If we have no word for “freedom”, for example, how can the concept exist? Likewise, without the word “perimenopause,” how does one account for the surge of violence that erupts when presented with a loved one breathing through a whistling nostril? You see? Words matter.The other lovely thing about words is that they are always changing. Language is not static, but is in a continual state of renewal and adaptation. Yes, we all have a lot of fun bemoaning how Gen Z are abusing the sanctity of the English language with their “rizz,” “delulu,” and “lit,” but deep down we know that it’s a rite of passage for the young to come up with a new lexicon that baffles their elders. We all did it. I came of age during that bizarre Pauly Shore movie blip in the 1990s, when he would say things like, “don’t tax my gig so hardcore, cruster”. I used to try and talk like that, just to be cool.
However, I do have to put my foot down when words become more opaque and less nuanced. And when that is being done to satisfy an algorithm, action must be taken. If you are not on social media, you may have been spared this, but others of you may have become aware of a lexical shift that began a few years ago to avoid online censors, primarily on TikTok.
I will give you some examples. “Dead” has become “unalive/unalived”. To “die by suicide” has become “unalived themselves”. “Murder” is now “shmurder”. “Guns” are now “pew pews”, and “shot” is “pew pewed”. “Rape” has been absurdly censored to “grape,” “sexual assault” is “shmexual assault,” or “SA”. I have seen “paedophile” being cleaned up with “PDF file,” and “domestic violence” has been reduced to “DV”. This list is not exhaustive, there is more of this rubbish. (Sorry, more of this “untidied refuse”.)
“Unalived” has even made it into the dictionary. A perfectly serious sentence using this parlance might go: “A man with a history of DV graped and SA’d his partner, then shmurdered her and unalived himself with a pew pew.” And if that sounds ridiculous, it’s because it is.
A good friend of mine died recently and if anyone had called her “unalived”, I would have “un-not-hit” them in the throat. If someone has been raped or sexually assaulted, is it not the height of offence to make that hideous crime sound vaguely comical and reminiscent of a fruit salad?
This is not the first time that a new lexical register has emerged in order to obfuscate certain terminology and avoid sanctions. Polari was a dialect of the queer community with origins back in the 18th century. Although it is all but obsolete today, it allowed primarily gay men to converse in public spaces without risking arrest or community violence against them. Cockney rhyming slang emerged in the East End of London within criminal communities to avoid the bottle stoppers (coppers).
TikTok has very strict guidelines in force that rightly prohibit anyone showing sexually graphic content, nudity, drug use, violence, hate speech, disordered eating, and a whole lot more. When I say it’s strict, I mean it is strict. I once had a video removed because it violated their rules on sexually explicit content. What had I done? I showed an image of Michelangelo’s famous sculpture, David, who happens to be in the buff. TikTok is also one of the few social media apps that pays its content creators if they meet specific requirements, so you can understand why users are keen to toe the line.
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I cannot find any official list of prohibited words and I’m not convinced that using such terms will result in a penalty. In fact, I have seen plenty of content where such words are rightly and appropriately used. News channels use such terms all the time and still clock up millions of views. It seems like this censoring is entirely self-inflicted, and quite unnecessary.
Personally, I don’t believe that the correct use of such words is being suppressed online. But if they are, the answer is not to kowtow to such absurd censorship, but to push back and insist on using the correct language.
In fact, I would rather lose every single one of my social media accounts than call a rape victim a “grape victim”. If you ever catch me doing it, please feel free to, if not un-alive me, then definitely “un-silent” at me.
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