I was told that one of the ways dyslectics are able to recognize and spell words is by associating the way a word looks with something more meaningful (to a dyslectic), like what they represent and how they sound. For instance when I see the word “penny” I think of holding a real penny.

Most of the time it works well (it can be a little slow sometimes), however there are those words that are hard to associate with actual things. Words that do not easily associate with concrete objects or actions are tricky, homonyms are also trouble.

Both are against me in the case of since, sense and cents.

‘Cents’ has never given me any trouble, even though it sounds like the other two, the picture for that word is obvious and unique. Those other two though, those are trouble.

Currently my trick for figuring out which of these two words is called for is to imagine a brain, when I want to write “sense.” As in “you got any sense?”. Conversely when I want to write ’since’ I think of a “river of time” or “one idea flowing in to the next” (dramatic isn’t it).

I wish I just knew which one to use with out having to think about it, but at least I know how to determine the right one to use if I give my self enough time to figure it out.

Some more homonyms I hate are rain, rein and reign. The first one is easy. Rain is easy to picture. The problem is when I have to spell either of the other two. I always want to spell it ‘rain’. Fortunately both of the bad ‘rains’ have good synonyms however there are lots of expressions and idiomatic statements I like that require them. Oh well, poetry vs spelling I guess.

First off, some definitions:

• Conservative – Holding to traditional attitudes and values and cautions about change or innovation.
• Liberal – Open to new behavior or opinions and will to discard traditional values.

So if I am a “liberal”, that means, on any given issue, odds are, I would support “change for the better” conversely, if I am a conservative I would usually want to “leave well enough alone”.

These are straight forward an sensible definitions. However I will bet, based all political discussion in the media, on the interwebs, or my own friends and family, if I hear those two words said, the speaker has much different definitions in mind. I am sure, if American’s adults were asked to define what it meant to be a liberal or a conservative volumes could be filled the different definitions. However one trend would undoubtedly emerge:

• Conservative = Republican
• Liberal = Democrat

Why we do this? We take perfectly good words with clear definitions and then twist them to sort of express things we already have perfectly good words for already, yet now we can be even less definitive then the already massively huge tents the major political parties represent.

Here is my understanding of why these words came to this sorry state. First off, English politics, in the UK there are political parties that are actually named Conservative Party and Liberal Democrats. So if I were in England it would make sense to call my self a “Liberal” if I supported the Liberal Democrats, maybe a little ambiguous, but given the context most people would know if I was referring to the political party.

The second reason for the slide of these words into ambiguity is that someone, (possible Rush Limbaugh) decided to make a list of the major issues and determined what positions represented traditional American values and which ones did not. That way you could run down a score card and decided just how liberal or conservative someone is. Then we get to make everyones decisions easier by labeling people.

This second (and primary) reason represents flawed thinking and resulted in a semantic disaster. There are so many examples of this, I do not know where best to start, so I’m just going to list a a few and, hopefully the idea will come through.

1. Take abortion, my parents consider supporting legal abortion a liberal thing to do. I do not, abortion has been the law of the land my entire life. Not only that, but according to polls most Americans think abortion should be legal. I think if something is widely supported and the law of the land for 35 years (older than me), it qualifies as a traditional American value.
2. Slavery, I would say being anti slavery is a pretty conservative view point. However if you go back 150 years, that would have not been the case. So, American is about 230 years old, slavery was abolished about 145 years ago, so we have had more years with out slavery than with it making it a more conservative view. However it was an integral part of our founding (not to mention thousands of years of human history) so maybe someone who apposes slavery is a liberal.
3. Federal Income tax, it is hard for me to imagine America with out a federal income tax, taxing our income strikes me as solidly conservative. However the income tax in America is a relatively new thing, but old enough that just about everyone alive today has lived with Federal income tax their entire lives. Getting rid of it sounds pretty liberal to me. However “conservative” politicians seem to be all over the ideas to get rid of the IRS and replace it with the “Flat tax” or the “Fair Tax“.

I could go on, and on and on. Whether or not something is a traditional American value is not an easy thing to pin down and will vary dramatically from person to person depending on when and where they were born and many other factors. The point is, the popular definition of these words is such, that they should should not ever be used. There is no point to using them. Well, I take that back, for some, there is a use for these words, an evil and dangerous use. This is where I get really riled up.

