4 ms·

Is there a difference?

by seydor 1y ago

sbarre 1y ago
Passive vs. active voice. "Job losses" is chickenshit language. If you're going to fire people, at least have the integrity to own your actions, instead of trying to make it sound like something that "just happened".
- grugagag 1y ago
  That would make Bezos look bad .
  - jalapenos 1y ago
    "Regrettable attrition". Going to go wash my hands after typing that.
- itsoktocry 1y ago
  >Passive vs. active voice. "Job losses" is chickenshit language. "Job losses" isn't passive voice. "Jobs were lost" would be passive voice. Why are people so hung up on "job losses", as if we don't hear this every day? Who cares?
  - sbarre 1y ago
    You're being pedantic for no good reason. You know what I meant. If you don't care about this conversation, why are you participating?
orlp 1y ago
Passive voice deflects responsibility and agency. Loss happens, firings are a decision.
- slumberlust 1y ago
  Ironically, Amazon's document writing culture stresses NOT using passive voice, but it seems acceptable to do so when you need to spin a PR.
portaouflop 1y ago
It’s the same language used when taking about “car accidents” They aren’t accidents, it’s an inherent part of how we designed cars and roads and we decided as society that we are ok with thousands of people killed by cars.
- playworker 1y ago
  killed by drivers, cars are inanimate objects
  - tirant 1y ago
    Killed semantics includes intentionality (and lack of), while dying by accident clearly removes any intentionality whatsoever. So it's much more faithful to truth to talk about accidents than by killing, even if both terms are semantically correct.
    - portaouflop 1y ago
      It’s intentional though see above comment by throw0101c. I agree that it’s a hard pill to swallow especially if you are US American.
      - hrimfaxi 1y ago
        > I agree that it’s a hard pill to swallow especially if you are US American. Can you point me to countries that don't deflect agency in accident reporting? Here's a headline from just today in the UK: > Man airlifted to hospital after pedestrian hit First line in of the story: > A man has been airlifted to hospital after a vehicle hit a pedestrian.
        portaouflop 1y ago
        You are right, it’s an international problem. But from my experience few nations are so dependent on the car as the US. It so very similar in Germany where I’m from but mostly because it’s such an important part of the economy. But in a big city you can easily live without a car. I found this almost impossible in the US.
rs186 1y ago
The same difference as in "He died of heart attack" and "She was killed in a car crash".
- Sharlin 1y ago
  Or one of my favorites, "was hit by a car". While true in the strict physical sense, that’s like reporting that someone was "shot by a gun".
  - jalapenos 1y ago
    Maybe it's an effort to be more polite than "by some prick who can't drive". I suppose there's at least one example of someone being hit by a car that slipped off a car transporter too. "Had car thrown at him by negligent shipping company" would be a more click worthy headline though
  - isleyaardvark 1y ago
    "killed by an officer's duty weapon" or "died in an officer-involved shooting" are the ways police departments tend to put it.
- jalapenos 1y ago
  Fox news spin: "his heart murdered him, as we all know all hearts secretly want to do to all of us".
01HNNWZ0MV43FF 1y ago
Same as "hackers stole your data" versus "we left your data on an open S3 bucket"
- jalapenos 1y ago
  We didn't fail to secure things because we spent our security budget on security theatre - we were just kindly offering those poor hackers money to support their families.
dust-jacket 1y ago
in the uk job losses and firings are different things, with different meanings, so the criticism here is a bit off. job loss / redundancy = there is no need for this role any more. your job is gone firing = you are not appropriate/fit/whatever for this role. your employment is gone. someone else can have your job (the passive/active criticism is totally right though. this should read "Amazon CUTS / REMOVES 14,000 jobs")
mrtksn 1y ago
It’s like a rocket flew into the refugee camp vs the occupation forces struck the refugee camp with a rocket.
- jalapenos 1y ago
  My favourite is during terrorist attacks in Europe, it's always like "car attacks crowd". Like the car's wife had left it and it had decided to go out with a bang.
  - mrtksn 1y ago
    Damn cars why do they do that! Ironically soon cars may start actually doing it.
  - mschuster91 1y ago
    The problem is, there isn't much initial facts to base on, other than that a vehicle has plowed into a crowd. In the early 30-60 minutes, you often don't even know how many people died and how many are injured because emergency services are still working on rescue (alive people) and recovery (dead people). Maybe it's political or religious terrorism, maybe it's suicide-by-cop, maybe it's a generic mental health issue (think schizophrenics whose head voice tells them to commit violence), maybe it's a health issue (heart attack, driver floors the gas pedal), maybe it's a streetrace gone wrong, maybe it's a DUI, maybe it's a mechanical issue (loss of brake/steering), maybe it's a geriatric driver who just doesn't have any idea where he even is, maybe it's a driver blindly following Maps and ignoring the policeman winking at him, thus not noticing he's heading right for a rally. You see, the list of issues why a car plows into a crowd is very very long, and often it takes the police hours to determine what's going on. They gotta interview bystanders and victims, they gotta obtain and review camera footage, possibly search the driver's home and digital devices - because unlike Twitter pseudo-journalists and click/ragebait "news" media, police can normally be held accountable if they claim something in public that doesn't turn out to be true.
    - jalapenos 1y ago
      I think usually the vehicle has not, say, been flung unoccupied into a crowd by an oversized slingshot experiment gone wrong. So it'd be nice if they'd say like "a man has ploughed into a crowd" - we'll safely assume he didn't use an actual plough since I hear those are fairly slow. It does make a difference regarding people viewing news outlets as informers rather than an arm of some kind of agenda.
jonkho 1y ago
“It’s not what you say, but how you say it” syndrome.

