If you’ve read very much of anything I’ve written (on my blog or elsewhere), you’ll see a number of themes.

One of these is the abuse of language—most particularly in the name of dynamism.

Put simply, the idea is, people (often intentionally) use a word to mean something it was never intended to convey, in order to accomplish some end or other.

Sometimes it’s as simple as wanting to sound intelligent.

My father and mother watched a fair amount of sports on television in the time one Howard Cosell was acting as what amounted to an announcer and “color commentator.”

He did a great deal in the realms of football and boxing—though he covered other sports, too.

Howard was infamous in my mother’s eyes, for using the expression, “We’ll be back momentarily.” It always stuck in her craw that he did this. “He means in a moment, but momentarily means for a moment.”

Howard was a “trailblazer” in using the word momentarily in this way.

Today, you’ll virtually never hear it used as for a moment. It’s almost always something people say when they mean in a moment.

There are a number of other examples of this sort of thing I could cite, but I want to concentrate on just one in this piece.

Today, I want to discuss the idea of “genocide.”

I’m sure you’ve heard words like suicide, and homicide.

You may not have have heard the expressions, fratricide or patricide.

You almost certainly have used words like insecticide, and herbicide.

There’s an obvious link between each of these words, in that all of them end in the suffix “cide.”

The suffix “cide,” is essentially translated “the killing of.”

These days, you’ll hear folks discussing the idea of displacement of a given group of people and conflating it with the term genocide.

Though it’s accepted—to the point that many places on the Internet discussing meanings and origins count it reasonable to do this—in reality genocide deals with killing, not things like displacement, or even maltreatment.

I bring this up because I recently witnessed a discussion in which the Palestinians’ treatment by Israel was the primary subject.

I’m not arguing that the Jewish state is or isn’t potentially guilty of genocide where the Palestinian people are concerned (though I would tend to side against this idea, since the conflict between the Jews and the Palestinians is primarily in the Gaza Strip, and there are Palestinian folks in other areas not geographically aligned with Gaza, who are largely unaffected).

Furthermore, I would point out that Palestinians not threatening what the Jews would call the “Jewish homeland” are typically not at risk of being sought out and killed by Israel.

You can indicate the Jews are in error regarding what constitutes a liability to Israeli security. I’m not willing to state what’s correct or incorrect where that’s concerned—I lack the knowledge to make the argument in either direction, and well understand that to be the case.

The point here is, you can make a case that Israel is guilty of genocide where the Palestinians are concerned, and where we’re likely to disagree that’s true, I can understand your making it.

What I can’t stomach, is people accusing anybody of genocide, when there’s a disagreement over a given piece of land, in which one attempts to “run the other out of” that area.

This is not genocide—whatever else you may choose to call it.

Another point.

When talking about Christians, or Muslims, if someone is trying to exterminate that group, this is not a genocide. Here’s where things get a bit wonky. Talking about killing off all Jews by family is genocide, but based on religious faith is not.

The distinction is, when you try to kill off a given familial group, like Norwegians, Poles, Chinese, or one might even argue, residents of the United States (though it’s a bit of a stretch to do so), you’re attempting to commit genocide.

You’ll find a plethora of examples on the Internet in which they misuse the word to discuss the persecution or killing of Muslims, Christians, and other “faith based groups.”

Such persecution or killing is horribly bad, to be sure, but it is not genocide.

Why do I care how you use the term genocide?

To digress for just a moment, I’ve pointed out any number of times, that my son is Moderately Autistic. That first word—Moderately—matters a great deal.

There are a large number of folks—probably most accounted Autistic—considered Mildly so, and it’s a reality worthy to be called out without doubt. That considered, if I told you it was circumstantially the same thing that my son is Moderately Autistic, and another child is Severely Autistic, I would certainly be (whether by intent or accident) making light of those dealing with Severe Autism!

The same sort of distinction occurs between Mild and Moderate Autism.

Likewise, one should draw a bright line in one’s mind, between religious persecution, and (even bloody and evil) land disputes, and genocide.

Apples and oranges are both fruit, but they’re not the same thing.

If you ask me for a cucumber, I hope you don’t expect to receive a zucchini.

When we allow language to become so blurry—whether as a result of laziness or in

tent—that one cannot use a word, but that people are able to connect to unrelated things based on a bad definition of that word, we take away the ability to aptly describe or explain what is.

It’s on this basis I argue for careful use of language in general, and in this case, particularly where the term genocide is applied.

We already have enough of a problem with moral equivalence. To be clear, there are arguments to the idea that one who breaches any part of “the law” is guilty of all. I hope Christians in my audience will “get the reference” here.

Even so, being unable to distinguish between one thing and another because we’ve erased boundaries that should separate what things mean, and what we desire them to mean, confounds our ability to accurately convey meaning.

Too long; didn’t read?

When the word genocide is used to mean anything other than “the attempted extermination of a given genetic group of humans,” it’s not just being badly applied, it’s making it more or less impossible to convey that meaning when it’s desirable or necessary so to do.

As usual, here’s hoping you’re well and happy. If that’s not true at present, I pray it will soon be the case.