The primary “definition” of these words is obviously not to give us a clear understanding of someone political views. So why does not a day of news go by with out countless reference to “liberal” and “conservative”? Why on earth would anyone want to associate others and be associated with something that is essentially, meaningless? Because these labels is not treated as meaningless. I have heard about many elections that were won and lost based on how much of a liberal or conservative light a candidate was cast in. If you are a politician does anything actually matter less then then the “conservative” or “liberal” label you get stuck with? Why does something so nebulas, so ambiguous, so meaningless, seem to matter to much?

There are probably a lot of reasons. However the primary reason, is that people are lazy. We want to vote, but we do not want to have to actually spend a lot of time looking into and thinking about the political views a politician supports. Government policy can be complicated, sometimes very complicated, and we only have so much time on this earth, there are other things we want/need to do.

Defining a politician as “liberal” or “conservative” is an effective and easy method for getting enough people to win elections voting a particular way.

The ambiguity is the reason this technique works so well. If you are someone with a political agenda, maybe you are helping run an election, a politician, an editorial journalist, or anyone trying to convince people to vote a certain way, it does not matter what the politics are in your particular case, you are free to carefully choose whether you want someone to be considered a “liberal” or a “conservative” based on how many people you think will respond positively or negatively to those words. You do not need to give much regard to positions on any actual issues. Want to make everyone feel negatively about something or someone? Just add the prefix “ultra”, and bam, pure evil. You have achieved, what so many in politics seem to want more than anything, to “taking a stand”, to “laying out your agenda”, to “discussing the issues” and to “energize the base” with out having to say anything with any substance at all.

Political parties are supposed to make the decisions easier for us. However we have primary elections, and if nothing else, one message rings loud and clear: People in the same party sure disagree a lot. So how is a lazy voter to know who to vote for? “Conservative” and “Liberal” gives us a nice scale with “centrist” (our selves) in the middle. This allows us to put anyone on the sliding scale, the more to the right they are, the more conservative, the more to the left they are, the more liberal. So nice, so easy. This scale is really tempting for anyone who likes doing things other than pay attention to politics. It seems to hit the sweet spot for just the right amount thinking.

Human laziness, coupled with inherent ambiguity associated with trying to associated “liberal” and “conservative” to particular opinions is what makes these terms so dangerous and so pointless.

Many discussions I have been apart of have turned to politics. The phrase, “Well, I consider my self a liberal” almost inevitably comes up early on. Most of the time I let it slide, because if I did not I would probably say something everyone else would find confusing like “What you mean by ‘liberal’?”. Their confusion would be understandable, because everyone else seems to use that label as if it’s definition is a clear and obvious as the number 2.

Besides, usually I do not want to discuss semantics, I want to talk about something real. However, if there’s a third person, all to often they will chime in “oh well I’m a conservative”. I try to change the subject as quickly as I can. If I fail to do so in time, the discussion often degrades with lots ambiguous words and phrases being used, that doubtless (especially if the parties are from different ends of the political spectrum) would have very different definitions if the conversation is stopped to discuss semantics. I should point out here that I am as guilty as any of of throwing around words and phrases without thinking about how they could be defined differently by different people, but I’m trying to change my evil ways. I have found, that as I have improved, much more interesting, rich, and useful conversations can occur.

So in conclusion, there maybe times with the words “conservative” or “liberal” are just the right words to convey the meaning you intend. However, the odds are too high that person you are talking to is going to misunderstand you, even if you try to use the dictionary definitions. My advise to you is simple, just do not use the words “liberal” and “conservative” any more.

Many years ago I was taught a game that I really should play more, it is a great game for long car trips or any occasion where there an opportunity for a long conversation. Basically everyone talks as they normally would with the following rules:

• If someone uses any meaningless “filler words” like “um”, or “uh” they are punished. (Expletives are  a gray area, but in most cases those are also banned)
• If someone uses the word “like”, they are punished. (if you have to say something is like something else, you use the word “similar”)

Naturally the punishment needs to chosen in advance, usually ridicule is enough of a punishment.

It is a great game, everyone starts sounding so much smarter. I, in particular use filler words and ‘like’ way too often. When I’m forced to avoid them, I have to think about what I’m going to say before I start talking. I suggest playing this game during political discussions with the following additional rule:

• If anyone uses the words “liberal” or “conservative” they are punished.

I think this would also result in more thinking before talking and I have never been in a political discussions that suffered from too much thinking and not enough talking. Don’t ambiguate, disambiguate.