Euphemisms Quotes

Euphemisms are for the differently brained. ~ Spider Robinson

I like the term "decedent." It's as though the man weren't dead, but merely involved in some sort of protracted legal dispute. For evident reasons, mortuary science is awash with euphemisms. "Don't say stiff, corpse, cadaver," scolds The Principles and Practice of Embalming. "Say decedent, remains or Mr. Blank. Don't say 'keep.' Say 'maintain preservation.' ... "Wrinkles are "acquired facial markings." Decomposed brain that filters down through a damaged skull and bubbles out the nose is "frothy purge. ~ Mary Roach

Euphemisms, like fashions, have their day and pass, perhaps to return at another time. Like the guests at a masquerade ball, they enjoy social approval only so long as they retain the capacity for deception. ~ Freda Adler

And who came up with the animals for these euphemisms, anyway? Why bat shit? Why not cow shit or grasshopper shit? And why don't we give a rat's ass as opposed to a hamster's ass? ~ Darynda Jones

But as much as this is a soldier's reason d'etre, it is not often that you hear a soldier explicitly talk about 'killing'. The k-word as a verb is instead often disguised and supplanted by any number of other euphemisms. In precise and technical military parlance, reflecting the ever more precise and technically removed means of killing, the 'enemy' becomes the 'target'. But for the soldiers who personally 'engage' these 'targets', these objects are colloquially 'slotted', 'dropped', 'hit', 'fragged', 'sawn in half', 'smashed' or just plain 'shot'.
Then the soldier will have achieved the noun of a 'kill'.
The author's supposition is that such words are used by the soldier in combat as an attempt to mentally dissociate himself from the reality of his actions, so he can continue to operate as a soldier - and perhaps, when all is finally said and done, as a human being back home. ~ Jake Wood

How easy is murder when one calls it by a different name? How much easier is it for the conscience to condone "reaping" than "killing" - and when one knows that death isn't the end, does it stop the killing hand for fear of retribution, or does it simply make it easier to kill, because, if life continues, how can murder be murder at all? ~ Neal Shusterman

The truth is that any form of authoritarian control - any type of "government," whether constitutional, democratic, socialist, fascist, or anything else - will result in a set of masters forcibly oppressing a group of slaves. That is what "authority" is - all it ever has been, and all it ever could be, no matter how many layers of euphemisms and pleasant rhetoric are used in an attempt to hide it. ~ Larken Rose

For one thing, before the 20th century, there were plenty of genocides. We tend to forget about them, partly because they weren't as well documented and partly because, until recently, people didn't care. We used euphemisms like 'sackings' and 'sieges' instead of calling them 'genocides.' ~ Steven Pinker

That reminds me of a song," said Emilia. The women laughed; the men groaned. But the fire was blazing and the night was long, and folk will want entertainment after the tedium of a day's work. Emilia's song detailed the amorous adventures of a water horse who fell in love - if love was the right word - with a series of young women who passed beside the lake in which the creature dwelled and from which he emerged in the form of a good-looking young man of exactly the right sort to catch a young woman's fancy. She had a clear voice and a pleasing timbre, and every local knew the chorus, whose euphemisms about mounting and galloping embarrassed me. We did not sing these sorts of songs in the Barahal house. Rory caught right on and sang the chorus as if born to it. In the laughter and pounding of tables that followed, I said, to no one in particular, "I thought kelpies drowned and then devoured their victims!" The words, innocently spoken, only caused the gathered folk to laugh even ~ Kate Elliott

The Scottish vernacular is rich in colourful euphemisms for inebriation: 'stocious', 'stotting', 'guttered', 'steaming', 'steamboats', 'wellied' and 'hoolit' are just a few. Another is 'mortal', as in 'I was fair mortal last night' (meaning 'I was very drunk indeed'). So 'Mortal Causes' evoked, in my mind, the demon drink, just as surely as it did any darker and more violent imagery. ~ Ian Rankin

Today, when death and old age are increasingly concealed behind euphemisms and comforting baby talk, and life is threatened with being smothered in the mass consumption of hypnotic mechanized vulgarity, the need to confront man with the reality of his situation is greater than ever. For the dignity of man lies in his ability to face reality in all its senselessness; to accept it freely, without fear, without illusions - and to laugh at it. ~ Martin Esslin

