Friday, 26 March 2010
As the tail-end of a parliament, and probably a government, approaches, and despite the strong spotlight shining on their affairs after the expenses furore, behaviour that is, at best, inappropriate emerges from our political class all over the place.
To avoid raising my blood pressure too high, rather than focussing on the actual behaviour, I’m going to look at some of the language used – because becoming more aware of the (conscious or unconscious) linguistic tricks that politicians – and “normal” people – use helps enormously in enriching our understanding of what is really going on.
The impetus for this article was a wonderful article in the FT (Financial Times) by Chris Cook (if you register, you can read it here. Stephen Byers, a former minister, having been caught in a “honeytrap” offering his services as a lobbyist and stating that he could help clients change, alter or prevent laws and regulations that they disliked coming into force (he wasn’t the only one – two other ministers fell into the same trap), made the following statement, that he…
”regretted that my misleading comments might be taken seriously”
Read, and re-read that statement. What is Stephen Byers regretting? Is it that he made misleading comments – something for which he can reasonably be held responsible? Not really, no. He regrets that other people might take his comments seriously – and, as this relates to the behaviour of other people, surely it is unreasonable to hold him directly responsible for that?
Some time ago, on the subject of the potential misuse of NLP you can read it here, I discussed the problems that can arise when people use their knowledge of language to deliberately mislead, distract from and distort the truth. However, it is not an issue with NLP, or with any knowledge of language – the issue is with the intentions of the people who use (misuse) that knowledge.
As part of awareness-raising, it is highly instructive to actively look for phrases used (and the political sphere is a rich seam to mine) that seem perfectly acceptable from a superficial point of view but that, under scrutiny, are either misleading or meaningless. How about these:
I’m sorry you’ve taken it that way
meaning I’m sorry about your behaviour
”X-brand” toothpaste combats oral bacteria
It combats it, but does it win?
Some people say he can’t be trusted
Who says? How many? Does the person saying this agree?
You might find this is the best taste you’ve ever experienced
But then again…
In the comment section below, I’d like to start collecting the most meaningless, distorting and distracting real examples of language that we see. Who is going to start us off?
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Please leave your thoughts and comments here
Reeta Luthra | Stress and Health
Hi Simon - in the article you mentioned yesterday on twitter, the headline was incredibly misleading.
Headline: Pupil power: The children who chose their own head --> implies the head was recruited on the sole decision of the children.
Reality: The children did NOT choose their own head, they were merely allowed to state a preference.
The headline is emotive and works in getting the person to read the article. If the person is not careful, their reading of the article will be influenced by the false emotions the headline has already generated in them.
Simon Roskrow
– Yorkshire
That's a brilliant example Reeta, and one that I should really have spotted myself - perhaps my "energetic" reaction to the article clouded my preferred dispassionate precision!
Newspaper headlines, news reports (radio and TV), politicians, writers - it happens all the time, and I'd not go so far as to suggest it should never happen...pure, unemotive language can get rather dull.
The important bit, I think, is to understand why - the intention behind the choice of language - and to see how comfortable you feel once you have a perspective on that. In the case you mention, the journalist probably made the decision to use that language in order to get the article read, and I'm OK with that...it seems to me to be fair enough. If however, as in the case of Stephen Byers, the intention is (appears to be) to shift blame and avoid responsibility, whilst that is understandable, it's less acceptable.
As an aside, I would recommend that anyone even remotely involved in education (specifically at primary/secondary school level) takes a look at the article that Reeta refers to...
Thanks for your valuable insight Reeta.