The Trump Administration has ordered the CDC from using these words in official statements:

• vulnerable
• entitlement
• diversity
• transgender
• fetus
• evidence-based
• science-based

I posted about this here.

Then I saw the above comment from a poster in Facebook on a friend’s page.

“Love it, doing away with fake words! Go Trump! Just watching liberals freak out and get hysterical over something every other day was worth my vote!”

— Neil Neuwirth

This seems really bizarre. I certainly have severe objections to censorship of any type, particularly as it relates to communication and government. This is the opposite of transparency. Any democracy-minded person should be alarmed when censorship enters the official discourse, particularly at the highest level of government. Mr. Neuwirth does not seem to be worried about that.

Then he calls those words “fake.” I don’t understand. What are the true words for these concepts? Give me a better word for “diversity!” Or “transgender” or “science-based.” I don’t understand the concept of “fake words.” How does a scientific organization like the CDC speak about a fetus without using the word “fetus?”

In the past year, Trump and ilk have created this new concept of “fake” which has become to engender everything they don’t like, it appears. If they don’t unilaterally approve, it’s “fake.” But the contrary is actually the case. When you censor communications, you are hiding the true meaning and covering it up with obfuscation.

Purposefully obfuscating simple concepts so the public can no longer grasp what is really going on is propaganda. We should be weary of propaganda. While the Trump camp now tries to make us believe that all media, foreign and domestic, is “fake news,” except of course Fox News, I suspect the opposite is actually true. When I watch Hannity now I always feel that I am bombarded by propaganda, yet when I read the Washington Post, I feel I am getting clean, succinct and world-class journalism.

By definition, half of the population in the United States has an IQ below average. By banning “big words” the government is pandering to those who have not learned to think critically.

Making America Dumb Again is in full swing.