We can dismiss any notion that the Nazi regime murdered Jews in order to gratify German public opinion. It took elaborate precautions to hide these actions from the German people and from foreign observers. In official documents the responsible authorities referred to the killings with euphemisms like Sonderbehandlung ("special handling"), and undertook major operations to eliminate all traces of them, at a time when men and materiel could hardly be spared from the fighting. At the same time, there was no particular effort to keep the secret from German troops on the eastern front, many of whom were regularly assigned to participate. Some soldiers and officials photographed the mass executions and sent pictures home to their families and girlfriends.57 Many thousands of soldiers, civil administrators, and technicians stationed in the eastern occupied territories were eyewitnesses to mass killings. Many more thousands heard about them from participants. The knowledge inside Germany that dreadful things were being done to Jews in the east was "fairly widespread." As long as disorderly destruction such as the shop-front smashings, beatings, and murders of Kristallnacht did not take place under their windows, most of them let distance, indifference, fear of denunciation, and their own sufferings under Allied bombing stifle any objections.

In the end, radicalized Nazism lost even its nationalist moorings. As he prepared to commit suicide in his Berlin bunker in April 19 ~ Robert O. Paxton

Progressives' don't just redefine (and valorize) deviancy; they insist on renaming it, too. ~ Kathy Shaidle

Our manic accumulation of wealth,' Kuru Qan went on. 'Our headlong progress, as if motion was purpose and purpose inherently virtuous. Our lack of compassion, which we called being realistic. The extremity of our judgements, our self-righteousness - all a flight from death, Brys. All a vast denial smothered in semantics and euphemisms. Bravery and sacrifice, pathos and failure, as if life is a contest to be won or lost. As if death is the arbiter of meaning, the moment of final judgement, and above all else judgement is a thing to be delivered, not delivered unto. ~ Steven Erikson

In the older folklore, faeries were frightening beings. In fact, it was such a bad idea to get their attention that people would use flattering euphemisms for them, such as 'the people of peace,' 'the little people,' and 'the good neighbors.' ~ Holly Black

While the framers of the United States Constitution were ashamed of slavery and used euphemisms in place of the term "slave", the authors of the Confederate Constitution proudly used the term no less than ten times. ~ C.L. Gammon

Over the past few decades we have developed euphemisms to help us forget how we, as a nation, have segregated African American citizens. We have become embarrassed about saying "ghetto", a word that accurately describes a neighborhood where government has not only concentrated a minority but established barriers to its exit. We don't hesitate to acknowledge that Jews in eastern Europe were forced to live in ghettos where opportunity was limited and leaving was difficult or impossible. Yet when we encounter similar neighborhoods in this country, we now delicately refer to them as "the inner city", yet everyone knows what we mean. When affluent whites gentrify the same geographic areas, we don't characterize those whites as "inner city families". Before we became ashamed to admit that the country had circumscribed African Americans in ghettos, analysts of race relations, both African American and white, consistently and accurately used "ghetto" to describe low-income African American neighborhoods created by public policy, with a shortage of opportunity, and with barriers to exit. ~ Richard Rothstein

Let us, just for a moment, look at the implications of that 'distress'. Severe depression affects more than 120 million people worldwide and more than 5 million in the UK. By 2020, according to the World Health Organisation, it will be one of the world's most debilitating conditions, second only to heart disease. Is that distress? Or is it a major illness? The danger in polite euphemisms is that they drive the condition underground. I constantly see people struggling with severe depression, clamping down on the pain so as not to bother anyone. I know how they minimise both themselves and the severity of their struggle. Mute, pale shadows, they are gagged by polite euphemisms and by misunderstanding. ~ Sally Brampton

The middles cleave to euphemisms not just because they're an aid in avoiding facts. They like them also because they assist their social yearnings towards pomposity. This is possible because most euphemisms permit the speaker to multiply syllables, and the middle class confuses sheer numerousness with weight and value. ~ Paul Fussell

