4 ms·

Ah yes, COVID-19, technical name for a respiratory disease, totally in the same category as Gestapo

mdp2021 5y ago
I think the point was that creating a term can create the idea of an entity one can taint with emotional meanings which may be used to enforce an agenda. «Telescoped words and phrases [and] abbreviations» for that aim do not need to be referencing political entities only. (The poster was probably just eliciting smiles or reflections when suggesting 'COVID') Mussolini, it seems, choose 'OVRA' as a name for the secret police to suggest the "piovra" (octopus), the tentacled entity which reaches anywhere in agility and hypnotically remains fixed at its core while acting with unfolding determination at its periphery. These constructions can be more easily be emotionally charged. Instrumental emotional charge can be invested in terms from other areas, though instrumentality may remain political.
josefx 5y ago
Technical name is a bit funny, in the past we had no issues calling something a "spanish flu", "bird flu" or "Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease", now these are officially considered "inappropriate". With the WHO responsible for picking an interim name until an appropriate name could be issued when an inappropriate name enters common use. They even list tourism among the things that absolutely need protection against this type of language misuse[1]. [1] https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/163636/WHO_HSE_FOS_15.1_eng.pdf https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/163636/WHO_...
- robocat 5y ago
  > Spanish Flu Which the Spanish called “French Flu”, and which many signs point to it actually being “American Flu”: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC340389/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC340389/
  - josefx 5y ago
    > American Flu Funny how Wikipedia mentions that it was used early on in France but in order to avoid antagonizing an ally journalists were advised (source is a bit short on that) to call it the Spanish flu[1]. So there was also active suppression going on to keep the source out of the news, just back then it was at least partially war time censorship. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu#Geopolitical https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu#Geopolitical
joophro 5y ago
>technical name In an era where almost all viruses/diseases have been referred to by non-technical names, the rapid switch to a technical mouthful of “COVID-19” or “SARS CoV 2” is absolutely political. I remember sitting at an airport last year watching newscasters denigrating the use of the term “Wuhan virus” as I had just walked past a sign warning about MERS (Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome) just on the other side of security. It felt other-worldly. Then, after the CCP PR campaign of using the technical term had fully caught on, all of same news stations called the original variants the “UK/Kent variant” and the “Indian variant” for weeks/months until they caught themselves and switched to the Greek alphabet. And like programming with too much abstraction and bad variable names, the new Greek alphabet names for the variants actually obscure useful information — you no longer know where the hotbed locations are for each variant, and you have go looking online for their origins, instead of just having that info in the name. West Nile, Guinea Worm, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, Lyme disease, Ross River fever, Omsk Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola, MERS, Marburg Virus, Spanish Flu, Lassa Fever, Legionnaires Disease. All without fanfare or protest. Wuhan virus? Oh, no no no. That would look bad for the party. Can’t have that.
- bellyfullofbac 5y ago
  Geez, how hard is it to just call it Covid rather than moan about it? What next, do you want to complain about having to call the HIV-caused disease AIDS, do you prefer "gay cancer"? "Gay plague"? As to where the hotbed for Delta variant is: nowadays, everywhere!
  - joophro 5y ago
    Nobody is “moaning”. We are pointing out obvious inconsistency. What’s ironic about THIS particular virus is that if any virus DESERVES a regional origin name, it’s this one, as this one was most likely created in a lab and released on the world due to lab failures. Perhaps I could entertain the notion forgoing regional naming for viruses of natural origin, so as to not unduly destroy tourism, travel, and reputation of areas that just got unlucky. In this case, though, name and shame is more than fair — it’s deserved. And consistent!
- 5y ago

mdp2021 5y ago

I think the point was that creating a term can create the idea of an entity one can taint with emotional meanings which may be used to enforce an agenda. «Telescoped words and phrases [and] abbreviations» for that aim do not need to be referencing political entities only. (The poster was probably just eliciting smiles or reflections when suggesting 'COVID') Mussolini, it seems, choose 'OVRA' as a name for the secret police to suggest the "piovra" (octopus), the tentacled entity which reaches anywhere in agility and hypnotically remains fixed at its core while acting with unfolding determination at its periphery. These constructions can be more easily be emotionally charged. Instrumental emotional charge can be invested in terms from other areas, though instrumentality may remain political.

josefx 5y ago

Technical name is a bit funny, in the past we had no issues calling something a "spanish flu", "bird flu" or "Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease", now these are officially considered "inappropriate". With the WHO responsible for picking an interim name until an appropriate name could be issued when an inappropriate name enters common use. They even list tourism among the things that absolutely need protection against this type of language misuse[1]. [1] https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/163636/WHO_HSE_FOS_15.1_eng.pdf https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/163636/WHO_...

robocat 5y ago
> Spanish Flu Which the Spanish called “French Flu”, and which many signs point to it actually being “American Flu”: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC340389/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC340389/
- josefx 5y ago
  > American Flu Funny how Wikipedia mentions that it was used early on in France but in order to avoid antagonizing an ally journalists were advised (source is a bit short on that) to call it the Spanish flu[1]. So there was also active suppression going on to keep the source out of the news, just back then it was at least partially war time censorship. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu#Geopolitical https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu#Geopolitical

joophro 5y ago

>technical name In an era where almost all viruses/diseases have been referred to by non-technical names, the rapid switch to a technical mouthful of “COVID-19” or “SARS CoV 2” is absolutely political. I remember sitting at an airport last year watching newscasters denigrating the use of the term “Wuhan virus” as I had just walked past a sign warning about MERS (Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome) just on the other side of security. It felt other-worldly. Then, after the CCP PR campaign of using the technical term had fully caught on, all of same news stations called the original variants the “UK/Kent variant” and the “Indian variant” for weeks/months until they caught themselves and switched to the Greek alphabet. And like programming with too much abstraction and bad variable names, the new Greek alphabet names for the variants actually obscure useful information — you no longer know where the hotbed locations are for each variant, and you have go looking online for their origins, instead of just having that info in the name. West Nile, Guinea Worm, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, Lyme disease, Ross River fever, Omsk Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola, MERS, Marburg Virus, Spanish Flu, Lassa Fever, Legionnaires Disease. All without fanfare or protest. Wuhan virus? Oh, no no no. That would look bad for the party. Can’t have that.

bellyfullofbac 5y ago
Geez, how hard is it to just call it Covid rather than moan about it? What next, do you want to complain about having to call the HIV-caused disease AIDS, do you prefer "gay cancer"? "Gay plague"? As to where the hotbed for Delta variant is: nowadays, everywhere!
- joophro 5y ago
  Nobody is “moaning”. We are pointing out obvious inconsistency. What’s ironic about THIS particular virus is that if any virus DESERVES a regional origin name, it’s this one, as this one was most likely created in a lab and released on the world due to lab failures. Perhaps I could entertain the notion forgoing regional naming for viruses of natural origin, so as to not unduly destroy tourism, travel, and reputation of areas that just got unlucky. In this case, though, name and shame is more than fair — it’s deserved. And consistent!
5y ago