More and more, things just happen

More and more, things just happen

Join the discussion on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/antlerboy_once-you-start-to-see-language-that-hides-activity-7219226016265711616-8G7j

Once you start to see language that hides who is responsible, you can’t unsee it.

Obfuscatory de-agentification, you could call it…

‘Three people died in a car accident’ somehow omits anyone having taken that action. ‘A driver caused an accident that killed three people’ is a lot more accurate, isn’t it?

‘Ten civilians were killed in an airstrike’ really means ‘a [country or group] killed ten civilians’.

These are my favourite, and sadly most common examples — and it’s fascinating to see which actors are absent from the picture. Cyclists kill people but when it’s a car, ‘people died’. Whichever country is favoured isn’t in the picture when ‘people are killed’, but other countries get full credit when they kill.

But it happens all over the place:

‘Funding was cut for the education programme’ — wow, a reverse miracle.

‘Jobs are lost in a restructure’ — which as we know happens by magic, or fate.

‘Prices have increased across the board’ or ‘the price has gone up’.

‘Service was interrupted for several hours’

‘Hundreds of employees have been laid off’

‘A large area was contaminated by the spill’

‘Funds were misallocated in the project’

‘The contract was terminated early’

‘Safety protocols were not followed’

‘The release date was pushed back’

The passive voice, the impersonal language. It’s often not even intentional, but it reveals something central to the writer’s biases. By neutralising agency, taking responsibility out of the picture, it shapes public perceptions and reduces accountability.

Once you see it, you can’t unsee it — and, like ice-nine, I’m now passing it on to you.

Let’s start calling it out wherever we see it. What are some examples you’ve noticed?