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This is too much for me. America? Anyone's there?
Message
De
02/12/2003 19:46:23
Dragan Nedeljkovich (En ligne)
Now officially retired
Zrenjanin, Serbia
 
 
À
02/12/2003 18:18:01
Information générale
Forum:
Politics
Catégorie:
Autre
Divers
Thread ID:
00855239
Message ID:
00855261
Vues:
18
>Orwell wrote in 1945 the "Big Brother" book. I read it back in 1987, under communism regime, copied by hand by someone, I don't know who - I wasn't able to find out. The most evil part was the "new-english". This thing was supposed to be a new kind of language, and no one would be able to pronounce sensitive phrases. One could use the word "Free" but only in phrases like this one: "this dog is free", but cannot construct phrases like that: "my mind is free".
>
>And Orwell was talking about communism there. The worse thing in the world.

George Orwell was actually picturing the wartime behavior of the British government, adorning the image with some of the real-communism traits. The difference is the same.

And the example you picked is the most benign one. Just look at the expressions used elsewhere: the armies don't retreat, they "take evasive action". One will not say "I don't know jack about geography", but rather "I am geographically challenged".

If you ever feel like peeing in The States, what will you be looking for? A toilet? Lavatory? WC? A room with "00" on the door? None of that - it's called "restroom". Just don't go there if you're just tired, the porcelain is not upholstered at all. You may get some rest sitting on the john, though.

The people with disabilities (formerly known as "invalids" - which still have the square with that name in the middle of Paris) have their own reserved parking spaces, called "handicapped parking". I once thought handicap was something used in horse races, but I was wrong.

We've had our share of newspeak in Yugoslavia. At some point, "enterprise" was a proscribed word, one had to say "organization of united labor". Teachers were called "lecturess of class curriculum", and farmers "individual agricultural producers" (which slang turned into "individual agricultural peasants").

So many years after the calendar year 1984 has come and passed, it's still the old Joe South's song of games people play: "never mean what they say, never say what they mean".

back to same old

the first online autobiography, unfinished by design
What, me reckless? I'm full of recks!
Balkans, eh? Count them.
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