Some kids get called 'bundles of joy' or 'slices of heaven' or 'dreams come true.' We got 'the fifty-fourth generation of DNA experiments.' Doesn't have the same warm and fuzzy feel. But maybe I'm oversensitive. ~ James Patterson

What are my options?" she asked as I climbed into the driver's seat. "Meaningless euphemisms at one end and your full-on Unseen University at the other," I said. "The Unseen University is a bit like Hogwart's - " Stephanopoulos cut me off. "I have read some Terry Pratchett," she said. ~ Ben Aaronovitch

The alternative which I favor is to renounce all euphemisms and grasp the nettle of the word atheism itself, precisely because it is a taboo word carrying frissons of hysterical phobia. Critical mass may be harder to achieve than with some non-confrontational euphemism, but if we did achieve it with the dread word atheist, the political impact would be all the greater. ~ Richard Dawkins

I always call that the year it rained in my life. That was one of Maud's euphemisms. There were rainy years, fertile years and sunshine years. The rainy ones were when your life cycles brought losses of some sorts. Fertile years were years of learning and growing and reaching out. Sunshine years were few and far between, but when they came, she told me to soak myself with their happy radiance. They were reward years to her, and they made up for all the suffering, pain and growth we'd persevered through. ~ Lindsay McKenna

Every culture has blasphemy laws. They are not always called that, but no society allows citizens to rail against the reigning deity. In our pluralistic times, these blasphemy laws are called "hate crimes" legislation, among other euphemisms, but they are really religious protections to keep the reigning god, demos, from being blasphemed. ~ Douglas Wilson

I ask you, why is it so hard to stay away from the euphemisms? They creep in, always, and attempt to make the difficult things more pleasing. ~ Kate DiCamillo

Victorian rigidities were such that ladies were not even allowed to blow out candles in mixed company, as that required them to pucker their lips suggestively. They could not say that they were going "to bed"
that planted too stimulating an image
but merely that they were "retiring." It became effectively impossible to discuss clothing in even a clinical sense without resort to euphemisms. Trousers became "nether integuments" or simply "inexpressibles" and underwear was "linen." Women could refer among themselves to petticoats or, in hushed tones, stockings, but could mention almost nothing else that brushed bare flesh. ~ Bill Bryson

Parental efforts to gain leverage generally take two forms: bribery or coercion. If a simple direction such as "I'd like you to set the table" doesn't do, we may add an incentive, for example, "If you set the table for me, I'll let you have your favorite dessert." Or if it isn't enough to remind the child that it is time to do homework, we may threaten to withdraw some privilege. Or we may add a coercive tone to our voice or assume a more authoritarian demeanor. The search for leverage is never-ending: sanctions, rewards, abrogation of privileges; the forbidding of computer time, toys, or allowance; separation from the parent or separation from friends; the limitation or abolition of television time, car privileges, and so on and so on.

It is not uncommon to hear someone complain about having run out of ideas for what still might remain to be taken away from the child. As our power to parent decreases, our preoccupation with leverage increases. Euphemisms abound: bribes are called variously rewards, incentives, and positive reinforcement; threats and punishments are rechristened warnings, natural consequences, and negative reinforcements; applying psychological force is often referred to as modifying behavior or teaching a lesson. These euphemisms camouflage attempts to motivate the child by external pressure because his intrinsic motivation is deemed inadequate.

Attachment is natural and arises from within; leverage is contrived and imposed from witho ~ Gabor Mate

Euphemisms are unpleasant truths wearing diplomatic cologne. ~ Quentin Crisp

A lot of nonsense is spoken at funerals, especially when the deceased had not been well liked in life. Many euphemisms are called into play: "vital," "energetic," and (repetitively) "full of life. ~ G.M. Malliet

Do not put statements in the negative form.
And don't start sentences with a conjunction.
If you reread your work, you will find on rereading that a
great deal of repetition can be avoided by rereading and editing.
Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.
Unqualified superlatives are the worst of all.
De-accession euphemisms.
If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a linking verb is.
Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky.
Last, but not least, avoid cliches like the plague. ~ William Safire

