The BBC was recently criticized for a headline it used to announce the death of Phil Spector, the music producer behind such hits as “Da Doo Ron Ron” by The Crystals, and “You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling” by The Righteous Brothers. The BBC’s initial headline read, “Talented but flawed producer Phil Spector dies aged 81”. This was changed to, “Pop producer jailed for murder dies at 81.”
The BBC normally does a better job presenting the facts of the news and leaving one person’s opinion out it. The public were right to call them out on their failure. Quoting from the BBC’s own article on the reaction to the story:
“The headline was also discussed on TV and radio programmes on Monday, including Loose Women and Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, and prompted an article in the Guardian. The phrasing of the BBC’s article – and others like it – were “a reflection of how a man’s ‘genius’ is often viewed as more important than a woman’s humanity,” said columnist Arwa Mahdawi.
https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-55702855
Words matter. They can instill fear or give hope, they can lift us up or diminish us. Mr Trump was a great ‘diminisher’ when he penned nicknames for his opponents, whether they be from his own party – Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, or from the Democrats – Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. We can argue how mature such behavior is, let alone the level of decency, but the bottom line is, sticks and stones may break your bones but names can also hurt us.
Words can elevate us, galvanize us, and fill us with a sense of resolve. Delivery is important, but imagine history’s great speeches without these arrangement of words, which many of us can recite without even looking them up on the internet, from “Four score and seven years ago…” to “I have a dream,”and from “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end, but it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” to “We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.“
Tony Robbins is a phenomenal exponent of correct word use. With the precision and deft-handedness of a brain surgeon he selects the right tool, at the right time, for the right job, to charge his expectant audience with positive energy. Indeed I did this myself just then. How much less color would there have been if I had said, “Tony Robbins always knows he right thing to say to make his audience feel good?” Words matter.
Using the right words can be easier if you have a toolkit, but an online thesaurus can work really well. Deploying the right words comes with curiosity and passion. I love etymology, and I am a self-confessed word bore. I know, for example, that the plural of octopus is not octopi but octopodes, because we pluralize words that come to us through Latin with an ‘i’ (cactus becomes cacti), but octopus comes from Greek. (Apparently octopuses is the truly correct plural because it is used so extensively. It seems the Greek version is too obscure, and the Latin version is too wrong. As I said, I can be a word bore.)
“Give me a word, any word, and I show you that the root of that word is Greek.”
Gus Portokalos ~ My Big Fat Greek Wedding
You don’t need to get all fancy-shmancy with words. You can have a smaller amoury and still be effective, as Lincoln was in the Gettysburg address.
“Of the 276 words used, only fifteen have more than 2 syllables. None of these are particularly ‘fancy’ and one word alone – dedicated – accounts for 6 of them.”
http://www.speaklikeapro.co.uk/Gettysburg.htm
My Tai Chi teacher taught his class more than Tai Chi; he too was a deft and deliberate users of words. He began every class by saying, “allow yourself to relax.” Allowing yourself to do something immediately conveyed sentiments of release and surrender. If he had in contrast said, “try and relax” it could have had the opposite effect, because we commonly equate trying with effort, and even force.
Pausing to select the right words has other benefits. Pausing allows me to select the right words for myself first; I want to fill my head with words that are nurturing, supportive, and energizing; why would I want to walk around with a lot of garbage in my head? The pause also helps me assess whether any words are needed at all. To follow Lincoln’s example at Gettysburg, less is sometimes more… but when less is still something, let’s make it count!
