Okrent

Daniel Okrent's “The War of Words: A dispatch from the Front Lines” and responses " Nothing provokes as much rage as what many perceive to be The Times's policy on the use of "terrorist," " terrorism" and "terror." Ther is no policy, actually, but except in the context of Al qaeda, or in direct quotations, these words, as explosive as what they describe, show up very rarely."(Daniel Okrent)

Not having a policy in which the T-word is to be used brings real confusion when reading certain articles. As Nunberg explained in his essay, " How much wallop can a simple word pack?"; he adresses the context disagreement when president Bush uses Terror and Terrorism interchangably. The question is what are we actually fighting for/against. The fear or the actuall action? Is it true what Okrent said, the t-word is only used," in the context of Al qaeda". If we truly can't define the words terror,terrorism,terrorist than how can we substitute them in our language to mean something they don't. (Sam's Group) //paragraph 10 "The Armed Conflict in the Area Between Lebanon and Egypt may yield the most linguistically volatile issues confronting Times editors, but I've encountered a ferocious tug-of-war between advocates of each of the following as well: Genital mutilation vs. genital cutting ("would you call ritual male circumcision 'genital mutilation'?"). Liberal vs. moderate ("you're simply trying to make liberalism look reasonable and inoffensive" as in calling Michael Bloomberg a "moderat Republican"). Abuse vs. torture ("if the Abu Ghraib victims had been Ameican soldiers," The Times "would have described it as torture"). Partial birth vs. intact dilation and extraction (the use of the former demonstrates that The Times "has embraced the terminology of anti-abortion forces"). "Iraqi forces" vs. "American backed forces" ("aren't the Sunni insurgents Iraqis?"). Don't get me started on "insurgents," much less homeless vs. vagrant, affirmative action vs. racial preferences, or loopholes vs. tax incentive.// I believe this paragraph shows his entire idea of the use of terror and the play on words people use in controversial areas. Terror just as much as any other hot topic word, is used only when felt appropriate and when beneficial to the speaker or writers ideal presentation. Like any word in any language different orientations and perceptions of the word evolve. Terror is fear, its destruction, its a group? Are we really fighting a war on terror? Nobody really could say yes or no because of the different perceptions each person has on the word. It is entirely dependent on how the diction is received by the audience. (Liz's Group)

paragraph 2 "Among pro-Israeli readers (and nonreaders urged to write to me by media watchdog organizations), the controversy over variants of the T-word has become the stand-in for the Israel-Palestine conflict itself. When Israel's targeted assassinations of suspected sponsors of terrorism provoke retaliation, some pro-Palestinian readers argue that at any armed response against civilians by such groups as Hamas is morally equivalent. Critics on the other side say The Times's General avoidadnce of the word "terrorism" is a political descision, and exactly what Hamas wants.

Response: Whenever any American hears or speaks the word terrorism, they immeadatly think of eaither 9/11 or arabs or the Israel-Palestine conflict. It has lost its origional meaning which is, as defined by dictionary.com: the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, esp. for political purposes; becasuse it is over used to a spicific event. Because of this, many stereotypes have been applied to Arabs and most of the time, when American people see a person of Arab decent, they generalize their opinion on the person and see a terrorist in front of them, proving that Hamas gets what they want. (Theresa, Egan, Alex, Taylor)