Crusader War College

"Lexijacking"

What's "lexijacking", you ask? It's my lame attempt at naming a phenomenon that I noticed since I was 15 and an avid reader of the Santa Ana Register.

"Lexi-" is a prefix that refers to "words". For instance, lexography is the study of words.

"-jacking" is derived from "hijacker" and has been used as a suffix to describe a "carjacker": Someone who illegally takes over something belonging to another, appropriates it for their own use, and benefits from the value created by the former owner.

In this context, "Lexijacking" is someone taking over a word to appropriate or utilize its benefits, when it was someone else whose efforts originally invested the word with its value and benefits.

I can imagine people scratching their heads, so I'll provide some examples.

The Communists were consummate lexijackers, and it was reading about them in the Register that I noticed the phenomenon: "Democratic" was a word used in the formal titles of some Warsaw Pact nations, even though the only thing democratic about them was the appearance of the people voting for Communist government leaders exclusively. The word "democratic" and "democracy" have good connotations, because the United States is a Republic that employs "democracy" (voting by the people) to choose its leaders. Two centuries of running a Republic, plus slow, sometimes violent, work to extend the privilege of voting to everyone invested "democracy" with real, objective value and meaning: Mention the words that come to mind when you think of the word "democracy", and "United States" will be on the short list. Heck, the good meaning and value of "democracy" is so associated with the United States that those wackos accusing the United States of slipping into "Fascism" fervently hold, at the same time, the conflicting belief that this slide into the darkness can be reversed in the next election by voting for Kerry. The thought that Kerry, a presumed anti-fascist, can be elected into the office of a "fascist" nation already occupied by a "fascist" leadership shows how strong this association has become: If the United States was REALLY Fascist, the "democratic" process of voting is as meaningless as it was in Communist Russia, Nazi Germany, and Saddam's Iraq.

When I say that the Communists "lexijacked" the word "democracy", I mean that they slapped it into the formal titles of their nations with the express purpose of investing themselves with the beneficial aura that surrounds a real democracy, hoping to gain benefits that they otherwise wouldn't have by default. This aura was generated, in modern times, by the good reputation and integrity of the United States. In reality, they were no democracies, but out and out tyrannies. Nevertheless, some people were fooled into investing these despotic regimes with the virtues of real democracies, and thus indirectly investing them with virtues they did not truly possess.

The Soviets "lexijacked" the word "Socialist", incorporating it into their title as an obvious play toward the Europeans, who felt good warm fuzzies when they heard that word. England was socialist. France was Socialist. Hey, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is just as innocuous and democratic as they are! Or so the Russian Communists wanted people to think.

The motivation behind lexijacking is to get some benefit from the word "lexically hijacked" without having to actually meet the strict definition of the word, or to earn the reputation of those to whom the word has real meaning, and whose actions GAVE the word the good connotations in people's minds.

I am assuming, when words get lexijacked, that words have value and meaning that are worth "-jacking", just as a car has a value that makes it susceptible to being carjacked. It is closely related to the concept of "reputation" and "the family name."

Before John F. Kennedy ran for any office, the name "Kennedy" was synonymous with "smuggling". After his assassination, there descended on the Kennedy name an aura that has shielded its possessors since that time, and which blinds people to the vast differences between John F. Kennedy and the rest of his family: JFK was a supply sider whose tax cuts early in his Administration fueled an economic boom that sustained America despite the real expense of the Vietnam War, the accelerated rise of the Welfare State, and an ambitious space program that is still unequalled: The only boots on the moon are American. In contrast, Ted Kennedy has fought every supply side tax cut brought forth by Republicans, the weight of his words increased by the aura of the Kennedy name, despite denying the genius of the Kennedy who invested that name with the aura that now surrounds him.

I am sure you can, if you think a bit, come up with other instances of "lexijacking". The title "Sanitation Engineer", a euphemism for "garbage man", lexijacks "engineer", a term referring to someone who studies for at least four hard years in a challenging, solid, well established, and prestigious area of academic study, transferring the aura of "hard working and intelligent accomplishment" to a job that can be filled by a high school drop-out or an illegal alien who couldn't qualify to be admitted on his own merits, and who jumped the line because he couldn't offer anything to the nation into which he stole.

