refugee, IDP, evacuee

[Jonathan Lighter]

It would be even more revolting to yours truly if the entire chain if events were instigated by the comments of that bare handful of refugees (out of hundreds of thousands who may not object).

And that would imply, though not quite entail, that the politicians involved saw a chance to get some air time and went for it, devil take the hindmost.  Now they look like "leaders," as the sheep line up to follow.

Sorry, now that I think of it, "devil" may be a naughty word.  I don't mean to imply anyone involved is a servant of you-know-who (the name might be even more offensive), or is personally a supernatural power of evil. I apologize too for "hindmost," which as everybody will agree must simply be another word for "ass," which, however, appears not to be offensive anymore.

Off-topic, thank God :  A few months ago a talking head informed us from the screen that to determine (roughly) the relative popularity of a TV show, you should count the occurrences of the word "ass" in an average episode.  The more successful the series, the higher the "ass" count.  That's entertainment !

As always : we report, you deride.

JL


Harrold Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Harrold Wilson Gray
Subject: Re: refugee, IDP, evacuee
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

FWIW, as the listserv's token black, uh, Negro, uh, colored person, uh,
person of color, African-American, or whatever other lame-assed term is
currently in use, I personally do not find any of these terms
objectionable in any way whatsoever, with the sole exception of
"insurgent," which I find appallingly insulting and racist, implying,
as it does, that the black population of New Orleans is, for no reason
whatsoever, in armed rebellion against the government of the United
States, which is only trying to help.

-Wilson Gray

On Sep 7, 2005, at 4:24 PM, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Benjamin Zimmer
> Subject: Re: refugee, IDP, evacuee
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
>
> On Wed, 7 Sep 2005 16:17:09 -0400, sagehen
> wrote:
>
>>> I hadn't heard of any "refugee" objecting to the word before the
>>> televised statement of the African American members of Congress went
>>> out last week.
>>>
>>> If the Rev. Jackson said that "refugee" implies/ means "criminal,"
>>> the
>>> objections become even more ludicrous. I hadn't heard that, either.
>>>
>> My first hearing of "refugee" was in an interview on NPR with a
>> person so
>> designated, and she was objecting to the term for herself and the
>> others
>> with her. The Jesse Jackson echo came later, if the timing of these
>> broadcasts was in proper order.
>
> The Congressional Black Caucus started complaining about "refugee" in a
> press conference on Friday morning (Sep. 2). When was the NPR
> interview?
>
> http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0509/02/lt.01.html
>
>
> --Ben Zimmer
>

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com