Political language has become a weapon against the truth and Israel - opinion

Political language, Gil Troy argues, no longer merely describes reality. It increasingly reshapes it, turning disagreement into a contest over who can drain words of their meaning most effectively.

Troy contrasts the plain-speaking image he associated with Americans and Canadians during his childhood with the Orwellian language he once linked to Soviet Communists. He says democracies have lost that supposed clarity. On the American right, he points to Donald Trump’s renaming of the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America and his proposal to call Lake Ontario Lake America.

On the left, Troy focuses on anti-Zionists who, he argues, have inflated the meaning of “genocide” to attack Jews and Israel. He says the term traditionally required an intent to destroy a nation and referred to mass murder on a vast scale. He accuses Israel’s critics of using it whenever Israel defends itself.

The column also criticizes the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation over its handling of language surrounding the September 11 attacks. Troy says CBC managers instructed journalists not to call the attacks terrorist attacks, leading instead to a description of hijackings and plane crashes. He writes that the wording avoids moral judgment about the purposeful mass murder of civilians.

Troy then turns the argument into satire. He suggests calling Greenland Trumpville, Israel Bibleland, the United States the Disunited States, and the Ivy League the Gulag. He proposes Lindy Lane for Tucker Carlson, recalling Charles Lindbergh’s antisemitism and sympathy for Nazi Germany, and suggests Dumpster Fire for Candace Owens’ street. The exaggerated labels are intended to expose what Troy sees as the political abuse of naming and euphemism.

The column’s target is broader than any single phrase. Troy presents political branding, media euphemisms and accusations surrounding Israel, Zionism and the Jews as part of the same struggle over whether words retain stable meanings.