatic, pinko, extremist, snowflake, libertard, bleeding-heart, and tree-hugging.” New words for “conservative, Republican, and right-wing” include: “Teabagger,  moron, idiot, racist, ideologue, deplorable, bigot, and misogynist.” These words are insulting, denigrating, and hurtful to all!  They are “sticks and stones” that do, in very fact, “break the bones” of our democracy.  Conversation, much less compromise, is almost impossible among those who see one another as being of little worth!  Words hurt and destroy. 

"And when he left there, [Jehu] met Jehonadab the son of Rechab coming to meet him, and he greeted him, and said to him, "Is your heart right, as my heart is with your heart?"* And Jehonadab answered: "It is." [Jehu said], "If it is, give me your hand." 2 Kings 10:15. (John Wesley's text for "A Catholic Spirit")