In a piece Glenn linked titled “Words you can’t say at the Pentagon,”Stewart Baker makes it clear that top Army bureaucrats (along with a large number of politically correct people in the ruling classes) only want Islam referred to with stultifyingly propagandistic terms such as “the religion of peace.”
It’s easy to yell about free speech, but if you’re in an environment where you don’t have it (such as the military, the government, schools, academia, many large corporations, etc.) you might just have to adapt to the lingo using whatever magic words are demanded, no matter what.
So what happens if a member of the Religion of Peace goes postal and opens up on a crowd of people, and makes clear his belief that he is doing it in the name of his religion? It’s like, if you can’t call someone like Major Nidal Hasan an Islamist, an Islamic terrorist or a Jihadist, then how is he to be described in discussions? A religious peace shooter? A religious shooter for peace? A shooter of the religion of peace? A religious peacenik?
Regardless of what they were supposed to say, it is clear that the Army personnel who dealt with Hasan knew what was going on:
Off the record, it seems, everyone thought Hasan was dangerous, a nutjob, or an Islamist, and perhaps all three.
On the record, though, no one would criticize him. You don’t rise in the armed forces if you can’t read your superiors. And the rising officers who met Hasan knew what their superiors wanted without having to be told. Islam was a religion of peace, and Muslims in the Army were a welcome sign of diversity. Treating Hasan as a dangerous Islamist would put those messages at risk.
And that might be bad for their careers. So instead they spun Hasan’s rants into gold. His 2007-2008 evaluation praises Hasan for having “focused his efforts on illuminating the role of culture and Islamic faith within the Global War on Terrorism.” It adds that his “work in this area has extraordinary potential to inform national policy and military strategy. … His unique interests have captured the interest and attention of peers and mentors alike.”
The next year was the same, full of praise for Hasan’s “keen interest in Islamic culture and faith and his shown capacity to contribute to our psychological understanding of Islamic nationalism and how it may relate to events of national security and Army interest.”
I can’t help noticing the quotation marks, and I guess putting words in quotes is bureaucratically permitted. So when referring to Major Hasan, would it be acceptable to just call him a follower of the “religion of peace” — with the latter in quotes?
In the same manner, just keep the quotation marks around the rave reviews he drew:
“extraordinary potential to inform national policy and military strategy.”
Check.
“His unique interests have captured the interest and attention of peers and mentors alike.”
Who could argue with that?
And his “keen interest in Islamic culture and faith and his shown capacity to contribute to our psychological understanding of Islamic nationalism and how it may relate to events of national security and Army interest.”
Yes! Double plus absolutely!
I’m being a little sarcastic, but I’m sure some would say that no sarcasm is needed.
It’s all so… so religion of peace!
See? I didn’t even need to put that in quotes!
Comments
10 responses to “Who needs words you can’t say when you can use the words you can say?”
Reminds me of an old joke about writing references for (soon to be former) employees:
1 Bob Smith, my assistant programmer, can always be found
2 hard at work in his cubicle. Bob works independently, without
3 wasting company time talking to colleagues. Bob never
4 thinks twice about assisting fellow employees, and he always
5 finishes given assignments on time. Often he takes extended
6 measures to complete his work, sometimes skipping coffee
7 breaks. Bob is a dedicated individual who has absolutely no
8 vanity in spite of his high accomplishments and profound
9 knowledge in his field. I firmly believe that Bob can be
10 classed as a high-caliber employee, the type which cannot be
11 dispensed with. Consequently, I duly recommend that Bob be
12 promoted to executive management, and a proposal will be
13 executed as soon as possible.
Addendum:
That idiot was standing over my shoulder while I wrote the report sent to you earlier today. Kindly re-read only the odd numbered lines.
Kathy that is hilarious!
I’m surprised it isn’t widely circulated as a chain email.
🙂
Actually, I am surprised that Hasan hasn’t been tagged with the “far right” label. He sure sounds like one of those anti-government activists we keep hearing about, as the greatest threat the nation has faced since the dark days of the Bush junta.
Those evaluations were so chickenshit because, perhaps, the fools decided that sliding through is the easiest way to go and the whole mess soon would be someone else’s responsibility.
Also, maybe they felt that, if they were accurate, they would spend the next three years in court, courtesy of ACLU and CAIR.
Hasan would be far right by any logical leftist standard. Of course, there are no logical leftist standards, which means that objecting to right wing fundamentalist theocracy is right wing! So is objecting to anti-Semitism!
“Conservative” Andrew Sullivan can explain, I’m sure.
Actually those evaluations tell the exact truth — in ways that those who have ears can hear, etc. It’s just that NO ONE dared interpret them.
WOW. I wonder how much of this is going on at all levels. I’ve encountered it in schools in other PC circumstances…
When you can’t tell the truth that’s in front of your eyes, we’ve reached a new level of twisted.
“I’m surprised it isn’t widely circulated as a chain email.”
It was – over a decade ago. There was another one – I just found it. This one is simple double-meaning…
Dear Search Committee Chair,
I am writing this letter for Mr. John Smith, who has applied for a position in your department.
I should start by saying that I cannot recommend him too highly. In fact, there is no other student with whom I can adequately compare him, and I am sure that the amount of mathematics he knows will surprise you.
His dissertation is the sort of work you don’t expect to see these days. It definitely demonstrates his complete capabilities.
In closing, let me say that you will be fortunate if you can get him to work for you.
Sincerely,
A. D. Visor
“Actually those evaluations tell the exact truth — in ways that those who have ears can hear, etc. It’s just that NO ONE dared interpret them.”
Writing that kind of performance evaluation has been going on in the military since forever – I’ve written one or two of them myself, on personnel who were absolutely useless, but not actually useless enough that you wanted to give them an outright bad assessment that they could contest. See, the challenge is to make it absolutely factual, but open to two wildly different interpretations; the one that looks perfectly proper and even rather complimentary to the person you are writing it about – and yet, when examined by someone of a cynical persuasion, all the warnings are there.
This was the former Major Hassan writ large in performance evaluations. The real pity of it is, he was a useless, untalented, bigoted dirtbag who was carried all the way by the system because he was their precious little diversity snowflake, and not one person or institution all the way along had the guts to pull the plug on him on the basis of failure to meet training standards.
A classic of alternate line stenography is yhis letter written by Georges Sand to her lover Alfred de Musset:
« Je suis très émue de vous dire que j’ai
bien compris, l’autre jour, que vous avez
toujours une envie folle de me faire
danser. Je garde un souvenir de votre
baiser et je voudrais que ce soit
là une preuve que je puisse être aimée
par vous. Je suis prête à vous montrer mon
affection toute désintéressée et sans cal-
cul. Si vous voulez me voir ainsi
dévoilée, sans aucun artifice mon âme
toute nue, daignez donc me faire une visite.
Et nous causerons en amis et en chemin.
Je vous prouverai que je suis la femme
sincère capable de vous offrir l’affection
la plus profonde et la plus étroite
amitié, en un mot, la meilleure amie
que vous puissiez rêver. Puisque votre
âme est libre, alors que l’abandon où je
vis est bien long, bien dur et bien souvent
pénible, ami très cher, j’ai le cœur
gros, accourez vite et venez me le
faire oublier. À l’amour, je veux me sou-
mettre entièrement.
Votre poupée. »
@SgtMom – I agree that “It’s just that NO ONE dared interpret them.” Unfortunately, anyone who dared interpret them would probably have been in a world of trouble.
That’s something we need to FIX.