I don't think I'm alarmist. I'm more disappointed by the euphemisms in some instances than outright bigotry. Now, to me, you walk around with a Klan hat on or you've got a swastika on you arm, you just look like a dope, you know what I mean? ~ John Ridley

Words like lucky and advantages we knew, even at our young age, were upscale euphemisms for not poor, not the son of a drunk and, later, not the son of a suicidal mother. ~ Hannah Pittard

I was not a fan of euphemisms. If you couldn't say it, you shouldn't touch it, and definitely not fuck it or lick it. A cock was a cock, maybe a dick; an ass was an ass, possibly a hole. No shafts, no members, thank you very much. Some words had the power to put me off. Like rod. Or bud. That was just eww. ~ Roe Horvat

It is time to stop the mealy-mouthed euphemisms: 'Nationalists', 'Loyalists', 'Communities', 'Ethnic Groups', 'Cultures', 'Civilizations'. Religions is the word you need. Religions is the word you are struggling hypocritially to avoid. ~ Richard Dawkins

Every individual needs revolution, inner division, overthrow of the existing order, and renewal, but not by forcing them upon his neighbors under the hypocritical cloak of Christian love or the sense of social responsibility or any of the other beautiful euphemisms for unconscious urges to personal power. ~ C. G. Jung

In 1487 alone, two hundred heretics had-in one of the greatest euphemisms in the history of language-"relaxed," that is, burned at the stake.
Dogs of God, Columbus, the Inquisition, and the Defeat of the Moors ~ James Reston, Jr.

The very use of the term "mental illness" (rather than, say, "neurosis", "insanity", "nervous breakdown", or other euphemisms) can be seen as an effort to move certain kinds of psychological distress into the biomedical realm. ~ Carl Elliott

I love the unanswered question, the unresolved story, the unclimbed mountain, the tender shard of an incomplete dream. Most of the time. But is it mandatory for a writer to be ambiguous about everything? Isn't it true that there have been fearful episodes in human history when prudence and discretion would have just been euphemisms for pusillanimity? When caution was actually cowardice? When sophistication was disguised decadence? When circumspection was really a kind of espousal? Isn't it true, or at least theoretically possible, that there are times in the life of a people or a nation when the political climate demands that we - even the most sophisticated of us - overtly take sides? I think such times are upon us. ~ Arundhati Roy

The National Rate of Unemployment is one of the most vicious euphemisms ever coined. ~ William Vickery, Canadian Nobel Laureate, The Cult Of Impotence, By Linda McQuaig

Users of clichés frequently have more sinister intentions beyond laziness and conventional thinking. Relabelling events often entails subtle changes of meaning. War produces many euphemisms, downplaying or giving verbal respectability to savagery and slaughter. ~ Patrick Cockburn

'Senior Citizen' and 'Silver Surfer' are the new euphemisms. Unless you're a female presenter on TV, in which case you're ready for the knacker's yard at 35. ~ Terry Wogan

Nature tells the truth as it is; it has no euphemism ~ Bangambiki Habyarimana

I'm tired of being told it's elitist to call stupid behavior stupid. Remember when you were just a tot and thought it might be a good idea to stick your wee-wee in the electrical socket? Hopefully, you hade a mom who kicked you in the behind and called you stupid. There are times when mincing words and pleasant euphemisms simply don't cut it. Sometimes, you need to call stupid by its given name. ~ Quentin R. Bufogle

In the weeks prior to the war to liberate Afghanistan, a good friend of mine would ask me almost every day, "Why aren't we killing people yet?" And I never had a good answer for him. Because one of the most important and vital things the United States could do after 9/11 was to kill people. Call it a "forceful response," "decisive action" ' whatever. Those are all nice euphemisms for killing people. And the world is a better place because America saw the necessity of putting steel beneath the velvet of those euphemisms. ~ Jonah Goldberg

Be that as it may, we do need you in particular to complete this assignment. (Syd)
What is it with you government assholes that you just can't say anything in plain English? You always have to beat around the bush and use euphemisms or fucked-up acronyms for everything. (Steele)
Fine. We need you to kill an assassin before he executes his target. Either you eat the bear, or the bear eats you, Mr. Steele. Or, to humor you, in plain English- you find and kill the assassin, or we kill you. End of story. (Syd) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

