• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 770 0

of the strange utterances of Stephen Colbert. If you think this, you’re right. This doesn’t mean that we need the wordinistas at Webster’s, however, because the literal meaning of words does not have to come from them. If you recall, with all of the single-word examples that we have worked through, we have figured out the literal meanings without a dictionary. Many philosophers argue that we come to know the literal meanings of all words and sentences in a similar way. We hear new words or sentences used (preferably more than once) and we reason to the meaning based on the context or contexts in which they appear.79

So what now? Even though you now know there is no need for the wordinistas at Webster’s, this should not end your contemplation of the subject, as there are several issues to consider which stem from this conclusion. First, the discussion of Colbert’s “new words” should affect how we respond to those people we run into every day who we might call grammar Nazis, and who Colbert would call wordinistas. If “truthiness” and “freem” are legitimate words with legitimate meanings, is it right to tell others that there is no such phrase as “for all intensive purposes”?

Another thing to think about is whether or not you’re a responsible speaker. If you’re not following Grice’s Maxims, the answer is “no,” and you now know why people have trouble understanding you at times.80

SECOND SEGMENT

The ThreatDown: Truthiness

6

Truth, Truthiness, and Bullshit for the American Voter

MATTHEW F. PIERLOTT

Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.

—John Adams

Let’s face it. John Adams is a sissy, and this kind of defeatist attitude weakens America.

—Some guy in the room after Adams had left

On October 17th, 2005, the world was exposed to the first segment of “The WØRD” on The Colbert Report, and “truthiness” has been with us ever since. Undoubtedly, Colbert had the kind of bullshit we see daily in political discourse as his target when he coined this term (the word’s pre-existence is irrelevant here, since it was not in common usage, and Colbert’s usage has completely eclipsed the former meaning). But perhaps Colbert has confused a few different ideas, thinking bullshit and truthiness amount to much the same thing. I don’t think they are the same. Furthermore, truthiness may not be as bad as it sounds.

As a satirist, Colbert’s mocking of truthiness has a double edge. On the one hand, his comedy invites us to laugh at those who seem to fit the category he is parodying. If I ever hear someone say, “I don’t need to check the references; I can tell you have a good heart,” I will be reminded of how Colbert mocked Bush’s nomination of Harriet Miers for Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court in that first episode: “We are divided between those who think with their head and those who know with their heart.”81 But this association is the result of an appeal to ridicule; by mocking some person or idea, I am invited to dismiss that person or idea without critical reflection. On the other hand, satire is not merely a mode of ridicule in that it presupposes a level of critical thought. There’s a big difference between the schoolyard bully who says “Shut up … you’re ugly and stupid,” and the sophisticated exposure of contradiction or absurdity achieved through satire. So satire may, in fact, invite us to reflect on the issues, and not merely take the satirist’s side.

So why does Colbert expose truthiness as a dangerous concept? Out of character, he has said:

We’re not talking about truth, we’re talking about something that seems like truth—the truth we want to exist.82

Truthiness is tearing apart our country… . It used to be, everyone was entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts. But that’s not the case anymore. Facts matter not at all. Perception is everything… . Truthiness is “What I say is right, and [nothing] anyone else says could possibly be true.