Yesterday I went for a long walk, and my route happened to take me past a large, very desirable residence, the kind that you probably don’t get much change out of three quarters of a mill from these days.
I was interested to see a huge homemade poster in an upstairs window which read ‘LEAVE THE OIL IN THE GROUND! RENEWABLES ARE HOPE!’. The irony of having a huge fuck off Range Rover and a VW saloon parked up on the front drive seems to have entirely escaped the owners.
Anyway, there it was again, that word. ‘HOPE’. I’ve gone on before about words that become so overused that in effect they become meaninglass; ‘executive’ and ‘luxury’ spring to mind. I fear that ‘hope’ and its corollary ‘hate’ are going the same way.
What makes this a cunt however is that these words aren’t just being devalued, they’re being hijacked. They’re being politicised and weaponised by groups and organisations with a particular viewpoint or agenda to push. If you endorse the view, you’re right thinking and progressive, you’re endorsing ‘hope’. Disagree, and you’re asking to be labelled a reactionary, far right or what-have-you, so by definition you’re a ‘hater’, and a candidate for that most dreaded of all forms of ostracisation, *gulp* cancellation.
This hijacking of words seems to be happening a lot lately, mostly by the SJW and wokerati types as far as I can see. Voice an opinion contrary to the prevailing orthodoxy, and you run the risk of being called out for ‘hate crime’. They’ll probably throw in a few choice epithets as well, you know, fascist, xenophobe, transphobe, and so on. This has proved to be a very powerful way of closing down discussion without actually engaging in it.
This appropriation is likely to continue, and I fear that it will only grow the longer that it goes unchallenged. I really hope that doesn’t happen. I’d hate it.
As an example … Sky News Link
Nominated by: Ron Knee