How about the word "veteran" as applied to Democratic Candidate John Kerry? "Veteran" has been invested with the aura of "Surviving a great ordeal with integrity and valor." "Fighting in defense of your country." "Enduring comradeship under crisis." This aura has been bestowed on the word "Veteran" by countless men and women going through countless wars, fighting, surviving, perhaps being wounded, enduring the loss of friends who wouldn't live to be veterans. "I was a veteran of World War II" MEANS something because that war put down a great evil. "I was a veteran of Gulf War II and the Iraq recovery" is going to mean just as much, and add even more to the glory attached to the word "Veteran". Hell, it has been so sacred, that to justify discrimination against SOME veterans, the adjective "Vietnam" was attached to it in order to DENY the truly brave and patriotic souls who fought in that war the aura of the term "veteran" that they REALLY deserved (lexispoiling?). This worked so good, that discrimination against "Vietnam Veterans" is NOW legally prohibited. (And of all the special interests, this is one of the few for which protection of this sort is truly justified, seeing how this was a group of people whose discrimination was created and tolerated SOLELY by leftists.)

Now, in the lexijacking of the year, this bilious, pustulent, hypocritical boil on the public anus of our glorious Republic never fails to invest himself with the aura brought by the word "veteran" at any public gathering of more than three people or one TV Camera, despite everything he did to GET OUT OF, DEGRADE, and DESTROY the American military, whose actions and members give the word its glory and worth.

As another example, consider the term "special", which was lexijacked by those who work with people with mental disabilities. I do not, for a single minute, despise or put down those with such disabilities. My real beef is with those who, probably with good intentions, lexijacked the word to invest their charges with the aura of possessing something that they clearly do not have. Just as a carjacker, by stealing and using a car for their own use, degrades the value of the car, so does the lexijacker degrade the value of the word they've stolen: NOBODY is now fooled by "special students", "special programs", and "special schools".

Personally, another lexijacked term was "choice". As in "pro-choice" with regard to the abortion debate. "Pro-life" is NOT a lexijacked term: the issue is abortion, which is undeserved killing, and being for life means being against undeserved killing. When it comes to killing someone who's not deserving of it, the choice facing the killer MAKES THEM GUILTY, not innocent. "Choice" of course, has a good, warm, positive aura. Who's against being able to choose, since choosing implies having variety and lots of options, things which are good in themselves? But choice, as applied to killing someone? I don't give a fuck in hell denying the "choice of killing or not killing" to a murderer, a terrorist, or a genocide bomber. I don't lose a millisecond of sleep over it. Nobody else in their right mind should. Yet, a third of Americans aren't bothered by abortion, and vigorously support even fewer controls on abortion. "Pro choice"? Choice to do what, exactly?

This post is already too long without going into the lexijackings of "Christianity", "Love", "Peace", and "bright". Instead, I'll devote the space to the real motivation for this post: The ongoing lexijacking of the word "Marriage".

Why do the gays want that word to be applied to their union, other than to undeservedly clothe themselves with its aura? An aura that was generated by countless millions and millions, perhaps billions, of faithful HETEROSEXUAL marriages and passionate romances between men and women that have been chronicled, eulogized, and celebrated for many thousands of years? If it was merely a matter of getting legal rights, then a civil union would be more than enough. But no, "civil union" just simply does not have the aura that "marriage" has, so "marriage" is the term they want applied to their account, even if they have to use two judges in two separate states to cram it down 200+ million throats. No matter that it is spitting in the collective eyes of billions of past and present REAL marriages, very few, if any at all, being Homosexual or Lesbian.

I should mention that not all inappropriate word appropriations are "lexijackings": I'm the first to cheerfully admit that this blog isn't being hosted on the web server of a REAL college, and I truly do believe we live in a democratic republic, not a vassal state of the Rottweiler Empire. And our gracious Emperor will be first to admit that fact. Who hasn't been amused at the lexijacking antics of Dilbert's Pointy Haired Boss, as he tries one fad, trick, or twist after another to get respect from the people actually "doing the work" (on the rare times he lets them work)? It's all in fun and good humor when the lexijacking is so obviously a joke. In contrast, real lexijackers are SERIOUS. They WANT TO PROFIT IN A REAL SENSE from the value the word brings, without doing the necessary work to qualify for the word. We may laugh at Dilbert's boss, but Dilbert's popularity is due to the fact that such bosses DO EXIST, demanding respect without wanting to earn it, when earning it is the only way to get the real thing.