The medical literature on the causes of food poisoning is full of euphemisms and dry scientific terms: coliform levels, aerobic plate counts, sorbitol, MacConkey agar, and so on. Behind them lies a simple explanation for why eating a hamburger can now make you seriously ill: There is shit in the meat. ~ Eric Schlosser

All euphemisms are dishonest, but many are designed to make life easier ~ Kate Burridge

The company calls it 'downsizing' or 'rightsizing.' My own informal "Name the Layoff" contest produced some other euphemisms: Retroactive Hiring Freeze, Resume Revision Days, Amway Opportunity Time, and Corporation Lite. ~ Dale Dauten

When you sit down to write a book about sex, as we hope you one day will, you will discover that centuries of censorship have left us with very little adequate language with which to discuss the joys and occasional worries of sex. The language that we do have often carries implicit judgments: If the only polite way to talk about sexuality is in medical Latin - vulvas and pudendas, penes and testes - are only doctors allowed to talk about sex? Is sex all about disease? Meanwhile, most of the originally English words - cock and cunt, fucking, and, oh yes, slut - have been used as insults to degrade people and their sexuality and often have a hostile or coarse feel to them. Euphemisms - peepees and pussies, jade gates and mighty towers - sound as if we are embarrassed. Maybe we are. ~ Dossie Easton

Though intelligence is powerless to modify character, it is a dab hand at finding euphemisms for its weaknesses. ~ Quentin Crisp

The paradox of identity liberalism is that it paralyzes the capacity to think and act in a way that would actually accomplish the things it professes to want. It is mesmerized by symbols: achieving superficial diversity in organizations, retelling history to focus on marginal and often minuscule groups, concocting inoffensive euphemisms to describe social reality, protecting young ears and eyes already accustomed to slasher films from any disturbing encounter with alternative viewpoints. Identity liberalism has ceased being a political project and has morphed into an evangelical one. The difference is this: evangelism is about speaking truth to power. Politics is about seizing power to defend the truth…

If liberals hope ever to recapture America's imagination and become a dominant force across the country, it will not be enough to beat the Republicans at flattering the vanity of the mythical Joe Sixpack. They must offer a vision of our common destiny based on one thing that all Americans, of every background, actually share. And that is citizenship. We must relearn how to speak to citizens as citizens and to frame our appeals - including ones to benefit particular groups - in terms of principles that everyone can affirm. Ours must become a civic liberalism. ~ Mark Lilla

Well, I'm not sure the New York Times was consciously trying to trivialise me, but the effect of it is to put everything in the same category as the gossip you read in the magazines you pick up at supermarket counters. I was asked, for example, why I thought there were so many euphemisms for genitalia. It's not a serious question. Whatever the purpose of such a tone is, the effect is to make it appear that anyone who departs from orthodox political doctrine is in some ways laughable. ~ Noam Chomsky

A nationwide study published by the USDA in 1996 found that [ ... ] 78.6 percent of the ground beef contained microbes that are spread primarily by fecal matter. The medical literature on the causes of food poisoning is full of euphemisms and dry scientific terms: coliform levels, aerobic plate counts, sorbitol, MacConkey agar, and so on. Behind them lies a simple explanation for why eating hamburger meat makes you sick: There is shit in the meat. ~ Eric Schlosser

As her brother turned to walk away, she asked with mild exasperation, "Where are you going? Leo, you can't leave when there's so much to be done."
He stopped and glanced back at her with a raised brow. "You've been pouring unsweetened tea down my throat for days. If you have no objection, I'd like to go out for a piss."
She narrowed her eyes. "I can think of at least a dozen polite euphemisms you could have used."
Leo continued on his way. "I don't use euphemisms."
"Or politeness," she said, making him chuckle. ~ Lisa Kleypas

I was jarred - a little spooked as well - at so blatant a reference to something referred to, by mutual agreement, almost exclusively with codes, catchwords, a hundred different euphemisms.
"It was the most important night of my life," he said calmly. "It enabled me to do what I've always wanted most."
"Which is?"
"To live without thinking. ~ Donna Tartt