Is there a difference?

by seydor 1y ago

Is there a difference?

Passive vs. active voice. "Job losses" is chickenshit language. If you're going to fire people, at least have the integrity to own your actions, instead of trying to make it sound like something that "just happened".

grugagag 1y ago
That would make Bezos look bad .
- jalapenos 1y ago
  "Regrettable attrition". Going to go wash my hands after typing that.
itsoktocry 1y ago
>Passive vs. active voice. "Job losses" is chickenshit language. "Job losses" isn't passive voice. "Jobs were lost" would be passive voice. Why are people so hung up on "job losses", as if we don't hear this every day? Who cares?
- sbarre 1y ago
  You're being pedantic for no good reason. You know what I meant. If you don't care about this conversation, why are you participating?

orlp 1y ago

Passive voice deflects responsibility and agency. Loss happens, firings are a decision.

slumberlust 1y ago
Ironically, Amazon's document writing culture stresses NOT using passive voice, but it seems acceptable to do so when you need to spin a PR.

portaouflop 1y ago

It’s the same language used when taking about “car accidents” They aren’t accidents, it’s an inherent part of how we designed cars and roads and we decided as society that we are ok with thousands of people killed by cars.

playworker 1y ago
killed by drivers, cars are inanimate objects
- tirant 1y ago
  Killed semantics includes intentionality (and lack of), while dying by accident clearly removes any intentionality whatsoever. So it's much more faithful to truth to talk about accidents than by killing, even if both terms are semantically correct.
  - portaouflop 1y ago
    It’s intentional though see above comment by throw0101c. I agree that it’s a hard pill to swallow especially if you are US American.
    - hrimfaxi 1y ago
      > I agree that it’s a hard pill to swallow especially if you are US American. Can you point me to countries that don't deflect agency in accident reporting? Here's a headline from just today in the UK: > Man airlifted to hospital after pedestrian hit First line in of the story: > A man has been airlifted to hospital after a vehicle hit a pedestrian.
      - portaouflop 1y ago
        You are right, it’s an international problem. But from my experience few nations are so dependent on the car as the US. It so very similar in Germany where I’m from but mostly because it’s such an important part of the economy. But in a big city you can easily live without a car. I found this almost impossible in the US.

rs186 1y ago

The same difference as in "He died of heart attack" and "She was killed in a car crash".

Sharlin 1y ago
Or one of my favorites, "was hit by a car". While true in the strict physical sense, that’s like reporting that someone was "shot by a gun".
- jalapenos 1y ago
  Maybe it's an effort to be more polite than "by some prick who can't drive". I suppose there's at least one example of someone being hit by a car that slipped off a car transporter too. "Had car thrown at him by negligent shipping company" would be a more click worthy headline though
- isleyaardvark 1y ago
  "killed by an officer's duty weapon" or "died in an officer-involved shooting" are the ways police departments tend to put it.
jalapenos 1y ago
Fox news spin: "his heart murdered him, as we all know all hearts secretly want to do to all of us".

01HNNWZ0MV43FF 1y ago

Same as "hackers stole your data" versus "we left your data on an open S3 bucket"

jalapenos 1y ago
We didn't fail to secure things because we spent our security budget on security theatre - we were just kindly offering those poor hackers money to support their families.

dust-jacket 1y ago

in the uk job losses and firings are different things, with different meanings, so the criticism here is a bit off. job loss / redundancy = there is no need for this role any more. your job is gone firing = you are not appropriate/fit/whatever for this role. your employment is gone. someone else can have your job (the passive/active criticism is totally right though. this should read "Amazon CUTS / REMOVES 14,000 jobs")

mrtksn 1y ago

It’s like a rocket flew into the refugee camp vs the occupation forces struck the refugee camp with a rocket.

jalapenos 1y ago
My favourite is during terrorist attacks in Europe, it's always like "car attacks crowd". Like the car's wife had left it and it had decided to go out with a bang.
- mrtksn 1y ago
  Damn cars why do they do that! Ironically soon cars may start actually doing it.
- mschuster91 1y ago
  The problem is, there isn't much initial facts to base on, other than that a vehicle has plowed into a crowd. In the early 30-60 minutes, you often don't even know how many people died and how many are injured because emergency services are still working on rescue (alive people) and recovery (dead people). Maybe it's political or religious terrorism, maybe it's suicide-by-cop, maybe it's a generic mental health issue (think schizophrenics whose head voice tells them to commit violence), maybe it's a health issue (heart attack, driver floors the gas pedal), maybe it's a streetrace gone wrong, maybe it's a DUI, maybe it's a mechanical issue (loss of brake/steering), maybe it's a geriatric driver who just doesn't have any idea where he even is, maybe it's a driver blindly following Maps and ignoring the policeman winking at him, thus not noticing he's heading right for a rally. You see, the list of issues why a car plows into a crowd is very very long, and often it takes the police hours to determine what's going on. They gotta interview bystanders and victims, they gotta obtain and review camera footage, possibly search the driver's home and digital devices - because unlike Twitter pseudo-journalists and click/ragebait "news" media, police can normally be held accountable if they claim something in public that doesn't turn out to be true.
  - jalapenos 1y ago
    I think usually the vehicle has not, say, been flung unoccupied into a crowd by an oversized slingshot experiment gone wrong. So it'd be nice if they'd say like "a man has ploughed into a crowd" - we'll safely assume he didn't use an actual plough since I hear those are fairly slow. It does make a difference regarding people viewing news outlets as informers rather than an arm of some kind of agenda.

jonkho 1y ago

“It’s not what you say, but how you say it” syndrome.