And, in the end, that's the essence of being a leftist/liberal/democrat in the world today: Wanting the benefits and values, but not wanting to do what it takes to qualify. Getting together with like minded slackers and demanding as a mob what they couldn't earn as individuals. Ignoring the rules, conventions, and traditions, while demanding being respected as much as the one who does.

So how do you combat lexijacking?

Lexijacking is, at the base, the misapplication of value laden words. It can only be combatted by YOU refusing to use the word the way the lexijacker wants YOU to use it.

Unfortunately, the best examples of this process involve words that were not lexijacked in the first place.

One of the most bitterly contested weapons systems during the 80s was the MX missile. "MX" was a program designation, not a proper term. The Reagan Administration gave it the name "Peacemaker", obviously to associate it with the Legendary Colt .45, whose use in the wild west indeed contributed to its eventual pacification.

The MX Missile was one of an array of military systems proposed or deployed by the Reagan Administration to challenge the Communists into an economic footrace that Reagan knew they couldn't win. Naturally, it was bitterly opposed by leftists and liberals of all stripes. Being consummate lexijackers themselves, they knew the potential power and value of a word, so they either refused to use the term "Peacemaker", continuing to use "MX Missile" exclusively, or used the phrase "the so-called Peacemaker" after using the term "MX Missile", always in a dismissive tone of voice.

Fact is, "Peacemaker" WAS the official name of the MX missile. And, as far as it contributed to the urgency that the Soviets felt in trying to keep up with the Americans, it DID help "Make the Peace": We did not win the footrace with the USSR by beating it. We won it the moment we heard the thump of the exhausted corpse of communism hitting the track, followed by its death rattle.

I've already mentioned the lexijacking of "choice". Note that the vast majority of major media writers and commentators refuse to use the word "Pro-life", choosing instead to use "anti-abortion" in opposition to "pro-choice". Since abortion kills a living unborn human being, and being anti-abortion means being against the killing of living unborn human beings, and since being against being dead is being FOR-life, "Pro-life" is an appropriate term, not a lexijacked one. Yet, most people would call those opposed to the unrestrained killing of unborn human beings as "anti-abortionists" rather than pro-lifers, thanks to the media's careful screening of the words they choose to employ or ignore.

Conclusion
I don't know if the term "lexijacking" will mean anything to you, my patient reader. I like to have a word or phrase for all the important concepts that I hold in my mind. Maybe you can come up with a better terms than "lexijacking" and "lexijacker". What IS important is that we recognize the threat of the habit of people of fraudulently appropriating the value of a word without earning the right to use the word as a noun or adjective. "Something for nothing" is the rallying cry of the welfare state, and taxes are the means for getting it. It is the same rallying cry of idiotarians and the policially correct in the realm of ideas, and misappropriated words are the means for getting it in that realm.

[02/27/04 edit] Richard Roark points out that "Star Wars" was another lexijacking. Strictly speaking, it was not because the Reagan Administration called the space based defense system SDI (Strategic Defense Initiative). It was those who opposed a defense against nuclear missiles who called it "Star Wars". The title emphasized the idea that it was a science fiction fantasy (like the movie series of the same name), while the "Wars" part of the title tried to slander the system as an offensive system, when it it really is the most moral defensive system on the drawing board today. There's already an appropriate word for this maneuver: Slander.

[02/28/04] No one less than Victor Davis Hanson has remarked, in his latest article at National Review Online that:

...preemption is now a politicized, debased word. It is part of the anti-Bush lexicon and has lost any real meaning for the foreseeable future of its usage. The same may be true of "multilateralism" and "unilateralism."

What he is not talking about is lexijacking, but the draining effects on the word when it has been lexijacked. Apparently, his inclination is to discount the word while heeding the definition. While the Left steals away our guns, our property, and devalues our values, it seems that they are also destroying the value of words as a means of communication. Destruction everywhere they go...

Posted by ptah at February 25, 2004 08:03 PM